THE PERSON BEHIND THE LESSONS
About El
Native Persian speaker. Milan-based. Teaching the Persian that textbooks forgot.
Tehran doesn’t come with subtitles.
I moved to Italy for my Bachelor’s in Political Science and International Relations at the University of Messina, and I’m continuing my studies at Bocconi in Milan starting September 2026. Along the way I picked up five languages — English, Italian, Turkish, plus my two native ones, Farsi and Azerbaijani. Here’s the thing that surprises my students: Persian is actually my third language. I learned how to learn languages from absolute zero. I know exactly what it feels like to go blank, to forget words, to feel exhausted by boring apps and dusty textbooks. I know the struggle, and I know how to hack it. Somewhere along the way, I realized something: every Persian course I’d ever seen was teaching a language that doesn’t exist anymore.
The Farsi in textbooks is the Farsi of formal government letters and 1970s diplomacy. It’s not the Farsi spoken in the cafes of Tehran, in protest chants, in family arguments, in the jokes that make Iranians laugh until they cry.
So I started teaching the real thing. Not just language, but the culture, politics, history, and unwritten social rules that give every word its actual meaning. My PolSci background means I don’t just teach you what Iranians say. I teach you why they say it.
Whether you’re a journalist decoding political rhetoric, a heritage speaker reconnecting with your roots, or someone who fell in love with an Iranian and needs to survive the family dinner. I teach the Persian that actually matters.
Why I Teach Differently
Most Persian courses separate language from context. They teach you grammar rules and vocabulary lists in isolation, as if language exists in a vacuum.
I do the opposite. Every lesson is built around real-world content: a news article about Iran’s economy, a clip from a banned Iranian film, a social media post that went viral in Tehran. You learn the language by engaging with the world it comes from.
My Political Science background means I can explain why Iranian political rhetoric uses specific phrases, why tarof isn’t just politeness but a complex social negotiation, and why the same word means completely different things depending on whether you’re in a boardroom or a bazaar.
This is context-first language teaching. And it’s the only way to achieve real fluency.
Every student gets their own slide deck.
No “open the textbook to page 47.” I build a custom slide deck for each student between sessions, calibrated to your level, your interests, and the specific things you want to do in Persian. I keep a track record sheet for every learner, so I know exactly which gaps we’re closing and what to drill next.
If you mention your dog’s name once, your dog ends up in the example sentences. If you tell me you want to argue politics with your in-laws, that’s what we practice. The lessons are yours, not a curriculum I recycle.
Honest about messy Persian.
My Preply anonymous “clarity” score is 4.7, not 5.0. It’s lower by design. Real spoken Persian is messy — half-finished sentences, regional accents, register switching mid-thought, slang that didn’t exist last year. I don’t drill clean grammar in a vacuum and pretend that’s the language. I expose you to the chaos of how Persian actually works.
Clean lessons produce confident-sounding students who freeze in real Tehran. Messy lessons produce students who survive Tehran. I pick the second one every time.
What students actually say
From 32 verified five-star reviews on Preply.
I went from knowing what ‘hello’ and ‘good’ are to communicating full thoughts to my Persian family. Elyar uses many techniques like mnemonic devices and personalized lessons to make sure I can remember new vocabulary consistently.
He builds custom PowerPoints tailored specifically to me, even working in my dog as a recurring example. It makes the lessons feel genuinely personal. You can tell he actually cares whether you succeed, not just whether you show up.
My partner and I have been learning together as a couple. He plans lessons with both of us in mind. One of us grew up around Farsi, the other came in clueless, and he bridges the gap masterfully.
Ready to Start?
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