‘Sizdah Be-dar’ simply means “getting rid of the number 13.” In Iran, just as in many world cultures, the number 13 is feared as an ominous number. ‘Triskaidekaphobia’ is the scientific term for this fear. They believe that by going out for picnics in places like parks and the countryside on the 13th day of the ‘Nowruz’ celebrations, they are discarding all their bad luck and would start the rest of the year on a good note. The last activity of the day’s celebration is generally believed to perform that task. At the end of the picnics, observers take green plant shoots grown from the beginning of the ‘Nowruz’ celebrations and release them on flowing water bodies, usually rivers or streams.
