Camels are camels are camels While in the country for a couple of weeks, meeting with artisans for the online archive Atharna is building with Middle Eastern crafts, I inevitably crossed paths with many individuals from this long-standing community in the peninsula – camels. That’s typical of course, just like seeing a moose...
Jeddah – more than the gateway to Mecca Port cities, especially those on important travel and trade routes. They are more than cities, more than ports. With all the people coming and going, bringing pieces of home and place with them, they become meeting points and crossroad spaces – inherently rich...
Jeddah’s Al Balad ‘Al Balad is a unique place. This architecture cannot be found anywhere else. There are traditional high-rises in Shibam and Sanaa in Yemen also, but they are made from clay.’ Sami Nawar, the head of the municipality in Al Balad, Jeddah’s old town, stands on top of...
Bishkek in the summer heat When the Kara-Kirghiz Autonomous Oblast (the name used for the different regions incorporated in the Soviet Union) was established in 1925, Bishkek – at the time called “Pishpek”, then one year later named “Frunze” – became its capital. The city has since been the...
Between us and the sky: Sri Lanka’s Tamil temples In the morning, if you still have not woke up by the sound of dissatisfied dogs barking away to pass time, or the ever-repeated Für Elise jingle of Sri Lanka’s mobile bakery trucks, there will no doubt be a morning puja in a...
Anuradhapura – ancient city of Buddha In the morning, you wake up early. You hear the silence that is no longer fully silent: somewhere far away, people are chanting. Someone outside the door is wiping the floor; the strokes against the ground remind of others, on other early mornings...