The study of the history of non-Western societies – especially those that have ‘failed’ – may be one of the most valuable resources that we have to help guide us through the coming ‘time of difficulty’ that we seem to be heading for. Watching a good BBC documentary about Tiwanaku, I was struck by how pertinent to our present climate change woes was the story of these people, not only surviving, but flourishing in an …
The bulk of this was written the day before yesterday, but I was unable to post it then. I have also added an extra paragraph just now, from my hotel in Yazd that happens to have wi-fi… I have just returned from five hours at Persepolis. This ruined palace is probably the single most important reason I came to Iran. But now I have that feeling of exhaustion that I comes upon me (I’m pretty …
It’s unusual for me to write another post so soon, but I am trying to get into practice for what I hope will be quite regular postings from Iran. To this end I have been spending quite a bit of time setting up all the apps, online services and interlinks that will allow me, hopefully, to blog from there on my iPad. In truth, this device is not really well geared at present for the …
I have been watching Spartacus: Blood and Sand with much enjoyment and would like to counter various sneering reviews such as this (it was another review I can no longer find that provoked me to write here)… The general drift seems to be to point out the banally obvious, that the show contains a constant diet of sex and violence, and to state that there is no plot. It seems to me that this entirely …
