It Rhymes With "Two"

Yes.  It’s good to be back in Beijing.  It’s good to be home.  This I can say.  I had lots of calls, but these you can navigate.  Even some calls that turned into follow-up calls.  I had one meeting where a social friend was going to introduce me to the head of IT at his company.  I was going to introduce that person to my head of sales.  He shared with me where it was his office was located and, realizing that it would take about one-hundred minutes to cab it there, I suggested I introduce his guy to my guy and we save the trip.  He agreed, readily. 

Once my daughter returned home I did my best to pull-the-cord on all work.  This is all rather human in a way that doesn’t work the same if you are working in another city in an apartment has I have for the last few days.  If I’m working in that apartment there is nothing to stop me from working and working and working, save sleeping and eating.  My one sanctuary is the bathroom where I keep my novel.  The computer is not allowed to enter this bathroom, unless it is to broadcast music, while I shower.

It was only my little one and we shuffled through the various neighborhood restaurants we had to choose from.  “I’m sick of family style Chinese.  That’s all I had all week.”  “The butter chicken at that place is always too sweet.”  “Why don’t we just order out.” “I’d like to get out of the house.  I’ve been here all day.”  We settle on a Pakistani place, which isn’t far away and isn’t much for atmosphere but really does have the best South Asian food around these parts.'

Saag Palak Paneer, Tarka Dahl, garlic nan and yes, of course, the butter chicken.  I point out the framed script on the wall and remind my daughter that script and mosaics were so important in Islam because depicting humans and God was blasphemous.  Remember the name of the mosque we visited in Istanbul?  There were two.  It rhymes with “two.”  The waitress is pleasant and I ask her how to say “thank you” in . . . Urdu.  “Is it shukriah?” “Yes.” I pause because I know Urdu is a written form, but isn’t the language simply Hindi?  It doesn’t matter, we’re mopping up sauces and naming all the countries in South America.  It’s great to be home.

Friday, 6/09/17