Tea Houses of Iran

چایخانه های سنتی

Babur's Gardens: An Oasis in Kabul

Like most Tuesday afternoons, I attended "Pashto coffeehour" today where students of the Pashto language can practice their speaking skills with local Afghans and Ostad Rakhmon Inomkhojaev--Senior Specialist of Afghan languages at IU. Since learning of Professor's Inomkhojaev's  upcoming retirement, I've developed a deeper appreciation for these coffeehours and the opportunity to study Pashto--a language I first fell in love with back in 2007. Having a background in Pashto made learning Persian a little less of a hurdle and I'm currently trying to develop my ear for Dari. I've found watching "Voice of America" broadcasts to be the best strategy where I jot down new word I hear, pause the video, and look it up with a dictionary or on google translate. I also get to mess up a lot and confuse the two languages in front of Rakhmon as I try to compartmentalize everything. It's a labor of love though! Along with being incredibly patient, one of Rakhmon's many strengths is Mughal poetics and he loves to discuss the historical sites of Afghanistan. Today he talked about Babur's Gardens in Kabul during coffeehour.

After decades of war and neglect, Babur's gardens have been completely restored thanks to the Aga Khan Foundation who began rebuilding the site in 2002. It receives thousands of visitors every week and has become an oasis for the residents of Kabul to relax, have picnics, and spend time with friends and family. Babur, the founder of the great Mughal Dynasty, is buried there and the site has expanded into an enormous complex of gardens and waterways. His tomb is rendered in white marble with a plaque bearing his last wish:  "If there is a paradise on earth, it is this, it is this, it is this." In a lot of ways, Babur's garden has become a type of paradise--at least a weekend escape for city dwellers. Someday I'd like to visit, but in the meantime there are some great videos that document the transformation of the site in English and Dari:

Extra Links:

Aga Khan's Restoration Projects in Afghanistan

More about the History of Bagh-e Babur

Voice of America: Dari

Center for Languages of the Central Asian Region at IUB

Summer Plans

This summer I'll be in Dushanbe, Tajikistan for two months studying Persian through the US State Department's Critical Language Scholarship. Since I've never been to Tajikistan, I've been looking at a lot of photos from the region to get a sense of its landscape and people. So far it looks like an eclectic mix of socialist architecture with traditional marketplaces and citadels. Dushanbe has a lot of Soviet-style monumental architecture and reminds me of what I saw in Russia. The natural scenery is really beautiful (about 95% of the land is mountainous) and I hope to get a chance to see some of the higher mountains outside the capital. Love the photos of suzani textiles and women's clothing!

Dushanbe from above

Khojand

Color Through Light

Stained Glass from Nasir al-Mulk Mosque (Shiraz) 

& Khaneh Tabatabaei-ha (Kashan)

Persian Domes & Tiles

More of my photo-collages:

Landscape & Architecture in Painting

Persian Landscapes & Architecture (Link), a set on Flickr.

Today I found the motherload of beautifully digitized Persian manuscript paintings. In 2005, the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art showcased over 300 classical paintings dating from the 14th century to 17th century (Timurid and Safavid eras). Unfortunately the Museum website removed their digital images of the paintings, but a fellow blogger: pruned.blogspot.com has been able to resurrect a number of them and here is a slideshow of what was retrieved. Many of the miniatures depict scenes from the Qur'an, One Thousand and One Nights, the Shahnameh, and a few portraits. A real visual feast!

Click on the link above to view the whole set or click on the pruned.blogspot link. The flickr slideshow option tends to blur the images :(