As we settled into our lockdown lives, I realised that, while fun, binge watching Netflix every day was not going to be a very healthy approach to lockdown. We had to be creative and bring some alternative new ways to have fun into our lives.

One of our greatest lockdown traditions was born on the first Friday of our lockdown; when we celebrated Nowruz (Iranian new year). Salma’s parents are Iranian, and she wanted to celebrate New Year with us. Nowruz is usually between the 19^th-21^st March (depending on when the sun crosses the equator), and is celebrated in Iran, Afghanistan and many other countries. Apparently, it dates back thousands of years when the Persian empire ruled a lot of land beyond modern-day Iran.

There are lots of traditions associated with it, the first one is apparently a good spring clean of the house- one which Salma conveniently forgot to mention 😊 (although this was the beginning of lockdown so our flat was much less lived in and much cleaner than it is now!)

The second tradition is preparing a table, like an altar, adorned with different things to bring you goodness. All the objects begin with the letter S (in Persian obviously) and symbolise something different. Objects include apples to bring health and beauty, garlic to cleanse the body and environment, a mirror for reflection and some coloured eggs for fertility. Sadly, we didn’t prepare a table, as we could’ve done with some health and cleansing at this point, but Salma’s mum did one so we piggy-backed on hers.

In Iran there are many other celebrations that happen during this period. Salma remembers how in the lead up to Nowruz there would be a symbolic burning of everything negative from the previous year and as part of this people would jump over bonfires and chant “Give me your red colour, take my yellow colour, ” with yellow symbolising sickness and red health and warmth. And I thought Serbian traditions were weird(?!!). Needless to say, we didn’t want to get in trouble with Fulham Council at a time like this, so we didn’t follow through with this either, although the timing seemed eerily appropriate.

What we did do however, is have a nice Iranian meal and a boogie. It was a special event, so we tidied the living room, put some nice fairy lights on, put away our mobile phones, played some Iranian music in the background and popped the prosecco.

We all got dressed up; Salma and I put on dresses and heels and did our hair and make-up, and Miguel took off his pyjamas for the first time since lockdown began and even put a nice shirt on. It was obviously a bit weird to get so dressed up, put on your heels, apply your lipstick and then walk 4 metres into the living room and sit back down again, but it was well worth it.

Salma had prepared an amazing meal; a vegan khoresht gheymeh, a lentil stew that her granny used to make. The stew is served with rice and then topped off with home-made crispy chips on top. I’m not doing it justice, but it’s made with saffron and other typical Iranian spices and is much more sophisticated and exotic than my description. Salma did an amazing job of it too.

Salma’s rice was apparently not crispy enough by Iranian standards (Miguel and I still thought it was delicious), and while we praised her food she share with us how a typical Iranian woman would spend the rest of the meal verbally chastising herself for messing up the rice. Sound familiar Serbian ladies?

For us though, it was all delicious. We also made sure to have a plentiful supply of prosecco and wine (we had stockpiled pleeeenty of that in advance- we actually even had an alcohol-only shop). This coupled with the great company, meant we had a lovely evening, and at one point we were drinking and chatting and laughing so much that I realised that it was the first moment of the whole week that I had forgotten about corona completely. It was very refreshing.

The drinking and the good atmosphere eventually led us to the dance floor (also the living room). The night started off with some sexy Iranian dancing. This involved Salma doing sexy Iranian dancing, me just doing sexy dancing and Miguel doing something that doesn’t quite fit into the category of sexy or dancing, but he was moving his body to the music and enjoying the moment.

This sexy dancing initially led to less sexy dancing and then ended in total debauchery of us throwing ourselves around the room to some Bhangra-style Indian music which I’m pretty sure wasn’t linked to Iran in any way at all. Still, we were having fun, that was the main objective.

We decided that no matter how long lockdown lasts, every Friday we would have a ‘night out-in’, that would involve the Triple Ds- dinner, dancing, drinking. We obviously have a flat joke though that if Maja is really good she gets an extra D that evening….to do the dishes of course….

We’ve kept up our Triple Ds over the whole lockdown so far, although it has evolved over time. Every week we alternate who is cooking – Salma, then Maja, then Miguel. I have to say, you may have your doubts, but Miguel’s cooking has been amazing.

Just a bit of background here – Miguel generally considers himself a bit of an ‘alternative chef’. I have tried to explain to him on multiple occasions that you can’t mix everything you want in a dish. For example, you can’t add parsley and coriander and basil into a carbonara. He always dismisses me and says I’m not ‘experimental’ enough with my cooking. This has just led to me doing 90% of the cooking.

But after 4 years I have finally seen that he is able to cook a meal to an actual recipe. And although his go-to during the week is still pizza 9 times out of 10, this piece of information will come in very useful in the future.

this was our “totally tropical” themed week

Another new development we had a couple of weeks in was that we introduced cocktails to the evenings. While one person cooks, the other makes cocktails. Now, as you may know, my margaritas are one of the best in town, so those were the first to debut, but as the weeks went on, we got more creative.

We even bring out the special cocktail glasses. Salma and I (as the sophisticated ladies that we are), have all the nice glasses for martinis, margaritas, prosecco, cosmopolitans, etc. These are wasted on Miguel however, who refuses to drink from a glass which is a) “girly” b) “easily breakable” and most importantly c) has a “limited capacity that I could drink in one gulp”. He prefers his cocktails far less sophisticated (quantity over quality) so he has found one of Salma’s old Tupperware containers which fits 500ml and he makes his cocktails in that.

Overall, the Triple Ds have been a great success, and are one of the things that I will miss the most about lockdown. Even when I’m feeling sad, tired, indifferent, I still make the effort to dress up and it’s well worth it. For one evening a week at least, we have a night of normality and fun.