Fontainebleau Day 1

 Let it not be underestimated how challenging it is to shop for groceries in a foreign language. How can I tell what the equivalent of cream is among the dairy? Moreover, why can't I find salt at Monoprix? Aren't the French known for their salt?

It's only been one day (and a half) but I have a feeling I will eat very well here. I spent >100 Euros on groceries thus far (worried about emergencies) and my favorites so far is this garlic and herb cheese, fig jam from Bonne Maman... oh I guess that's it, haha. Also some sables breton I bought from Monoprix.

There are many kinds of tomatoes here. Many kinds of cheese (expected) and lots of tea and spice options (which I was worried about). People say bon journee even into the afternoon (7pm, when sunset is 9pm) and are much politer than I expected (in grocery stores, my main domain of exploration thus far). And like the dumb American I am France is much more diverse than I expected. Fontainebleau is more diverse than Dallas--way more.

Anyway, I actually don't have that much to say except that I'm tired. Haha

On the Eve

 of an international move, nothing you anticipated to be able to do in the last five days will get done.

Preparing to Move Abroad Pt.2

 So I have another expense to add to my visa fees--apparently 50 Euros to activate your visa upon arrival in France.

-_-

Preparing to Move Abroad Pt. 1

So I didn't read much in June, other than some fiction, and learned no random, potentially useless information, partially because I need to actually be reviewing some other things in preparation for graduate school.

I did however, have a very frustrating visit to the VFS (Visa Facilitation Services) and figured I would document my experience in part to satisfy my frustration but also in case it is potentially helpful to someone down the line (who somehow comes across my blog and randomly wants to go to the same program as me).

Here is what they actually needed:

• a visa-size photograph, which is actually a different size than the passport photograph, which is annoying and not specified beforehand--so confirm sizes before you go to save $13
• VFS appointment letter + proof of payment for appointment
• scan of the first page of your passport--not of the entire thing, which is asked for in the checklist but my interviewer did not need it and it was a total waste of a printout
• for a France student visa, your email of approval from Campus France (not specified anywhere, and $1/page for print outs)
• French visa application form
• residence in France, or lease agreement that includes a contact phone number (my interviewer took the lease agreement and letter, but her only focus was on the letter)
• proof of financial collateral (mine was bank statements)
• program acceptance letter--not specified anywhere to bring, one would assume Campus France approval was inclusive of this
• they only accept UPS pre-paid envelopes to ship your passport back to you, otherwise you pay for them to pay for FedEx Overnight service, which is extremely extra. They provide very conflicting information on this--online UPS is not specified specially, and when I entered the person at the front desk told me no pre-paid envelopes were acceptable (I had brought a FedEx one, because I had used it for Turkey back in the bad times when Turkey-US visas were suspended)

Here is what they did not need:

• for a France student visa, the student visa checklist that you are told to bring--my interviewer just printed it out herself in front of me
• the lengthy lease agreement, or landlord ID (which is specified on the above checklist but honestly extra)
• a pre-paid return envelope for any service other than UPS.

Overall, you have to pay for:

• Campus France, which is like $240+
• VFS Appointment, $40+
• Consulate of France visa processing fee, $60+

... and I ended up also paying for:

• a couple of printouts for things that were not even specified to bring before hand, $3+
• visa photos, $13+
• shipping service for passport return, $38+... ridiculous

Hope this saves a life, or at least $50 for someone.

Incredibly Random, Potentially Useless Info Pt. 1

(Un)fortunately with all my reading (which is not even that much) I acquire a lot of random information that I find interesting and am pretty good at being annoying about bringing it up in conversation. To that end, one of my friends one day suggested I send out a newsletter said random info. Rather than inundate and bore people, I figured a kind of monthly blogpost would be useful for my own memory and reference. So, let 's see how long I sustain this (if at all):

• Muslim women were the last category of citizens to gain the right to vote in France, in 1958
• Source: Ian Coller, Muslims and Citizens
• MGM is the last independent studio in the US (the rest being owned by corporations or PE groups)
• SoFi newsletter, also Wikipedia
• Dostoevsky's father died in a similar fashion to the Karamazov patriarch--likely killed by peasants
• Alex Christofi, Dostoevsky in Love

في القدس

 I hate being the person who posts Mahmoud Darwish poems when something happens in Jerusalem (putting it very lightly), but I am going to be that person--I think this one is so powerful:

في القدس، أَعني داخلَ السُّور القديم

In Jerusalem, and I mean within the ancient walls,

أَسيرُ من زَمَنٍ إلى زَمَنٍ بلا ذكرى تُصوِّبُني

I walk from one epoch to another without a memory to guide me. 

فإن الأنبياءَ هناك يقتسمون تاريخَ المقدَّس

The prophets over there are sharing the history of the holy...

يصعدون إلى السماء ويرجعون أَقلَّ إحباطاً وحزناً

ascending to heaven and returning less discouraged and melancholy,

فالمحبَّةُ والسلام مُقَدَّسَان وقادمان إلى المدينة

because love and peace are holy and are coming to town.

:كنت أَمشي فوق مُنْحَدَرٍ وأَهْجِسُ

I was walking down a slope and thinking to myself: 

كيف يختلف الرُّواةُ على كلام الضوء في حَجَرٍ؟

How do the narrators disagree over what light said about a stone?

أَمِنْ حَجَر ٍشحيحِ الضوء تندلعُ الحروبُ؟

Is it from a dimly lit stone that wars flare up?

أسير في نومي. أَحملق في منامي. لا أرى أحداً ورائي

I walk in my sleep. I stare in my sleep. I see no one behind me. 

لا أرى أَحداً أمامي

I see no one ahead of me.

كُلُّ هذا الضوءِ لي

All this light is for me.

أَمشي. أخفُّ. أطيرُ ثم أَصير غيري في التَّجَلِّي

I walk. I become lighter. I fly. Then I become another. 

:تنبُتُ الكلماتُ كالأعشاب من فم أشعيا النِّبَويِّ

Transfigured. Words sprout like grass from Isaiah’s messenger mouth:

((إنْ لم تُؤْمنوا لن تَأْمَنُوا))

“If you don’t believe you won’t be safe.”

أَمشي كأنِّي واحدٌ غيْري. وجُرْحي وَرْدَةٌ بيضاءُ إنجيليَّةٌ

I walk as if I were another. And my wound a white biblical rose. 

ويدايَ مثل حمامتَيْنِ على الصليب تُحلِّقان وتحملان الأرضَ

And my hands like two doves on the cross hovering and carrying the earth.

لا أمشي، أَطيرُ، أَصيرُ غَيْري في التجلِّي.لا مكانَ و لا زمان 

I don’t walk, I fly, I become another, transfigured. No place and no time. 

 فمن أَنا؟

So who am I?

أَنا لا أنا في حضرة المعراج.

I am no I in ascension’s presence. 

أُفكِّرُ: وَحْدَهُ، كان النبيّ محمِّدٌ يتكلِّمُ العربيَّةَ الفُصْحَى.((وماذا بعد؟))

But I think to myself: Alone, the prophet Muhammad spoke classical Arabic. “And then what?”

ماذا بعد؟

Then what? 

صاحت فجأة جنديّةٌ: هُوَ أَنتَ ثانيةً؟ أَلم أَقتلْكَ؟

A woman soldier shouted: Is that you again? Didn’t I kill you?

قلت: قَتَلْتني... ونسيتُ، مثلك، أن أَموت 

I said: You killed me ... and I forgot, like you, to die.

Ramadan Mubarak

 

Sent some postcards out this year since I have the time... and postage!

27

 26 was inevitably a lost year. I went nowhere (well, Austin and Houston--as said by someone else on Twitter, I'm in Texas where we take vacations in other parts of Texas), made no progress in any area of my life...  except that I became accustomed to loss and developed some sense of personal contentment. I read a lot--mostly Chekhov and Rilke, over and over, and discovered some new hobbies (ceramics)... as well as stronger friendships. More than anything, I think the most valuable learning/development was to be OK by myself (or by myself, with a cat). I think... we'll see how long it takes for this facade to crumble.

I turn 27 soon. I feel like 27 is the turning point of young adulthood--I can't claim to have the folly of my early 20s any more, and neither am I exactly the mature person I would expect a 30 year old to be. Anyway, we'll see what it'll be like, should I be granted another year (and few days of life).

Anyway, here's what I want to achieve within the next year:

• grad school, new job, new city
• to finally read more of Borges
• to converse with my mom only in Urdu
• to visit five new countries (gotta make up for 2020-1)
• to become conversationally fluent in French
• to re-memorize surah kahf
• dine out by myself

My All-Time Favorite Books and One Line Why (Because I Can Never Remember When Asked...)

 Anna Karenina - long, no happy ending, but the novel. theme: trying to be happy

Fathers and Sons - like Anna Karenina, more contemplative, but a good read about generational differences

Naguib Mahfouz's Cairo Trilogy - heartbreaking, a one-time read for me--but very good fiction; tells the story of a family across a generation in early twentieth century Egypt, covers family dynamics, political upheaval, friendship, unrequited love... There is a great essay about this trilogy (as well as Mahfouz) by Edward Said in the NYRB: "The Cruelty of Memory..."

Naguib Mahfouz, Akhenaten, Dweller in Truth - in terms of fiction set in the ancient world, this is very good (more about Akhenaten's wife, to be honest)--also about personal beliefs and being an non-traditional leader

Colonialism and Its Forms of Knowledge, Bernard Cohn - the anthropological read on colonialism. The chapter on how the census fundamentally changed Indian society was a life-changing read

North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell - this is my favorite Victorian novel, I will take it over any of Jane Austen's

Brunelleschi's Dome, Ross King - an interesting read on Florentine society pre-Renaissance and the challenges of building the Santa Maria del Fiore

Portrait of a Lady, Henry James - the novel on early twentieth century female independence, if you ask me. About a woman who makes an unconventional choice in marriage thinking it will allow her the agency she wants, but realizes she and her intentions were misled

Pygmalion, George Bernard Shaw - a play, but my favorite, on a woman trying to claim some agency by improving her education

Man and Superman, George Bernard Shaw - also a play, interesting discourse on gender. Relatively long

The Age of Innocence - on love and choices in early twentieth century New York

Lawrence in Arabia - don't get me wrong, I'm no fan of western imperialists outside of their home country--and this book does a good job at describing imperial folly

White Teeth - is this the first contemporary novel on this list? An unpleasant read (on being brown, black, biracial, and privileged white in modern London) with genuine truths and humor

Mrs. Dalloway - I did not enjoy this book until a month ago, despite having tried to read it many times. A day in the life of an unhappy woman. I get it now

The Art of Living, Epictetus - kind of self-help writing but interesting and beneficial nonetheless

The Architect's Apprentice - another contemporary(-ily written) novel. Set in Ottoman Istanbul and interesting--about architecture, the Ottomans, and love (of course, what else to drive plot). But, interesting

Black Milk - Elif Shafak's memoir. On herself, and on famous female writers (or wives-of-writers, like Tolstoy's wife Sophia). Highly recommend

Brideshead Revisited - I've always enjoyed this one for its description of the vanishing class system in Britain through a struggling young Oxford student, which I found relatable for another context

The Corporation that Changed the World, Nick Robins - the book on the East India Company, if you ask me. Short and an easy history read

In the House of the Law, Judith E. Tucker - this is a great book on Islamic law in the seventeenth (? and around) century Ottoman empire. It delineates the flexibility of Islamic law and particularly focuses on how women had far more rights under the system of the time compared to now... Very academic, but a short and interesting read

Hadji Murat, Tolstoy - a heart-breaking short story about a guerilla fighter who forms an uneasy alliance with the Russian military... about the injustices in life

Anything by Chekhov, but particularly his plays (they're about missing more interesting places, boredom, family dynamics, grappling with traditional values and scientific advancement...) and I recently really enjoyed the story The Duel (about personal spiritual beliefs)

Affective Communities:...the Politics of Friendship - on the politics of friendship across power strata. A short sociology read, dense but informative

The Red-Haired Woman, Orhan Pamuk - a play on Orpheus. This is my favorite Pamuk (others being Silent House and Snow, I am iffy on My Name is Red, I personally hate The Museum of Innocence--underage relationship--and Istanbul--author fantasizes killing someone)

White Nights, Dostoevsky - my favorite short story of all time. On how a few minutes of happiness are enought to last a lifetime

Burning Country: Syrians in Revolution and War - on the Syrian revolution. It is a few years old now, published in 2015

The Sultan and the Queen, Jerry Brotton - an interesting account of Elizabeth I's dealings with the Ottomans

The Return, Hisham Matar - Matar's memoir on the loss of his father (who was kidnapped by the Gaddafi regime, fate unknown despite Matar attempting to trace it down)

The Vanishing Velazquez - non-fiction, about how an obscure shop-owner in England came across a Velazquez, proved it was real, and now the painting is lost

Dreams from My Father - I know... I think this is a good read, though, on identity, purpose, and coming of age

Evicted, Matthew Desmond - on evictions in the US; lots of facts, very sad and well-written. Author was evicted himself in his youth and spent two years living in the field

This is Not a Border, Ahdaf Soueif - collection of writings from the Palestine Literary Festival

The Ghost Map - an interesting account of how they figured out the cause of cholera in London

Notes on a Foreign Country, Suzy Hansen - I've given this book to so many people. It's by an American journalist who moved to Turkey over a decade ago, and about her experience reporting from about and realizing America's role in enforcing its hegemony and how media plays a role in it

20,000 Leagues under the Sea - I like to think that this is the first anti-nation state novel. So many layers to Captain Nemo

The Republic of Arabic Letters - really interesting, about the Qur'an and perception of Islam in early modern Europe

Making Morocco, Jonathan Wyrtzen - title says it all, interesting read

Stop Being Lonely, Kira Asatryan - I thought this was interesting book on relationships

Book of Conquest, Manan Ahmed - this is a history of the Chachnama, a text that the British used as a source for divide and rule and other legal bases of differentiation between Muslims/Hindus, but actually it was grossly misinterpreted (surprise, surprise) and is critical of (Muslim) princes

Bad Blood, John Carreyrou - on the Elizabeth Holmes startup, crazy story

Bella Figura, Kamin Mohammadi - a British Iranian woman's experience living in Florence one year, which changed her life. Kind of a self-help book of sorts but an enjoyable true story (spoiler alert, she marries a prince)

Fifty Million Rising, Saadia Zahidi - one Muslim women's increasing participation in the workforce. Lots of facts, interesting read

The Venetian Quran, Peter Tomassino - about a translation of the Qur'an widely circulated in Europe, that was actually for European refugees who were planning to move to the Ottoman Empire. Underrated part of history, IMO

Winners Take All, Anand Ghiridaradhas - was nothing new really, but provides language and context for a lot of the efficiency-driven corporate shifts and is an interesting read nonetheless

The Order of Time, Carlo Rovelli - a short book on the concept of time--what that has meant historically, across societies, and scientifically (Rovelli is a physicist)

The Last Leonardo, Ben Lewis - a fascinating read on the last Leonardo painting, its history and also its current status (it was purchased by MBS for the Louvre Abu Dhabi but has yet to be shown)

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, Murakami - a short read on running, stamina, and what that has meant for Murakami

MBS, Ben Hubbard - a good book on the modern KSA

God's Shadow, Alan Mikhail - on Selim and his expansion of the Ottoman empire. Very accessible

Slavery and Islam, Jonathan Brown - a not-dense account of the history of slavery in Islam. In short, slavery has had many forms and definitions--most of which are vastly different from the African American slavery we are familiar with in America

The Dark Interval: Letters on Loss, Grief, Transformation, Rilke - a book of letters on grieving. Rilke can be extra but I think this is immensely helpful

The Baron in the Trees, Calvino - a somewhat surrealist Italian novel about a baron who decides one day he will give up living on earth and instead in the trees. Funny and heartwarming

A Swim in the Pond in the Rain, Saunders - on how to read certain Russian short stories, a good reminder on how to read in general

The Anna Karenina Fix: Life Lessons from Russian Literature, Viv Groskop - title says it all, and the book is pretty hilarious

The Corpse Washer - this is a very sad and great novel. About a man from a family of corpse washers who finds himself in demand after the onset of the Iraq War, and also about unrequited love and loss

My Uncle Napoleon - hilarious and relatable

More Mahmoud Darwish, on the First Day of the Second Year into the Pandemic

في العزلة كفاءة المؤتمن على نفسه 

أن تكون وحيداً ، أن تكون قادرًا على أن تكون وحيداً هو تربية ذاتية

العزة هي انتفاء نوع الألم ، والتدرب على تصريف أفعال القلب بحريه العصامي

أو ما يشبه خلوك من خارجك و بصوتك الاضطراري نفسك بلا مظله نجاة

تجلس وحدك كفكره حالية من حجه البرهان ، دون أن تحدس بما يدور من حوار بين الظاهر والباطن

العزلة مصفاة لا مرآة

Solitude is good training for self-reliance

To be alone, to be alone is a form of self-education

Solitude is choosing a sort of pain, training to conjugate the verbs of the heart with the freedom of the self-sufficient

Or being more or less detached from your exterior self and forced to plunge inside yourself without a parachute for survival

You sit on your own, like an idea unencumbered by argumentation, not trying to guess the dialogue between the outward and inward

Solitude is a filter, not a mirror

Post-Undergrad Learnings

Here is a pretty useless (to the reader, probably) blog post that is really for my own nostalgia and edification... I was reflecting on some decisions I made post-college, as I tried to learn how to navigate my own life, without others' expectations, and what has worked for me:

• Keeping notebooks. In particular, a notebook I've kept for interview preparation has been super useful and I keep referring to it. I also keep notebooks for travel (from Il Papiro), for recipes (actually useful and I barely cook...), and for reading notes (because who remembers what they read...). And for poetry... because I don't buy many of those books
• I wish I had taken the GRE immediately after graduation. I had the time, and it would have been useful
• I should have felt less guilty about spending money on high quality clothing immediately after graduation. I hardly spent any money on clothing during college, and all the cheap stuff I bought for my first job I've since donated. I knew better alternatives and just put off buying them for some silly reason. I was lucky enough to have had the money, and I'm spending more money by buying the fancier thing now. If I ended up not using it I could have sold it
• I should have prioritized exercise and an exercise routine earlier on. I don't know why I thought exercise was almost solely for losing weight
• I should have bought a Chanel purse, because the price increases since are crazy and I could be selling it now for profit (and I was lucky enough to have had the liquidity)
• In general, I should have realized that expensive jewelry, handbags, and clothing--while they may have wear and tear--rather than being frivolous purchases are indeed luxury investments that can be resold for value, if ever needed (but in the meantime could be worn and actually enjoyed, unlike my unpredictable-in-the-short-term brokerage account)
• Should have put more money in my Roth IRA, don't know why I was so afraid to do so--it's been over five years since I've been working and I could withdraw the money now (I did put some, but not the full amount until a couple of years ago). Maybe this is situational, based on the fact that I did not in fact go to graduate school within five years
• I'm glad I bought the luxury makeup/hair products/skincare I wanted because I still use them today and know what works for me
• I'm glad I traveled and wish I had done so more, which I know everyone says... and I thought I had done enough for my age, but really I wish I did more
• I wish I printed out more photos before deleting them from my phone, because the memories are quite useful
• I am glad I purchased books, because even though it is hard to bring them with you during a move I am hoping they will be life-long relics
• Glad I developed a robust and conservative budget, and learned about investing and retirement funds early on (thank you, Wellesley)
• I am glad I went for umrah again, with my family. I thought it was silly because I've already been as a child, but it really was a personally valuable experience