Ach! or should that be !به! به I have my Farsi exam tomorrow - and I'm actually looking forward to it. Not because I have been permanently ensconsed in the library for the past 2-3 weeks, learning all there is to know about the ezafe, direct object marker or irregular verbs - I haven't, and I'm not that nerdy, despite the appearance presented by ( Read more... )

I've been on an Afghan movie tip lately: Osama last night, and Kandahar the night before. On account of my relative poverty lately my theatre-going has been diminished of late, and so taking advantage of the excellent DVD library at SOAS has become a not unacceptable substitute ( Read more... )

Harrumph! after a good start to the day - long-awaited parcels from Austin, TX and Dorset, England finally arrived; the former contained all sorts of delights, not least a beautiful scarf, whilst the latter parcel was of a highly intoxicating (legal!) nature and may have to be sampled in parts - I thought I'd toddle into to town to the British ( Read more... )

A couple of Christmas presents from my beloved have reignited a couple of my enthusiasms for the New Year. First, The Hundred Thousand Fools of God: Musical Travels in Central Asia (and Queens, New York), which also came with an accompanying CD; secondly, In a Persian Kitchen, which should clear up for me the mysteries of perfect pilav ( Read more... )