Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai


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Another online course

Thank goodness I’m not watching TV anymore.
I’ve moved my work station from my room back into the library room where it was supposed to be from the start.
Which means that either I’m at the PC writing or doing stuff, or in the kitchen cooking lunch or dinner, or out walking or doing some shopping.
The TV remains in my bedroom – where I’m either sleeping, or reading books.
I prefer books.

But cutting on the TV and living chained to the PC means I’ve got time and means to follow MOOCs – of which I’m a sort of addict. Continue reading →


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At last, The Far Pavilions

The_Far_PavilionsMy goodness, it’s been 18 months!
In January 2015, I announced my intention of reading M.M. Kaye’s The Far Pavilions1 as part of my reading list of adventure/historical novels set in India.
I got me a cheap, second-hand, printed-so-small-you’ll-burn-your-eyes hardback copy of the Italian translation2, and then all hell broke loose, my priorities changed, the book got buried at the bottom of my reading pile, and I picked it up again five days ago.
I’m going through it like a speeding train – basically because it’s a novel that reads like a breeze. It will be over by Wednesday.

Now, some personal background – I’m pretty sure my mother read The Far Pavilions when it came out in Italian in 1980. My aunt lent my mom her copy – I have this faint memory of the two of them talking about it. And both my mom and my aunt were into it because of the romantic element – about which, more later.

So, what’s the deal with The Far Pavilions? Continue reading →


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The only thing I have left

hyams zenI bought my copy of Joe Hyams’ Zen in the Martial Arts in 1992, while I was in London1.
The friend that was with me in the bookstore dismissed this beautifully illustrated book as

typical Yankee-a##hole mystical crap

and he was completely off the mark – but he was a very self-centered person, the sort that gets a kick out of making feel bad the people around them.

Anyway…
In his book, Hyams relates a discussion between himself, Bruce Lee and screenwriter Stirling Silliphant2, about time. Continue reading →


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Nicholas Roerich & The Sacred Union of the East

Like most readers of supernatural fiction, I first heard the name Roerich in H.P. Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness, in which the Gentleman from Providence references the

“strange and disturbing paintings of Nicholas Roerich”

RoerichWEB72

I would meet this unusual character much later, as I started collecting books and stories about the Silk Road, the mysteries of Central Asia, and the Himalayas. Continue reading →


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Learning Italian?

I just saw this post out there

The Top 5 Reasons To Learn Italian

… and ok,  a couple of points are pretty silly – but they do underscore how there’s a lot of Italian in the language a lot of English speakers speak.

So I thought, what with my current need for work and all that… what about offering my services as a language teacher, via Skype?
After all Continue reading →