This page contains the video, transcription, English translation and notes.
President Obama Speaks Persian
VIDEO

Nawruz greeting message by President Barack Obama

 1 `ayd-e shomā mobārak عیدِ شما مبارک
holiday-of you happy = Happy New Year
     
  `ayd :: festival; festival of Nawruz, Persian New Year's Day عید
  `ayd-e :: festival of عیدِ
  -e :: of, unstressed, written after a consonant just like the short vowel 'e' but functioning as marker of the ezāfe. English speakers have a tendency to pronounce this suffix heavily stressed and as a separate word as you see President Obama has done. (Compounding the problem is the unhelpful transliteration of the ezāfe as -eh, an unfortunate new trend.) See below for some easy, medium and hard tests & lists (with audio) of  pairs of words with stressed and unstressed -e(h) so you can train your ear and not fall into this trap! ِ
  shomā :: you (plural, polite) شما
  mobārak :: blessed, auspicious (Barack as in Barack Obama appears to be related to the same root, Arabic b-r-k having to do with "blessing" and is usually spelled باراک on Persian websites and باراك on Arabic websites, however only as a transliteration from English as this form is not used in either Arabic or Persian. In Persian, stress of mobārak  is on the last syllable, -ak. The president has pronounced it in the Arabic style with stress on the -bā-. مبارک
     
  Here are some Persian words ending in -e. On one hand, some end in stressed -e where the -e is part of the word (came down to New Persian from Middle Persian that way while others maybe had an Arabic diminutive or feminine Tah Marbuta added). On the other hand, others end in unstressed -e where that -e is a suffix (meaning "is" or "the" in spoken Persian or as the ezāfe usually translated as "of" for convenience.

Easy Test  ::  Easy List

Medium Test  ::  Medium List

Hard Test  ::  Hard List

(Firefox on Windows and Safari on Mac may have trouble getting the audio on the above lists.)

See the entire video with Persian subtitles. Also See text transcription.