Damascus by Night

 

Damascus by Night, Damascus, Syria ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Odd One Out

 

Odd One Out, Damascus, Syria ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Sisters and Goddesses

William Dalrymple unearths an incredible hybridisation of Hindu and Christian beliefs in the villages of South India where among other things (and much to the vexation of the local priest) the Virgin Mary is believed to be the sister of the Goddess Bhagavati. Dalrymple also touches on the idea that the disciple Thomas brought Christianity to India, but is less convinced than Dr Beckford was earlier this year.

Bhagavati is the pre-eminent goddess in Kerala, the most powerful and beloved. In some incarnations, it was true, she could be ferocious: a figure of terror, a stalker of cremation grounds who slaughtered demons without hesitation or compassion. Some of her titles reflected this capacity: She Who Is Wrathful, She Who Has Flaming Tusks, She Who Causes Madness. But, in other moods, Bhagavati could be supremely benign and generous - the caring, loving, fecund mother - and this was how her followers usually liked to think of her. For many, she was the deity of the land itself: the spirit of the mountains, and the life force in the soil. In this form, Bhagavati is regarded as a chaste virgin and a caring mother, qualities she shares with her sister, whose enclosure lies a short distance down the road.

"Yes, yes, the Virgin Mary is Bhagavati's younger sister," explained Vasudeva, the head priest, matter of factly, as if stating the obvious.

"But, for sisters, don't they look rather different from each other?" I asked. A calendar image of the goddess, pinned up behind him, showed Bhagavati as a wizened hag wreathed in skulls and crowned with an umbrella of cobra hoods. In her hand she wielded a giant sickle.

"Sisters are often a little different from each other," he replied. "Mary is another form of the Devi. They have equal power." He paused: "At our annual festival the priests take the goddess around the village on top of an elephant to receive sacrifices from the people. She visits all the places, and one stop is the church. There she sees her sister."

Milky Mughal

Last weekend I was regaled with an apt anecdote about the blindness to reality that can arise from an inflated sense of self-importance and the individual onus of social responsibility. The two protagonists in the tale were the Mughal emperor Akbar and his Grand Vizier, the Rajput, Birbal.

One day, at the peak of Akbar's majesty and grandeur he commented to Birbal on how much his subjects loved him. Birbal expressed respectful doubt on his master's supposition but Akbar's view was unswayed. Akbar eventually decided to settle the mock debate by confirming his impression of the people's adoration for him.

"I shall demonstrate the people's love for me to you Birbal!" exclaimed the emperor. "The people will answer the emperor's call. The emperor would like some...milk."

So an order was decreed that the head of every village in India was officially summoned to gift some milk from their livestock to the emperor. A huge tank was erected in front of Akbar's pavillion to act as a receptacle for the milk.

Soon, village chiefs began to arrive with buckets in hand and scaled the ladder to deposit their villages' contributions to the emperor's milk plea.

Once all the villages had paid their dues, Birbal turned to Akbar and said, "your majesty, the time has come to sample your citizen's generosity". Akbar turned the tap to the tank and nothing but water flowed forth.

Each of the village heads had assumed that if they were to substitute water for milk it would not be detectable amidst the copious milk others would offer. Unfortunately they all thought this way. Akbar was humbled, Birbal was vindicated.

Gandhi 'near a dustbin'

One of today's Pendennis pieces caught my eye:

A bad Indian takeaway

London's waxwork tourist attraction Madame Tussauds might have declined to include the Prime Minister, but it's more sensitive when it comes to Gandhi. On a recent visit, the President of India's National Council for Civic Liberties noted that Gandhi was on the second floor 'near a dustbin' rather than in the world leaders' gallery on the floor below and complained of 'insulting treatment'. When I called, a Tussauds spokesman insisted that Gandhi is now back downstairs. 'There was maintenance work going on and it was a temporary move but Gandhi could have been more sensitively repositioned,' he says. Meanwhile, a surprise new addition to Tussauds is to be announced, with sources hinting it could be David Cameron.

Milad in the Souq

 

al-Souq al-Hamdiyyah, Damascus, Syria ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Dimashq al-Qadeem

 

Dimashq al-Qadeem, Damascus, Syria ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

A Tate Coincidence

As part of the gruelling, evidence-based, intense training to make me into a(n even) better doctor, my tutorial group went to...the Tate Britain this afternoon!

For the cynical amongst you, it may not have been particularly gruelling or intense but the visit was evidence-based...sort of.

By strange coincidence whilst on the Victoria lie down to Pimlico, the book I've been reading, Iqbal Ahmed's Sorrows of the Moon, concluded with a passing reference to the Tate.

I visited the Tate Britain a few years after my arrival in Hampstead. When I saw the dreadful landscapes painted by John Constable, it reminded me of the middle-class women in Hampstead who raved about these paintings. I could not accept Forster's description of Hampstead as 'a thoughtful little suburb of London'. It had been painful for me to live in this neighbourhood. Its landscape, like the paintings of Constable, was very gloomy. It was an area where people apologized often but showed little kindness to others.

Heliotyping Cairo

Fortunately for us mere amateurs, Heliotype's photographic odyssey through Cairo continues here.

Persian Travelogue

I stumbled across a real gem recently: a semi-fictional travelogue compiled by 'Major P M Sykes CGM - His Brittanic Majesty's Consul-General and agent to the government of India in Khorasan - Royal Gold Medalist of the Royal Geographical Society - Author of 'Ten Thousand Miles in Persia'' at the turn of the 20th century.

This is a slightly fictionalized account of life in Persia (Iran) in the 19th century, capped off by a perilous pilgrimage to the Shiite holy city of Meshed (Mashhad), in the foothills of the mountains that run up to the Zoroastrian Olympus, Damavand. The book is a rare collaboration between a turn of the 20th century English and Persian author. The narrative method presages the classic Oscar Lewis ethnographies of poor Mexican families. In both cases, a straightforward account would have been dangerous because of the repressive nature of the society being studied. This is, on one level, an orientalist conceit of an Englishman writing the life story of a (semi-fictional) Persian from the point of view of a Persian. However, Sykes manages to pull off this literary feat convincingly, even for readers at this later date. He also uses the opportunity as a perfect Swiftian setup to gently satire European civilization, which adds an entire ironic layer to the read.

This long-out-of-print (and quite rare) book is a delightful read, particularly for connoisseurs of travelogues. The Shiite, Sufi, Islamic, and Persian lore and legends which are described here will be of great interest to folklorists. The photographs and other illustrations will be of use to graphic designers, anthropologists and historians. This is obviously a primary source on the architecture of the Mashhad pilgrimage site. Largely unknown to outsiders, this complex has some very spectacular (and gorgeous) structures. Most of all, this book is an eye-opener for westerners interested in the deep culture and history of Iran.

Read more here.

Shooting the Messenger

Just watched the most hard-hitting documentary I've seen in recent times courtesy of Aljazeera English's presence on Youtube.

The documentary looks at the incredible bravery of journalists on the ground in the world's hot-spots striving to bring images to our screens. It also explores the trend that it is becoming increasingly difficult and dangerous to report from frontlines as the press no longer enjoys the immunity it once did. Apparently the conflict in the Balkans marked a turning point with the active targeting of journalists. Reporting from Iraq, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka and Palestine are all explored.

More than 100 journalists and cameramen have died in action in the last 18 months!

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Old Damascus meets the New

 

Old meets New, Damascus, Syria ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Definitely indefinite

In Arabic, nouns are presumed to be indefinite until made otherwise (usually with the addition of the prefix 'al' 'ad-dukhool al-alif wa al-lam').

In Farsi, nouns are presumed to be definite until made otherwise (usually with the addition of the suffix -y).

Tube Piercings

Whilst riding the tube back home the other day I witnessed perhaps the most surreal of my underground journeys to date. Imagine a relatively packed Northern line train between Chalk Farm and Camden Town stations. To the left of me were sat two drunk middle-aged women (MAW) who, speaking in tandem, were trying to verbally restrain their even more inebriated friend sat opposite them. Directly in front of me was sat a rotund American man (AM) with a camera dangling from a lanyard around his neck. He was smiling inanely. To his left was a gentleman (GM) in a beige linen suit, holding a well-thumbed (bordering on brittle) paperback book in one hand, sharing the same hand with an arm of his spectacles which he twiddled endlessly. The seat to my right was free. The train stopped at Camden Town.

As soon as we were moving again I noticed that the dynamic inside the carriage had palpably changed. I looked up from my own book and noticed the most drunk of the women dropping her oversized aviator sunglasses to fix a gaze on my new next-door neighbour and subsequently point him out to her not-drunk-enough-to-not-be-embarassed colleagues. Everyone else was intently staring at the chap sat next to me (CSNTM). I glanced at him almost out of obligation and noticed he was sporting an incredible array of facial jewellery with almost every pore skewered by some form of metallic contraption. His mohican hairstyle and tartan clothing didn't help him blend in.

AM: (Looking at CSNTM.) Do you mind if I take of a photo of you sir?
CSNTM: (In an unexpectedly soft, almost inaudible voice) Erm...well...if you have to, but it's been a busy day...
AM: No, no. I don't have to. It's just that...you're worth taking a photo of.

(CSNTM's not impressed but too polite to refuse this intrusion. In the meantime, GM interrupts)

GM: (In a crisp home counties accent) Now hold on a moment. (Looking towards CSNTM) You're a work of art! You're expressing yourself through what you've done to yourself. You're an artist! He (pointing to AM) wants to appreciate your work. Let him photograph!
CSNTM: Well...I am an artist. Oh, ok then.

Amidst the resultant surrendering of the usual tube protocol of not making eye-contact or conversation with anyone whatsoever, the carriage inhabitants dissolved into several streams of chatter. The far-from-sober women revealed they were returning from a wake, AM was on his way to a musical, GM returned to his book and CSNTM brought a welcome reprieve from the cocoons we inhabit on the undergound.

Latte Artisan

 

 

 

Latte Artisan, Home, London ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

A principle of psychology?

Whenever two people meet, there are really six people present. There is each man as he sees himself, each man as the other person sees him, and each man as he really is.

William James, The Principles of Psychology (1890)

I like farsi

Learning farsi is such a refreshing break from the rigidity that gives Arabic its appeal but renders it incredibly demanding.

Take this construct for example:

chashm = eye(ball)
khanah = house, residence, dwelling

Therefore, chashmkhanah = eyesocket.

Genius.

Persecuting the Baha'is

I felt compelled to comment on Bahar Tahzib's article at comment is free.

SharifL - veiled beneath your rant lies something of interest: the Muslim perspective of the Other. As a Muslim (and admittedly unable, and unwilling, to represent all my co-religionists) I disagree with you imputing intolerance of other creeds to the Islamic world-view. Islam regards previous monotheistic religions as part of a progressive 'roll-out' of the Divine message by God, culminating in Islam.

I do however feel that Muslims have fundamental difficulties in how to view post-Islamic monotheistic religions, especially those with Islamic undertones, such as the Ahmadi/Qadiyani movement and the Baha'i faith. These faiths challenge one of the pillars of Islamic theology: the finality of Muhammad in God's chain of messengers. As such, they engender huge suspicion.

The Baha'is seems to be victims of circumstance in that major political and social upheavals in Iran coincided with birth of their faith rendering them convenient scapegoats for the upheavals of the 19th century.

Amidst the responses, this caught my eye:

LeoAfricanus. considering the persecution of the Zoroastrians in Iran since the Islamic conquest of Iran, islam can be just as intolerant to pre-islamic religions of the Book. The murder of the Christian Iranian archbishop by the Islamic Republic reinforces the picture.

AIDS in Central Asia

Newsnight ran an incredibly moving piece on the rise and rise of HIV/AIDS in the ex-Soviet republics, focussing on Kyrgyzstan. Despite millions of dollars of funding (probably in the form of the World Bank's notorious structural adjustment loans) rates of infection are soaring in Central Asia.

The piece looked at an alarming cause for the spread of HIV in addition to prostitution and drug use: substandard medical practice such as non-sterile procedures and needless blood transfusions (the blood bank being fuelled by unscreened donors). Children were the victims. The mothers of these accidentally infected children are stigmatised, ostracised and frequently banished from their households.

It's got me dusting off my copy of Malaysian academic, Prof Malik Badri's heavily criticised The Aids Crisis: An Islamic Socio-Cultural Perspective.

Are Horses and Giraffes Halal?

Join the debate of our times over at Ali Eteraz's.

The Moths and the Flame by Farid ud-Din Attar

(Courtesy of the Grand Mufti. Or to be precise, the Grand Mufti's new father-in-law. As in he didn't have one before but now has one, rather than a different one).

Moths gathered in a fluttering throng one night
To learn the truth about the candle light,
And they decided one of them should go
To gather news of the elusive glow.
One flew till in the distance he discerned
A palace window where a candle burned --
And went no nearer: back again he flew
To tell the others what he thought he knew.
The mentor of the moths dismissed his claim,
Remarking: "He knows nothing of the flame."
A moth more eager than the one before
Set out and passed beyond the palace door.
He hovered in the aura of the fire,
A trembling blur of timorous desire,
Then headed back to say how far he'd been,
And how much he had undergone and seen.
The mentor said: "You do not bear the signs
Of one who's fathomed how the candle shines."
Another moth flew out -- his dizzy flight
Turned to an ardent wooing of the light;
He dipped and soared, and in his frenzied trance
Both self and fire were mingled by his dance --
The flame engulfed his wing-tips, body, head,
His being glowed a fierce translucent red;
And when the mentor saw that sudden blaze,
The moth's form lost within the glowing rays,
He said: "He knows, he knows the truth we seek,
That hidden truth of which we cannot speak."
To go beyond all knowledge is to find
That comprehension which eludes the mind,
And you can never gain the longed-for goal
Until you first outsoar both flesh and soul;
But should one part remain, a single hair
Will drag you back and plunge you in despair --
No creature's self can be admitted here,
Where all identity must disappear.

Haute Hijab

Denmark's state broadcaster pushes the boundaries (and the buttons of its Muslim community) with its headscarf contest.

The 'Imam' Abbas fallacy persists

The BBC inexcusably continues to refer to the brother of Imam Hussein, Abbas ibn Ali, with the prefix Imam. The term is a multivalent one but in the specific context of Shia theology, it is reserved exclusively for the 12 successors of the Prophet. Abbas ibn Ali was, and is, never referred to as imam. The honorific reserved for him tends to be hazrat (a farsi construct).

The Review, reviewed

This week's review has plenty to ponder over. Pankaj Mishra, in his now regular column, raises his bat to 'Joseph O'Neil's beautiful new novel Netherland', set in New York, which 'so skilfully uses cricket's particular morality to dramatise geopolitical as well as interpersonal conflicts'.

Elsewhere Jhumpa Lahiri is accused of failing 'to challenge the inadequacies of this elite America - the latent racism that underpins it - and, as a result, Unaccustomed Earth isn't a truly provocative or innovative American book'. However, the Guardian's editor in the main section lavishes her with praise.

The first volume of Amitav Ghosh's trilogy is set on a ship amidst the Opium Wars of the lat 19th century and discover the uses of a spatula mundani in Tony Horowitz's account of America post-Columbus and pre-Jamestown.

Summer Time

It's June. It's raining. Radio 4's trying to convince me that olive trees are growing in the south of England. Whatever.

Towering Silence

I remember when my dad told me that Freddy Mercury was a Zoroastrian. In the naivety of youth I had believed them to be an extinct entity. I remember him telling me in pretty much the same breath about their highly idiosyncratic funeral rites as practiced in Mumbai, home to 50,000 of the world's 200,000 Zoroastrians. Needless to say I felt as if one of my lower limbs were being well and truly tugged.

The practice of dokhmenashini, the Zoroastrian method of handling their dead - carrying the body to the Towers of Silence, circular structures of stone, placing the corpse in the open and allowing encircling vultures to scavenge the body thus completing the cycle - is now under serious threat as the vulture population plummets due to the use of anti-inflammatory drugs in cattle!

Read more here.

Nike does cricket

Mongol

The excitement cranks up another level in anicipation of the forthcoming Russian-made Genghis Khan bio-epic.



Check it out in the magic of HD here.

(Ab)original Menu

Last weekend we were treated to a meal at Behesht, an Iranian restaurant in West London. Somehow the establishment appears to have escaped scrutiny from Human Rights Watch and the UN. A cursory glance at the menu exposed a brutal practice that would embarrass even the most bigotted Australian in the Outback.

Both aubergine-based dishes on the menu, Baba Ghanouche and Mirza Ghasemi, were described as containing grilled Aborigine!

The Jesus Minaret

The Jesus Minaret, Umayyad Mosque, Damascus ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Close Encounters

During our recent trip to Damascus we bumped into John Wreford, a freelance photographer living in the Syrian capital. His most recent project was to capture images for The Pigeon Wars of Damascus, the forthcoming title from Marius Kociejowski. An image of his also graces the frontcover of the Bradt guide to Syria.

Levantine Journey

Just returned from a burst of as-siyaahah wa az-ziyarah in Syria & Lebanon. The weather was beautiful (although a little on the cold side at night), the food was great (especially the street-side shawarmas) and the people wonderfully warm and welcoming. In fact we integrated so well that I was being mistaken for an Iraqi (a compliment?!) and The Digressive Mind for a Syrian!

We decided early on that our bargaining strategy in the souqs would be based on us pretending we weren’t from London but from Pakistan in a bid to drive down shopkeepers’ prices. This worked well with me creating a mythical Lahore existence for myself until we encountered an Orthodox Catholic shop owner who’d spent a month in Lahore (fortunately 12 years ago) which really put my powers of confabulation to the test.

Damascus still holds an understated charm and exudes a deeply engrained sense of history and holiness, despite the authorities' best efforts at wiping out the city's heritage (without even the pitiful Saudi excuse of ideology). Fifteen feet below today's street level lies the same earth that Persian kings, Roman legionaries and Byzantine emperors once trod upon. The Umayyad mosque typifies Damascus' absorbing of history: it was built over a Byzantine church which itself was constructed over a Roman temple to Jupiter!




We made it to Beirut too where in the southern suburbs you can order Katyusha fruit juice cocktails whilst being overlooked by portraits of Sayyed Hassan Nasrullah!

Retrace our steps here.

Reviewing The Review

Last Saturday's guardian review exceeded its usual quota of literary-appetite whetting. Three reviews in particular caught my eye. Firstly, the gushing praise lavished on Salman 'I actually look like the Devil' Rushdie's latest offering, a piece of historical fiction uniting the Medici clan, Machiavelli and Emperor Akbar!

Secondly, the bizarrely entertaining autobiography of Narendra Singh Sarela, former heir to the tiny princedom of Sarila in Central India.

This vibrant tale of growing up in princely India is unlike almost any other memoir in that it is so totally without personal points of reference for the reader. You never get that flash of recognition: oh yes, as a child I used to ritually behead a goat just like that! Or: how like the elephant I had as a pram when I was little! When Narendra Singh, heir to the tiny princedom of Sarila in central India, was first asked his name by a schoolteacher, he did not know how to answer: no one had ever needed to ask who he was before.

And finally, Asne Seierstad's The Angel of Grozny, an account of her clandestine return(s) to Chechnya to bring to our attention the plight of the Chechen people, in particular its forgotten orphans. The Digressive Mind and I managed to get to her recent reading at the ICA and were quite frankly completely underwhelmed by her lack of knowledge of the area and its people and her seemingly unashamed wish to capitalise on people's misfortunes. In fact, we were captivated by the person she was in conversation with - Tony Wood, deputy editor at New Left Review - and we ended up walking away with his book Chechnya: The Case for Independence!

Domestic Espressing

Domestic Espressing, London ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Latte Art - The Holy Grail of Coffee Making

The Vicar of Putney vs The President of the World

The vicar of Putney adopts shock and awe tactics.

Kingdom of Documentaries

Easter* heralds some of the best documentaries around and 2008 hasn't disappointed. The ubiquitous, anorak-clad Rageh Omaar kicked off proceedings yesterday by recloaking the Shroud of Turin in the mystery that Carbon-14 dating had apparently wrestled from it. The origin of Richard the Lionheart's legendary valour and a gritty account of the 3rd crusade followed. Richard I is portrayed as 'a man motivated by Christian duty, struggling with the problems of leading a fractious international coalition, fighting a Muslim opponent who cannot be beaten.' The nuanced battle strategies and guiles of wit between the English monarch and the Kurdish warrior-caliph Saladdin were gripping.

This evening, Dr Robert Beckford (whom I had the pleasure of listening to last week presenting his moving documentary on the injustice of trade entitled The Great African Scandal) took a detailed look at the secrets of the 12 disciples and rattled quite a few skeletons lurking at the back of theological cupboards in the process. Beckford shed light on the at times seemingly ruthless manipulation of the stories of the Apostles by the (Catholic) Church to bolster its own agenda - a particularly Pauline agenda. A few of the revelations that rocked my world included:

• Jesus allegedly had 4 brothers (3 of whom were disciples) and 2 sisters!
• There is scant evidence for the remains of St Peter lying in the basilica in Rome. Stronger evidence exists for his remains being excavated in Jerusalem where an ossuary dating from the 1st century was uncovered bearing the inscription Shimon bar Jonah (the Hebrew name for Peter). The Vatican played down the findings of its own archeological dig as it would undermine the basis of Rome's power.
• Thomas is widely believed in Eastern scholarship to have spread Jesus' message to India within 20 years of Christ's crucifixion using an established trade route between Egypt and India. The Christian community in Kerala lay claim to have embraced Christianity before Rome did so. The first converts to the new faith were in fact a thriving Jewish community. Portuguese colonialists were shocked to find their subjects were already Christian and with Papal authority attempted to impose a Rome-centric version of Christianity.
• A myth was created concerning James' remains being interred in Spain to bolster the Christian cause in its clash with Islam in al-Andalus.
• There is substantial scholarly doubt over the authorship of the Book of Revelations, supposedly penned by John. Christian Zionism strongly backs it to be John's work in order to lend authenticity to its account of Armageddon that relies on a Jewish presence in Jerusalem to facilitate the next coming of Christ.
• The vilification of Judas may actually be based on a 3rd century mistranslation of the Greek word 'paradidomi' as 'betrayal' rather than 'handing over'. A re-reading thus renders Judas a vital player in the Passion and not the devil incarnate.
• Prominent women (Phoebe, Joanna, Susannah, Thecla...) in the early history of the church have been airbrushed from the official accounts. There is even evidence to suggest attempts to masculinise female apostles to avoid offending cultural mores!

Regardless of your views on religion, things'd be pretty boring without it.

* Interesting fact: 'The date of Easter varies. Easter Sunday falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after March 20, the nominal date of the spring equinox.'

The Oyster Card Reject (Lat. Oysterus Cardus Rejecticus)

Several categories of social leprosy exist in London. Perhaps one of the most maligned species in the capital is 'The Oyster Card Reject'.

The Oyster card, for the uninitiated, is a blue credit card sized piece of plastic that creates the facade of enabling you to cruise the underground network at your leisure but does so by blinding you to how much it's really costing you.

At the entrance and exit to every tube station there are electronic points where you're invited to merely tap your Oyster card to open the barriers that allow you to enter or leave the station.

During off-peak hours this is nothing more than a banality permitting you to proceed with your journey. During peak hours however, this seemingly simple task takes on Biblical dimensions as hordes of sociopathic commuters desperate to craw back milliseconds of lost time wait impatiently in nightmarish queues to be granted access into yet lower levels of the Underground inferno.

Woe betide the unsuspecting passenger whose Oyster card is rejected and thereby becomes the human equivalent of a finger holding the Hoover dam at bay. The individual is immediately rendered incoherent, paralysed with fear by the baying of the now increasingly late bloodthirsty crowd.

The poor soul, drenched in their own secretions, is eventually rescued by an Underground employee and the commute continues.

God of Carnage

I had the wonderful pleasure of being treated to a surprise evening at the theatre by none other than my significant other tonight. Better still, the play itself - God of Carnage by Yasmina Reza - was simply fantastic.

"What happens when two sets of parents meet up to deal with the unruly behaviour of their children? A calm and rational debate between grown-ups about the need to teach kids how to behave properly? Or a hysterical night of name-calling, tantrums and tears before bedtime?"

"The premise that brings the four characters together is simple. In a Paris playground, an 11-year-old boy has hit another boy in the face with a stick. Alain and Annette, the culprit’s parents, played by Ralph Fiennes and Tamsin Grieg, are visiting the apartment of Michel and Véronique, the victim’s parents, played by Stott and Janet McTeer, to work out a way in which an apology might be made. As attitudes to politics, work, money, conscience and, crucially, hamsters are revealed, vast crevasses of disagreement open up, not only between the two couples, but between husbands and wives."

The star-studded cast including the uber-thesp, Ralph Fiennes, hillariously depict the hypocrisyand self-deceipt arising from the assumption of superiority felt to be inherrent in being adult and Western.

Witnessing an outrageously rotund American lady destroy her seat with the aid of gravity midway through the production only added to the guilty pleasure of seeing the social carnage on stage.

More marching in March

Marching in March

Anti War Demo, London, UK ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Maghrib in London

Maghrib, London, UK ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008


Maghrib, London, UK ©Tauseef Mehrali 2008

Conrad, Galloway & Somnolence

I'm midway through Joseph Conrad's 'The Secret Agent', my first foray into Conrad's works, and am in awe of the ingenuity and clarity of his prose. Furthermore, the sheer audacity and subversiveness of the book, considering it's early 20th century origins, is amazing. The depiction of late Victorian London as a hotbed of anarchist activity wherein ordinary citizens unwittingly share public transport, meals and glances with others who are hell-bent on bringing chaos to the city's streets is ominously resonant with the London of today. (Incidentally, the National Portrait Gallery has a small collection of what can only be described as understated yet statesmanlike portraits of Conrad on display in Room 29 marking the 150th anniversary of his birth that are worth seeking out).

Elsewhere, George Galloway continues to entertain. This time on Newsnight.

The Wellcome Collection's newest exhibition entitled 'Sleeping and Dreaming' is worth a visit too if only to find out just how damaging a week of night-shifts can potentially be!

The prodigal son returns...as a husband!

With rapidity equal only to the stealth with which I temporarily fled the blogosphere, permit me to bring you right up to scratch with events whilst on cyber-sabbatical.

• I got "married, married" (fortunately to the same person I got "married" to). Having once been the "leading intergalactic contender for the coveted title of happiest man in existence", I have now fought off all competition.
• Honeymooned in Malaysia - luxuriated in Langkawi, feasted in KL and trekked in Borneo
• I managed to prise off my Brum-magnet and have relocated to Das Kapital itself. Sometimes I still see the Rotunda in my dreams.
• My paediatric mantle has been placed in the wardrobe for now (not without successfully sitting my postgrad exams first) as I don the cloak of general practice.

With this humble offering I beg your pardon and resume service as normal.

Oh and for the doubters out there, I completed the 10k run (without the need for any major medical intervention).

My Travelogue

courtesy of passportstamp.com

Superman in Rome

Superman, Rome, Italy ©Tauseef Mehrali 2007

Arches

Palazzo Barberini, Rome, Italy ©Tauseef Mehrali 2007

Leonine Facies

Palazzo Barberini, Rome, Italy ©Tauseef Mehrali 2007

Blair at War

BBC's News at Ten tonight ran a fascinating piece on an exhibition currently running at the National Portrait Gallery entitled Blair at War: Photographs by Nick Danziger. (A quick Google search revealed this is the same Nick Danziger behind Danziger's Travels!)

In March 2003, as Tony Blair took the final steps towards leading the nation to war with Iraq, award-winning photojournalist Nick Danziger and Times Literary Supplement editor Peter Stothard were given thirty days of unprecedented access to the Prime Minister and his closest aides.

On display to the public for the first time, Danziger's portraits tell the candid story of a decisive time in Britain's political history. Revealing the inner circle of the political players in Downing Street, at Camp David and in the power corridors of Europe, these portraits provide a poignant insight into Blair's hopes and fears as he took on a sceptical electorate, the Labour Party, Jacques Chirac and ultimately Saddam Hussein.

The collection comprises some exceptional black and white photographs of which a couple particularly stand out: 1) A shot capturing Blair reclining in an office chair mid-telephone conversation with Alastair Campbell's ghostly presence revealed via a reflection in a mirror and 2) a wonderfully captured portrait of Blair in eclipse with a shadow eliminating half his face seemigly staring into a mirror, only to reveal that the supposed reflection is George Bush in person!

Onions in the Souq

Onions in the Souq, Fez, Morocco ©Tauseef Mehrali 2006

Mauritania's 'wife-fattening' farm

Reading this recent BBC story reminded me of the observations of my old Arabic teacher during his sojourn in Mauritania, learning classical Arabic. He was amazed at what constituted beauty in Mauritanian culture as compared to well-established Western norms - an aesthetic relativity of sorts.

Obesity is so revered among Mauritania's white Moor Arab population that the young girls are sometimes force-fed to obtain a weight the government has described as "life-threatening".

A generation ago, over a third of women in the country were force-fed as children - Mauritania is one of the few African countries where, on average, girls receive more food than boys.

"Iraq is a wonderland for apocalytpicism"

Juan Cole's perspective on recent events in Iraq.

The Top 21 International Films. Discuss.

A list put together by a friend of a friend. Pan's Labyrinth and Cache are very worthy inclusions.

1. Fateless (Hungary/Poland)
   
2. The Clay Bird (Bangladesh)
   
3. Paradise Now (Occupied Palestinian Territories)
   
4. Tsotsi (South Africa)
   
5. Osama (Afghanistan)
   
6. City of god (Brazil)
   
7. Spirited Away (Japan)
   
8. Children of heaven (Iran)
   
9. Moolade (Senegal)
   
10. Pan’s Labyrinth (Mexico)
    
11. Etre Et Avoir (France)
    
12. The Edukators (Germany)
    
13. Life Is Beautiful (Italy)
    
14. Almost Brothers (Brazil)
    
15. The Colour Of Paradise (Iran)
    
16. Whale rider (New Zealand)
    
17. Cache (France)
    
18. Au revoir, les enfants (France)
    
19. Central Station (Brazil)
    
20. The motorcycle diaries (Argentina)
    
21. Abandoned (Hungary)

9 days to go!

Iran's Giant Shoe Box of Faded Photographs, Full of the Unexpected

A fascinating article from the New York Times on the evolution of photography in Iran, especially under Qajar auspices.

"The photographs also reveal the king's taste in women: his wives were plump and often had black, bushy eyebrows and dark, thick mustaches."

Proving a point

Just to completely eradicate any hint of idleness on my part: Pay to see me cry.

Leo gets published

The travel feature from this month's emel magazine proves I'm not completely idle.

Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, Page 4, Page 5.

Sponsor my other half...or else!

Hitchens on Falwell

Christopher Hitchens ideological vacillations have tarnished his image and his demolition at the hands of George Galloway pretty much dealt him a death blow. It's good to a see a touch of the old magic in his scathing critique of the late Reverend Jerry Falwell.

Free time?

Destroy any remaining free time you have under the guise of productivity with goodreads.

Mr & Mrs Africanus

Yet another protracted spell away from the Blogosphere comes to an end and all is right with the world. Whatever could be the reason this time? Holidaying? (again!) Focusing on work? (a first!) Illness? (do doctors become unwell?) No, no and no.

The answer to my cyber-sabbatical lies somewhat cryptically in the accompanying image. Those are indeed Leo's very own hooves sporting a bit of pedal bling a la Sinbad. The fancy dress accessorised a transformative moment in my life; I had my nikah recited and have pledged myself to my soulmate, The Digressive Mind.

In doing so, I'm now leading intergalactic contender for the coveted title of happiest man in existence.

The rukhsati and walimah are lined up for Autumn of this year. I've never been so finely attuned to the changing of seasons; A man for all seasons.

Mind the Gap!

Brought to you courtesy of the Digressive Mind.

My VisualDNA

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

I'm 27 today!

Dreaming (or lack thereof)

Am I the only person in the world who has stopped dreaming? I've gone months, if not years, without so much as a faded memory of a dream on waking. I'm not totally regretful, as my uninterrupted, dream-less, corpse-like sleep is wonderfully refreshing but it'd be nice to quote Martin Luther King and mean it.

Nocturnalism

I'm convinced my night shifts are coming around quicker and quicker. As my second night of seven draws to an end, the minuscule portion of my brain that remains functional finds itself wholly diverted to dreaming up breakfasting possibilities. I subsist on two meals a day during nights - ascetic in principle but truly gluttonous in practice.

Breakfast takes on a whole new guise post-nights. Rather than a meagre means of preventing a potentially embarrassing ward round collapse, or worse still, a mid-ward round tummy rumble and filling the gap before a far more substantial lunch, breakfast in fact becomes lunch. My standard Sunday breakfast becomes a daily phenomenon for seven days. The resultant slumber is blissful.

However, with breakfast usurping lunch and sleep denying brunch an opportunity, my otherwise religious devotion to Philpotts is put to one side during a week of nights. Philpotts is not merely a lunch venue, it's a lifestyle choice. I simply cannot resist the opulent deli surroundings, the granary baguettes smeared in olive oil but most of all the bespoke smoothies. It is said you know you're in trouble when your local chip-shop owner knows your order before you've opened your mouth. My smoothie technician has me sussed out.

Having succumbed to different (admittedly delicious) smoothies for several consecutive days, at a certain point last week I decided to exercise some more will power. I marched to the sandwich counter avoiding eye contact with the predatory smoothie man with the gold capped front teeth.

Smoothie Man: Good afternoon sir!
Me: (Already resigned to yet another experimental beverage) Hello!
Smoothie Man: Not enjoying a smoothie today sir?
Me: (Talking as though possessed) What's today's special?
Smoothie Man: A lovely combination of kiwi, pineapple, honey and bio-yoghurt...try some.
Me: (Knocking back the taster). Give me a regular. You've really got me worked out haven't you?
Smoothie Man: Hahaha. Sir, if you don't mind me asking, do you buy smoothies for the taste or for the health benefits?
Me: If I'm brutally honest, it's for the taste and I retrospectively claim the health benefits.
Smoothie Man: Oh, I see. (Pouring in some honey). I can't actually partake of this drink you know sir.
Me: Why's that?
Smoothie Man: (Leaning forward and glancing side to side in a conspiratorial manner) I was diagnosed with diabetes last week.
Me: You can still have honey as part of a balanced diet.
Smoothie Man: Really?
Me: Yes. In fact if you crank up your exercising you can actually get rid of your diabetes.
Smoothie Man: No way! You see that lady across at the other counter? The one with the sad face. She has diabetes. I aint gonna let that happen. I'm gonna grab diabetes by the neck and overcome it. (Flashing a golden grin).

I picked up the smoothie, fleetingly cursed my lack of resilience and protractedly pacified my ravenous tastebuds.

March in March

Join the medical workforce on March 17th and protest against the massive employment and training crisis that we are now facing as a result of failed Department of Health policy.

The Telegraph's take on Modernising Medical Careers

Father and Son

Batu Caves Temple, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia ©Tauseef Mehrali 2005

The Tannery

The Tannery, Fez, Morocco ©Tauseef Mehrali 2006

Karbala in Verse

A pretty self-explanatory link that does what it says on the tin.

Decisions, decisions

My task yesterday was to convince a precocious 6 year old lad recovering from leukaemia to have an injection. Not usually too taxing a requirement as these kids have been subjected to more pin pricks than even the most elderly of tailors. This particular injection was different though. It had to be given intramuscularly i.e. in an arm or bum. In a bid to empower him I offered him the choice. He eventually opted for his posterior. Next we had to decide on a side.

Me: Which bum do you want it in? Left or right?
Kid: Ermmm...ermmm...which bum?
Me: That's right.
Kid: Ermmm...my mum's bum!

Proof

Photographic proof of my alleged trips to Fez and Bosnia is now available in 'My Travels'.

Travels with a Tangerine

Tim Mackintosh-Smith's entertaining travelogue subtitled 'A journey in the footsteps of Ibn Battutah' has made its way onto television with the first part being aired on BBC 4 tonight at 21:00.

Tim Mackintosh-Smith sets off in the footsteps of the Moroccan scholar Ibn Battutah who, in 1325, embarked on a thirty-year pilgrimage across forty countries and three continents.

This first episode, retracing Ibn Battutah's journey across North Africa, tells the story of an unprecedented age of wanderlust in the Islamic world.

Heading first for Battutah's birthplace, Tangier in Morocco, Tim stumbles on a performance of medieval trance music, devours a sheep's head in the souq and meets children being taught about the Hajj pilgrimage, the original reason Battutah left home.

Following Battutah's trail to Egypt, Tim ventures into the countryside by tuk-tuk and donkey to a remote village where Battutah had an astonishing prophetic dream. In Cairo, Tim visits Al Azhar, the world's oldest university, and explores how the search for knowledge and understanding is integral to Islam.

After sailing down the Nile, Tim finds a camel herder who is prepared to take him across the desert, and they set out into the wilderness.

Time to stand up to the extremists

Thanks to tc of Heliotype fame for bringing this to my attention.

Time to stand up to the extremists

Today's news of a third letter bomb attack - this time sent to the DVLA - should be a wake up call for everyone in this country. For too long we have allowed an extremist minority of Radical Motorists to grow like a cancer in our midst.

And the few brave souls who have stood up to the stifling politically correct "multivehicular" consensus and warned of the threat posed by Extremist Motorism have been shouted down with wild accusations of "Motorphobia" for their pains.

Let us be clear. The vast majority of British Motorists are law-abiding moderates. But they have allowed their community to be hijacked by a radical fringe with no respect for our common values.

These extremists have infiltrated so-called "driving schools" and taken over the most prominent Motorist organisations, such as the RAC and AA. And they have a hidden fanatic agenda of replacing our British rule of law with their Highway Code.

It's time for moderate mainstream Motorists to acknowledge the problem in their community and, errm, drive out the extremists. They need to be clear and unequivocal in their condemnation of the latest Motorist outrages. They should start cooperating with the transport police rather than complaining about how they're being "victimised".

And the government needs to take off the kid gloves and crack down hard on hate-filled extremists such as Jeremy Clarkson who hog the airwaves and give all Motorists a bad name.

Oh, and one more thing. How are we supposed to communicate properly if some of them insist on covering up their faces?

The Medina

The Medina, Fez, Morocco ©Tauseef Mehrali 2006

The Medina (2), Fez, Morocco ©Tauseef Mehrali 2006

Guess who's back?

In the end, this comment proved sufficient incentive to overcome the ineptitude of the cretins behind blogger.com who decided to fix something that wasn't broken and in doing so cripple by ability to blog. It was galling to discover that a mere '/' lay between me cluttering cyberspace with my random thoughts and remaining effectively mute for the last couple of months.

Any way, let the good times begin (again).

Clepsydra

Dar el Magana, Fez, Morocco ©Tauseef Mehrali 2006

Door and Arch

Door and Arch, Fez, Morocco ©Tauseef Mehrali 2006

Fez - Fes

It was about time the fake Leo Africanus trod in the original Leo Africanus' footsteps albeit courtesy of Ryanair.

Fez is a remarkable city predominatly due to the huge yet intense, bustling yet oasis-laden, medina, or old city - known as Fes al-Bali. I'm staying in a meticulously renovated town house in the heart of the Medina. The tranquil insulation it offers from the souq is amazing.

I'm making a habit of roaming through the marketplace usually ending up far off-piste by following the hyperstimulation of either my nose or retinae or both. I'm thankful to the orientation derived from a whistlestop, entertaining tour of the old city given by a precocious eleven-year old, Mahdi, yesterday evening. Architectural wonders that you catch fleeting glimpses of in Andalusia are the norm. Strange characters that would easily inhabit the literary world of say Allen Poe are even more common. People-watching in Fez could be marketed as a lifestyle, or even a full-time (pre-)occupation.

The unseasonally warm days (mid-20°C) and jumper-requiring cool nights lend the whole day to exploring. My palate is re-adjusting to the flavours of Maghribi cuisine and my tastebuds are pleasantly tantalised. The mint tea here has been a particular revelation, each glass sporting a jungle of fresh spearmint. Touts are bemused by my Franco-Arab hybrid language and are struggling to place me - Saudi, Algeria, Syria are variants from the "Bakistani?" overture. My inner-Berber is still lying somewhat dormant though. Maybe a fetching pair of yellow leather slippers will see to that?

Time to hit the streets again! Au revoir et ma'assalaam.

A case of mistaken identity

During a particularly busy night shift last week I was summoned to the delivery suite. The midwives wanted me to attend because the baby was being born through thick meconium and being vacuumed out with a ventouse, placing it in a higher category of risk than a 'normal' birth. I flipped into emergency mode and proceeded at breakneck speed to the labour ward.

I entered the room in question purposefully and strode towards the resuscitaire in anticipation of the newborn. As I passed the labouring woman and introduced myself I caught site of what I imagined to be her baby being delivered and the old alarm bells started ringing. In fact my internal siren was blaring. The baby appeared deformed, inhuman, almost alien-like in its lack of distinguishing features. I started rummaging through my mental archives for syndromes and conditions that could result in such an appalling condition. I was considering calling my registrar to join me in what was turning into an incredibly delicate and potentially intensive situation.

My feelings must have made themselves evident by breaking through to the exterior as the midwife asked me in a concerned tone:

"Are you alright doc? You look a bit shocked!"

The question prompted a swift re-evaluation of the scenario and metaphorically (and maybe even literally) stepping back I noticed that a baby was already lying on the mother's chest trying to hold on to the vestiges of its nine months of symbiosis. The penny suddenly dropped. I turned to the midwife and exclaimed:

"That's the placenta isn't it?!"
"It sure is doc. It sure is." She replied, triggering off a crescendo of warm laughter.

My bleep went off again and I left one moment of surreality for another.