Carpet Folklore with Hussain.

We are lucky this year to know about Hussain and Ali's so early on in the year. Every summer Hussain goes back to his hometown of Kabul, Afghanistan and searches out the best carpets he can find. He also travels to Iran and collects more authentic, hand woven carpets by women of the various villages. Once back in Kuwait, they primarily focus their sales on teachers, either because we are suckers for their prices or they just genuinely like us because we're truly interested in how the carpets are made, where they come from and the stories that are embedded in the designs. Hussain is an amazing story teller and educator of carpets himself, so it is a timeless experience when you walk through their doors up the uneven stairs & land in their small loft stuffed floor to ceiling with exotic carpets. On Friday night Geoff and I went down for our first visit since being back. We ended up leaving 3 hours later at 11:30p.m. (our Sunday night) with 4 carpets to try out back home. Hussain let's us bring carpets back that we like, lay them around the place and then decide if we truly desire any or not. No strings attached. I am loving having all these carpets around the place. Nice carpets made from neck of lambs wool are so soft it's like petting your favorite cat or dog. I think they're starting to take the place of not having animals for us.
Tonight we learned the difference between 'inshallah' and 'mashallah'. Inshallah is if God wills me to be there or have something happen that I am saying yes to, then I will be there and it will happen, otherwise it may not. Mashallah is when you see something very beautiful and you pay a compliment to the person, such as "I love your gorgeous carpet!" you say afterwards, mashallah. Meaning that God now protects your carpet from anything evil or awful happening to it. Next time we will bring our camera and get some shots of this wonderful storytelling experience.
I wish all of you strong health in body and mind and may the beauty around you soak into your pores and feed your spirit, ma'al salama, Leslie, Geoff and tribe.