"Givaneh!"

It's the month of Muharram in Iran and black-clad male Shia adherents are parading in the streets in preparation for the day of Ashura, which is the day on which the Shia saint Husayn was slain by troops of the Sunni Caliphate at the Battle of Karbala 1,329 years ago.

The anniversary is treated as a period of mourning; for weeks in advance, on bus journeys, we've been hearing monotone chants for hours on end grieving the loss of Imam Husayn. The event is covered on television as though Husayn was killed yesterday. Mullahs weep openly in television studios. Hours of programming are given over to the event.

A parade of several hundred men walked past our hotel in Shiraz yesterday. I went out onto the street to watch them. A lone drummer beat out a slow rhythm on a huge bass drum while the men chanted a monotone dirge. They each wielded a whip, made from several short lengths of chain attached to a wooden handle, ceremonially striking themselves over the shoulder and onto their backs in time to the drum. It was more a stroking, not a lashing. (It's no longer considered appropriate to break the skin.)

It was dark, but I stood on a raised grassy median strip in the middle of the busy road and tried to take some snaps in the available light. A man about my own age approached me. "Where are you from?" he asked. "Ireland," I replied. "Man Irlandiam."

"Givenah," he said scornfully. "They are foolish."