Al-talib - Lost Rayyán

Our knees rattle as a prayer, should our voices fail to speak.

Okay, so remember how I rebageled that post earlier with Ibn Battuta? Well, I’m now reviewing his wikipedia page, and look at this handsome dude right here.

Of course he probably didn’t look like this…being from the 14th century and all that, and we all know how art was nice back then…but not really very…well…

I’m not sure the artist had ever actually seen a boob or a baby in their life.

Okay, so dude goes to school, just regular school, apparently comes from a long line of legal scholars, which considering that Islam is kinda lawful…poetically lawful, he was probably coming from a pretty great background. Anyway, he goes on the Hajj, a 16 month trek from his home in Morocco to Mecca…he does not come back for 24 years. Furthermore…he didn’t even do the trip with company, he joined caravans to avoid raiders but didn’t make any friends, had no one to chat with, and while on his way figures ‘hey, why not see some serious shit in my lifetime.’

So…Battuta basically pulls one of my old stunts…or should I say I regularly pull a Battuta, he gets to Cairo, decides that 'hey, while I’m out, may as well see some sights…’ then proceeds to choose the least traveled route to Mecca, a trip that requires him traveling up the Nile. He ends up having to abandon the trek because of a rebellion then heads back to Cairo…probably after checking out a load of crummy Nile side attractions that he was no doubt endlessly fascinated with (me and you Battuta, bros 4 lyf).

So, now back in Cairo he decides to head to Damascus for the next leg of the trip. Wherein he meets up with a holy man who says he will only reach Mecca by visiting Syria. What’s he do? Take the detour. That holy man was probably a Syrian travel bureau agent disguised as a holy man…

“Hey, tell me my fortune, I’m on Hajj.”

“I see great tragedy if you do not visit the beautiful city of Aleppo, where you can find all of the best shopping and food the nation of Syria has to offer, if you leave now I foresee you getting half off at Abed’s Shawarma Shack, meal includes order of tabbouleh.”

Anyway, once he finishes the trip he heads on to Mecca and completes the Hajj. Then decides that since he’s already that far…why not visit a Khanate. At this point the Golden Horde had swept across the world and so up north there was a khanate, just waiting to be visited. Now, this isn’t entirely as dangerous as it sounds, because it is important to remember that with the Horde there was not just religious freedom that included rights to worship for whatever groups were within the khanate’s borders, but also greater security for travelers so that journeys through Mongol lands could be made more efficient.

So, he heads north towards Baghdad. Then gets distracted and goes into Persia, then down the Tigris, back around, and finally up to Baghdad. Watching him on a map would be like one of those old Goofy cartoons where you just see his dotted line ramble around incoherently while trying to get to a simple destination.

He goes back to Mecca, and kinda just mills around the whole fuckin’ peninsula for a while, and during all this he keeps meeting famous people and local kings and Sultans. He is basically like Indiana Jones, but with more friends.

He then goes to Somalia and Mogadishu, which is at the very height of Berber opulence  where he meets the ruler of the city, and describes how many people were there specifically to kiss this guys ass all day. 

He then goes south to Tanzania, visiting a town called Kilwa, which he described as the most well constructed he’d ever seen. Now…since he wrote all this at the end of his trip that means that yeah, Kilwa in the early half of the 14th century, winner of most well constructed city in the Eurasia or Africa.

So, now having gone down the African coast, he heads back to Mecca on another Hajj, and after a year hanging out there he decides to take a job with the Sultan of Delhi. That’s right, he decides 'why go home and work in Morocco, where I know people…I’ll just go to India…where I don’t know the language…or anyone, and get a job with the ruler there. So he gets a translator and hits the road. So how does he decide to get there? He goes through the Crimea…in the Black Sea, you know…above Turkey. There he chills with a representative of the Great Khan, then heads east.

So he gets distracted up there in those cooler climes…and ends up ingratiating himself into a caravan taking the pregnant daughter of the Greek Emperor back to her home town of Constantinople. So he basically doubles back, then hangs out in Constantinople with the EMPEROR, then visits all the nice tourist traps, like the Hagia Sophia and such. This is also the first time he’d left the comfort of the Islamic world, and into the relative stinky mess of the Christian world.

Once full of whatever food they serve in Constantinople he finally makes his way east, down through Afghanistan, and finally gets to Delhi where he befriends the Sultan. You know, that guy he’s trying to get a job from. How many years ago was that? Now, at this time the Sultan was the richest man in the Muslim world, and with his riches he employed a shit ton of random dudes, one of them became Battuta…who he employed as a judge of Islamic law…sharia…whatever. Anyway, Battuta thinks it’s a pain in the ass because it turns out that the people he was enforcing the law on had no interest in Islam…like…they preferred their native religion or something. 

Anyway, this did not keep him from vacationing again, so he journeyed again through India, then for a time found himself suspected of treason against the Sultan, and so began to engineer a way to get out of India with his life intact. At this time the Sultan offered him a sweet job…ambassador…to the Yuan Dynasty. In China…CHINA. So what does our globe trotter do? He fuckin’ goes to god damned China like a champ. Upon departing his party gets attacked by bandits, he nearly dies, gets separated, and likely because he was the best long distance walker on the planet he managed to catch up with his caravan in ten days time…after being lost…and nearly murdered.

So, setbacks abound, one ship he’s set to sail on is wrecked in a storm, and the other leaves without him and is then captured near Sumatra. Afraid of the Sultan he hides out in another local kingdom for a time…before that one gets overthrown, and because he still hasn’t visited China he decides to keep going East.

So he goes to the Maldives, where they had just recently converted to Islam from Buddhism. The ruling family hires him as a judge to enforce the law on the people there, and then get annoyed when all these laws conflict with their former ways of life. When Battuta finally starts complaining that all the women are topless all the time (this is after he marries into the royal family) he decides that this country is too stressful for him.

He sails to Sri Lanka…then departing there is shipwrecked, and then rescued…by pirates, who abandon him. He then goes to Bangladesh, Assam, and eventually Sumatra…up to Vietnam, and finally China. Once there he is blown away by the dudes painting peoples portraits as they get off the boats. His whole description of visiting China is basically him loving the food and all the tacky souvenir shops, like he seriously gets hyped about the most touristy stuff there.

He hangs out in China for a spell, eventually getting a ride on a junk headed back for South East Asia, where he is robbed of almost everything he earned during his stay in China.

He heads home and begins to discover all the places he had visited had been ravaged by war and plague, as he passes through Persia and North Africa on his route home he is surrounded by plague, and finds his father had died 15 years before his return, and his mother mere months before his arrival.

So, once home he hears that the moors are in trouble in Spain and decides to aid in the defense of Gibralter, except that when he arrives he finds that the enemy ruler has died of plague and the attackers have abandoned their plans. So what does he do? Sightseeing!

He goes home…

He goes home and decides “I haven’t seen the opposite side of the Sahara…there’re Muslims there…might as well say hi…brothers in faith right?” So he fucks off through the Sahara. His experience on the far side was one of general disdain…he didn’t like all the slaves, the poor living conditions, and at least one of the sultans allowed almost all the people in the city to wander around naked…and we all know how Battuta feels about naked women.

Finally he returns home, and the Sultan of Morocco says 'Hey, you know, you traveled the world right…why don’t you write a book.’ and Battuta literally blows him off like it was no big deal, but the Sultan was persistent and finally made Battuta dictate his experiences to a scribe who he’d befriended.

Best part…he kinda just settled into being a judge…eventually passed away…like it was no big deal…like he went out to get the milk and got lost…all the way to China!

Nancy Spero. Artemis, Goddess and Centaur, 1983.

hand-printing on paper

Writing tips I know but never use    #1

When you have an idea, write it down and stick to it. Doesn’t matter if it’s a tremendously stupid idea, like a microwave that sends food through time. Write the first chapter, where Napoleon receives a microwave home dinner which determines the outcome of the battle of Waterloo. The point is that you write it, and finish it. Even if you will never let it see the light of day, it is something that you can look at later to find the story you want to write. 

Commit to an idea, however weird, and see it through. It will be very valuable in the long run.

Reblog if no matter if you have 50,000 or 50 followers, you appreciate every single one. Reblog if you appreciate the messages you get, whether it's 100 or 1. Reblog if a little smile comes across your face everytime you see a new follower or message. Reblog if even though most of us aren't tumblr famous, we appreciate the little things.

A politician divides mankind into two classes: tools and enemies.

Friedrich Nietzsche (via friedrichnietzsche)

Love it.

Blue plate Special by JeffLeeJohnson

Anything to add to the library

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Amen!

11 stages of love in arabic.

1. الْهَوَى (hawa) = Attraction The beginning of love. This love can arise suddenly, but is transient, not yet firm in the heart. 2. الْعَلاقَةُ (‘alaqah) = Attachment Love that becomes attached to the heart, and loses the transitory property ofhawa. 3. الْكَلَفُ (kalaf) = Infatuation Love that begins to intensify and have a physical affect on the lover. 4. الْعِشْقُ (‘ishq) = Desire  Love that engulfs the heart of the lover entirely, and takes it as its residence, such that love and the heart in which it resides become intimately familiar with one-another.  This love blinds the lover to any faults in the beloved. 5. الشّعَفُ / اللَّوْعَةُ / اللعَاج (sha’af, law’ah, li’aj) = Passion  Love that starts to burn, but at this stage, the love is still pleasurable in the heart. 6. الشّغَفُ (shaghaf) = Affliction Destructive, all-consuming love. The heart begins to be devoured by the love. 7. اَلْجَوَى (jawaa)= Grief Love that started with the outer covering of the heart. It takes over the entire heart, and results in an inner grief and sorrow. 8. التّيْمُ (taym) = Enslavement Love to the point where the heart is enslaved to the beloved. 9. التَّبْل (tabl) = Malady Love, which was once living pleasurably in the heart, having made it its home, now turns against the heart, and so overwhelms, confounds and bewilders it, that it is as though it were its enemy. 10. التَّدْلِيْه (tadleeh) = Disorder Love when the heart is thus being destroyed from within, and begins to lose all sense of balance and reason, it goes into a state of chaos and disorder. 11. الْهُيُوْمُ (huyum) = Insanity Love that comes to its conclusion. 

History doesn’t remember everything, history forgets too. Names lost in the sands, how many things buried in the bottom of the hourglass?