Named one of Time magazine’s Ten Best Books of the Year, Tahir Shah’s The Caliph’s House was hailed by critics and compared to such travel classics as A Year in Provence and Under the Tuscan Sun . Now Shah takes us deeper into the real Casablanca to uncover mysteries hidden for centuries from Western eyes. In this entertaining jewel of a book, Tahir Shah sets off across Morocco on a bold new adventure worthy of the mythical Arabian Nights . As he wends his way through the labyrinthine medinas of Fez and Marrakech, traverses the Sahara sands, and samples the hospitality of ordinary Moroccans, Tahir collects a dazzling treasury of traditional wisdom stories, gleaned from the heritage of A Thousand and One Nights, which open the doors to layers of culture most visitors hardly realize exist. From master masons who labor only at night to Sufi wise men who write for soap operas, In Arabian Nights takes us on an unforgettable, offbeat, and utterly enchanted journey. “Intensely felt…. Teeming with sorcerers, enchanted animals, jinns , and dervishes….Shah’s Moroccans and the shards of their tales create a brilliant literary mosaic.”— Booklist "Creates moments of wonderment.... And worthy of note, especially in these times, is its illumination of a part of Arabic culture that is gracious, gentle and wise."— Cleveland Plain Dealer “A spellbinding journey from Casablanca to Fez and Marrakech…unforgettable… Highly recommended for larger armchair travel collections and for collections on the Arab world.” — Library Journal “Simply irresistible…bursts with quirky characters, Moroccan lore, desert and urban landscapes, odd encounters, an incisively curious and adventure-seeking mind, and a lust for and fascination with ancient tales.” — Providence Journal “Mesmerizing …brings the sights, sounds, and smells of modern Morocco to vibrant life …an enthralling triumph.” — National Geographic Traveler Tahir Shah was born into an Anglo-Afghan family with roots in the mountain stronghold of the Hindu Kush. Most of his eleven books (in a dozen languages) and four television documentaries have chronicled a series of fabulous journeys in Africa, Asia, and the Americas. He lives with his wife and two children in Casablanca. Chapter One Be in the world, but not of the world. —Arab Proverb The torture room was ready for use. There were harnesses for hanging the prisoners upside down, rows of sharp-edged batons, and smelling salts, used syringes filled with dark liquids and worn leather straps, tourniquets, clamps, pliers, and equipment for smashing the feet. On the floor there was a central drain, and on the walls and every surface, dried blood–plenty of it. I was manacled, hands pushed high up my back, stripped almost naked, with a military-issue blindfold tight over my face. I had been in the torture chamber every night for a week, interrogated hour after hour on why I had come to Pakistan. All I could do was tell the truth: that I was traveling through en route from India to Afghanistan, where I was planning to make a documentary about the lost treasure of the Mughals. My film crew and I had been arrested on a residential street, and taken to the secret torture installation known by the jailers as "The Farm." I tried to explain to the military interrogator that we were innocent of any crime. But for the military police of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, a British citizen with a Muslim name, coming overland from an enemy state–India–set off all the alarms. Through nights of blindfolded interrogation, with the screams of other prisoners forming an ever-present backdrop to life in limbo, I answered the same questions again and again: What was the real purpose of my journey? What did I know of Al-Qaeda bases across the border in Afghanistan and even, why was I married to an Indian? It was only after the first week that the blindfolds were removed and, as my eyes adjusted to the blaring interrogation lamps, I caught my first burnt-out glimpse of the torture room. The interrogations took place at night, although day and night were much the same at The Farm. The strip-light high on the ceiling of my cell was never turned off. I would crouch there, waiting for the sound of keys and for the thud of feet pacing over stone. That meant they were coming for me again. I would brace myself, say a prayer, and try to clear my mind. A clear mind is a calm one. The keys would jingle once more and the bars to my cell would swing open just enough for a hand to reach through and grab me. First the blindfold and then the manacles. Shut out the light, and your other senses compensate. I could hear the muffled screeches of a prisoner being tortured in the parallel block and taste the dust out in the fields on my tongue. Most of the time, I squatted in my cell, learning to be alone. Get locked up in solitary in a foreign land, with the threat of immediate execution hanging over you, a blade dangling from a t