Sayri Guli Lola (The Tulip Stories), a new short documentary directed by Sharofat Arabova
and produced by the State Tojikfilm Institution, has been completed this July. The film traces
the echoes of the ancient festival of Tajik people named Sayri Guli Surkh or Sayli Lola, the
festival of a red tulip. It was celebrated widely in Bukhara, Khujand, Isfara, Asht,
Kanibadam, Mazar-e-Sharif, and other cities. Sadriddin Aini, the classic Tajik writer,
dedicated a poem about the public gathering in celebration of the red flower, that traditionally
took place around the Sufi Bahaouddin Naqshbandi’s Mazar, in his memoirs of the 19th
century Bukhara.