Saira Shah: The Storyteller's Daughter
Sep. 25th, 2003 11:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
magidLast night I went to a reading sponsored by the Center for New Words (which is a newer incarnation of the New Words Bookstore that used to be in Inman Sq.). Saira Shah read from her new book The Storyteller's Daughter, after clips from her documentary, Under the Veil, were shown. The film is about women's life under the Taliban in Afghanistan, and even the short pieces were scary.
She is an interesting person, a Briton whose father is an Afghan storyteller, and she has not only a lovely accent, but the gift of reading well, of telling stories, herself. She'd grown up hearing stories of Afghanistan, and wanted to find the country of those stories, so traveled there. The book is about her trips to Afghanistan, both with the mujahadeen and during the time of the Taliban. Fascinating stuff.
I picked up a schedule of upcoming events this fall, and there are some that are of interest to me. This Wednesday Molly Ivins is speaking on her book bushwhacked: Life in George W. Bush's America, and there are 10-minute play slams as well.
I was meeting friends at the reading, and we were having dinner afterward. My original plan was to make chicken and rice so that the food would be ready when we got back to the house. Trader Joe's failed me again, however, in lacking chicken. So I improvised for dinner. I had lots of veggies around, which helped.
I sauteed onions and Swiss chard, then made some castanelle pasta. I added a lot of the greens, a pint of halved grape tomatoes, a can of small olives (broken up), and some kashkaval cheese. I debated other additions, but this turned out to be what I was in the mood for (had I not added the tomatoes, I might've put in chopped nuts, and perhaps some raisins; had I used a different shape of pasta, I might've added chickpeas; etc.).
I made spicy eggplant, sauteed with onion, Szechuan spicy sauce, and a touch of honey, and I baked two delicata squashes with maple syrup. I'd misestimated timing, so the squash wasn't quite done when we arrived, but it all worked out in the end.
a half-goat person writing ironic works: satyric satirist
She is an interesting person, a Briton whose father is an Afghan storyteller, and she has not only a lovely accent, but the gift of reading well, of telling stories, herself. She'd grown up hearing stories of Afghanistan, and wanted to find the country of those stories, so traveled there. The book is about her trips to Afghanistan, both with the mujahadeen and during the time of the Taliban. Fascinating stuff.
I picked up a schedule of upcoming events this fall, and there are some that are of interest to me. This Wednesday Molly Ivins is speaking on her book bushwhacked: Life in George W. Bush's America, and there are 10-minute play slams as well.
I was meeting friends at the reading, and we were having dinner afterward. My original plan was to make chicken and rice so that the food would be ready when we got back to the house. Trader Joe's failed me again, however, in lacking chicken. So I improvised for dinner. I had lots of veggies around, which helped.
I sauteed onions and Swiss chard, then made some castanelle pasta. I added a lot of the greens, a pint of halved grape tomatoes, a can of small olives (broken up), and some kashkaval cheese. I debated other additions, but this turned out to be what I was in the mood for (had I not added the tomatoes, I might've put in chopped nuts, and perhaps some raisins; had I used a different shape of pasta, I might've added chickpeas; etc.).
I made spicy eggplant, sauteed with onion, Szechuan spicy sauce, and a touch of honey, and I baked two delicata squashes with maple syrup. I'd misestimated timing, so the squash wasn't quite done when we arrived, but it all worked out in the end.
a half-goat person writing ironic works: satyric satirist
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Date: 2003-09-27 10:07 pm (UTC)