Category Archives: Blog

Somehow, wherever I travel, I always find myself on a camel — even on the Karakoram Highway in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China!

As you can see, I feel right at home in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China — so many hats!

I enjoyed wearing this Kyrgyz headdress while meeting with nomads on the Karakoram Highway in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China…

With a sweeping view of the dunes on the Silk Road like this, getting out of bed for breakfast in Dunhuang is easy…

I’ve been busy on the road, lecturing in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China while heading south towards Pakistan and Afghanistan on the Karakoram Highway — the highest paved international road in the world…

I was intrigued to read today that the President of Turkmenistan has issued a new decree to allow foreign journalists to operate in the country. I’m fortunate to know Turkmenistan’s terrain well, since I’ve lived there for extended periods of time while conducting research on Islam, excavating medieval Islamic archaeology, and helping preserve Sufi shrines on the Silk Road. Being a foreign correspondent there sounds like a dream job! I’m curious to see how greater journalistic access to Turkmenistan will influence news coverage of the country and its profile in the near future…

This evening, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge enjoyed a glittering reception with the King and Queen of Bhutan at the Taj Tashi Hotel in Thimphu as part of their Royal Tour of India and Bhutan. The hotel is one of my favorite places to stay in Bhutan.

Last fall, I stayed in a lovely suite at the Taj Tashi Thimphu after I had the honor of speaking with His Majesty, the Dragon King of Bhutan, while at the Royal Palace to give a talk on disability before an audience of scholars, activists, monks, and students at the International Conference on the Gross National Happiness Index. Since the global press this evening has been focusing on the Duchess’ floral gown at the reception (inspired by Bhutan’s national flower — the poppy), I thought I’d share some photos from my relaxing stay at Taj Tashi Thimphu to give a more complete picture of the hotel.

I took the photo above while exploring every angle of the spacious living room in my chic and comfortable suite there. This luxury suite has two inviting sitting areas, and funky neo-Buddhist art hung on the wall (not to mention an amazing mountain view). I tried to stay up as late as I could to take full advantage of my stay there.

I arrived at the hotel (and was greeted with a blessing from a Buddhist monk) just after finishing the intensive climb up to Tiger’s Nest — my favorite Buddhist monastery in Bhutan. A massage in the hotel’s spa followed by a long soak in the tub was just what the doctor ordered — to help me recover from a long day of adventuring in nature. I’m very grateful that I had the opportunity to stay at Taj Tashi Thimphu, and I’m really looking forward to returning there again one day soon!

This upcoming interdisciplinary conference at Brown University on the current Syrian refugee crisis will focus on the war’s impact on brain development and mental health outcomes in young children. Since “understanding the cultural and historic context of the Middle East is paramount to any intervention success,” this conference on the science of stress will include historians and anthropologists in its quest to address the global Syrian refugee crisis.

I witnessed the disturbing effects of war trauma and shock while working with Syrian refugees in Lebanon as a professor, yogini, mentor, volunteer, and advocate. As I mentioned in an article on refugees and disability in the Huffington Post, the traumatic impacts of the Syrian war and refugee crisis will linger long after the war has ended — for generations to come.

Symposium in Memory of Cathy Nepomnyashchy
Soviet, Post-Soviet, and Emigré Culture
April 8th, Columbia University

I’m sad that I won’t be able to attend this symposium tomorrow (April 8th) in memory of my favorite professor (and fellow Brown alumna) at Columbia University, Cathy Nepomnyashchy — who supported and deepened my love and knowledge of Russia and Central Asia:

Please join us as we celebrate Cathy Nepomnyashchy’s contribution to the study of Soviet, post-Soviet, and emigré culture. Presenting will be her fellow students at Brown and Columbia, her colleagues throughout the field, her students over the years—who all became her friends and interlocutors for life. This is to continue the conversation.

When I was following in the footsteps of Malcolm X in Sudan, I had the opportunity to visit the house in Khartoum where Malik Badri (pictured above) served him lunch in 1959. While there, I did a video and photographic survey of the crumbling structure for my research — a portion of which was published last year in a Special Issue of the Journal of Africana Religions: “The Meaning of Malcolm X for Africana Religions: Fifty Years On.” So it was with great interest this week that I read about the current excavation of Malcolm X’s childhood home in Boston…

On our walk to brunch in Muscat, my chihuahua and I got surrounded by a group of kids asking to pet him. One of the younger kids, his eyes swelling with ecstatic tears, screamed: “OH MY GOD, I LOVE HIM! I REALLY LOVE HIM!!!”

On our hike today in Oman, my Iranian trainer said my biceps are as dangerous as a truck barreling down a mountain…

I’m happy to share that Truthout has just published a review of Angela Davis’ new book by my friend Jasmine Syedullah: Making the Improbable Possible in the Struggle for Freedom: Angela Davis’ New Book. Jasmine has been my rock, soul sister, and zany buddy since our freshman year at Brown University (where we co-ran a theatre and playwriting program for at-risk Providence youth), and I couldn’t think of a more perfect scholar and activist to review Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement.

In reviewing Davis’ bold map for a radical movement of human liberation (rooted in black feminism, intersectionality, and prison abolitionism), Jasmine notes:

Her most recent work engages a series of timely questions. How do we talk about race in the United States after Obama? How do we distinguish terrorist acts from freedom fighters after 9/11? How do we talk about violence in the wake of the Charleston massacre and the state-sanctioned killings of Troy Davis, Oscar Grant, Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Eric Garner and Sandra Bland? After the grossly disproportionate, unrelenting and largely unacknowledged loss of so many Black and Brown lives to the altar of public safety, how do we find the words to name the racism that lives on in popular notions of the common good, in the universal language of human rights or in the protocols of due process? Can we even imagine the kind of insecurity that accumulates from our collective reliance on unwaged labor, torture, cages, walls and militarized borders to keep us safe?

I had the pleasure yesterday of attending the 4th Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Theatre Festival for universities and higher education institutions in the Sultanate of Oman. Our university, Sultan Qaboos University, is hosting this exciting festival for the next few days. As a performer and playwright (currently working on two new plays), it’s very inspiring to see so many students from the Gulf gathering together to perform and discuss theatre.