The Space Between

Today I finished reading "The Reluctant Fundamentalist," which was recommended by a friend. It was a quick and intriguing read. The book was written by a native of Pakistan, who graduated from Princeton University. His world was turned upside down in the wake of September 11th. The narrative is an exploration into the political and personal upheavals that this particular immigrant experienced. Written as a conversation with an American tourist in Lahore, Changez reflects on life before he returned home to Pakistan. I would recommend this read for a glimpse into a world away. 

Here is an excerpt from a chapter towards the end of the book: "It is odd how the character of a public space changes when it is empty; the abandoned amusement park, the shuttered opera house, the vacant hotel: in films these often feature as backdrops for events intended to frighten. So it is with this market: now that our fellow visitors have dwindled in number to a sporadic and scattered few, it has taken on a rather more ominous edge. Perhaps it has to do with the cloudy sky above, through which one occasionally glimpses a gash of moon, or perhaps it is the darkening shadows in the warren of alleyways slipping away from here in all directions, but I would suggest that it is instead our solitude that most disturbs us, the fact that we are all but alone despite being in the heart of a city. Ah!"