"Our old town is full of secrets and mysteries, hidden nooks and little alleys. I love these soft night murmurs, the moon over the flat roofs, and the hot quiet afternoons in the mosque's courtyard with its atmosphere of silent meditation. God let me be born here, a Muslim of the Shiite faith, in the religion of Imam Dshafar. May he be merciful and let me die here, in the same street, in the same house where I was born. Me and Nino, a Christian, who eats with knife and fork, has laughing eyes and wears filmy silk stockings" Chapter 2, pg. 19.

"Dadiani looked at me thoughtfully: 'You have the soul of a desert man,' he said. 'Maybe that is the one real vision between men: wood men and desert men. The Orient's dry intoxication comes from the desert, where hot wind and hot sand make men drunk...