(no subject)

Last night was really special. I threw a suprise-ish birthday for our friend J whose birthday is actually today. Basically, our cleaning lady is his cleaning lady and she told us, so I called yesterday and invited myself over. Then after he agree I called a couple of friends and invited them too. We didn't have power all day, but luckily our stove is gas and that was working. After waiting most of the day for the power to come back on, at 5 pm the sun started setting and I realized I better hurry up and get baking. So in very flat light through the window I managed to bake a chocolate cake. By the time it came out of the oven it was completely dark and R and I were poking it in the dark to see if it was done. It was worth it though, because everyone loved the cake and I even managed to find birthday candles (at the news stand, of course).

After we came home, R started practicing the tanbur. He's only had a few lessons, but the guy whose teaching him started him out on a really nice melody from maqom dugox. R is starting to get most of it and I sat down and asked him to show me how to play the melody. It was so nice to sit and play together. I've never had a partner I could play music with, and the dutar and the tanbur's timbre blend so nicely together. There was something really special about just sitting and picking through a melody like that. The only other person in the US I've found to play Uzbek music with is S, the doira player, and it was really special to have 2 melodic instruments playing together.

I never thought I'd find a partner to follow me to Uzbekistan, much less actually play Uzbek music with me.