It Strikes Me As Somewhat Uncomfortable That So Many People Focus On Asian Stories Only After The Events

They did that thing on TikTok again, except this one guy did the arrangement

(x)

nathanielthewise on ig

I really like what this physicist, Lamar Glover, has to say in Behind the Curve. 

+ this part from Spiros Michalakis:

daily fitness motivation http://inspiremyfitnessspirit.tumblr.com

you will live and you will say the wrong things and make mistakes and people will love you anyways.

So as a continuation of this post I made in frustration about how anglo-centric most “must-read” book lists are, I went and found a few lists with a focus on non-English speaking authors (sorted by number of books listed):

8 Must-Read Foreign Books Translated Into English (Babbel)

The non-western books that every student should read (The Guardian)

10 best translated fiction (Independent - has suggestions regarding editions + prices)

49 Incredible Books From 49 Different Countries (Huffpost - has amazon links to all the books, which is great to find the editions but please please please support your local bookstores!!!!)

100 Must-Read Classics in Translation (BookRead - Amazon links again. Most bookstores will offer to order books for you if they don’t have them, please utilise their services and support local shops whenever possible!)

All these lists have reviews and feature books from a wide range of countries. I haven’t read every single review but I browsed the lists to make sure they wouldn’t all just name the same books and they don’t!!

I hope you’ll find inspiring new reads on those lists! :)

Dark Academia for Brown People

 Most people, when they think of dark academia is books (that’s the whole point) and ancient languages such as Latin or Ancient Greek. I’m here to tell you that you all are SLEEPING on brown culture. Love that is conveyed in the languages of Persian and Urdu (my native language) crosses borders. Sure, Shakespeare and Sappho wrote great pieces of literature but the stories and poems of Rumi, Manto, Hafez and Iqbal have a special place in my heart. 

Some of my favourites are:- (all are translated)

Sit at my grave with wine and a minstrel in a trance, so your smell will raise me from the dead.

HAFEZ

My lover’s sadness lit a fire in my heart that burned my chest, there was a fire in his house that burned the nest.

HAFEZ

O the day turned night, what a shame, a gazelle of kindness a lion became, my partner and lover grew tired of my words and prayers too.

RUMI

These are my personal favourites. I can always make a longer post if you all want.

Female poets deserve a whole other post.

As someone who goes to an English-Medium school, we are always taught to converse in English, see the language as a part of yourself but deny a place to Urdu. As I grow older, I have come to appreciate my identity and so should all my fellow brown people. Take pride in your mother tongue.

An RNA vaccine produced by Pfizer & BioNTech was approved for use in the UK today.

Here’s a graphic, made with the Royal Society of Chemistry, explaining how these vaccines work: https://ift.tt/3g0d6Kh https://ift.tt/39xwwFf

Advice I gave someone today was: 'do it stupid.'

She wants to learn photography. Do it stupid. Take a million photos. Don't think about why they're not good. Enjoy the process of taking photos.

Pick out tge ones you like the most and figure out why you like them. Is it because the subject is centered? Is it because you caught them doing something cool? Is it because the light made cool shadows?

Do it stupid. If you try to do it smart, youll get stuck. If you think too much you'll never get to doing. Do it stupid.