Blog
The blog echoes the remit of the RSAA, covering current affairs, culture, travel, exploration and recent history from the Levant to East Asia.
Opinions expressed in posts are those of the contributor, not of the RSAA.
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Unpicking Uzbekistan
Joanna Lillis is a Kazakhstan-based journalist and the author of Silk Mirage: Through the Looking Glass in Uzbekistan and Dark Shadows: Inside the Secret World of Kazakhstan One overcast morning in late 2016, I sat beside a flower-strewn grave on the terrace of a mosque in Samarkand, as mourners bowed their heads reverentially while a…
Red Sands: Reportage and Recipes from Central Asia
Caroline Eden is a writer and literary critic and author of the weekly newsletter Journey beyond borders Earlier this year, Green Mountains: Walking the Caucasus with Recipes, was published concluding my ‘colour trilogy’ set of books covering the food, history and culture of the Black Sea region, the South Caucasus and Central Asia. Encompassing ten years…
Persepolis, Armenia, and Iran’s Balancing Act
Jack Roush is a PhD candidate affiliated with the London School of Economics Iranian History Initiative In early September, Iran hosted the Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra for a concert at Persepolis, the 2,500-year-old remains of the Achaemenid Empire’s ceremonial capital. According to media affiliated with the Islamic Republic, the concert “gates of civilization” was intended to…
Tianjin: China’s ‘port of heaven’
Sean Paterson is a member of the RSAA living in Guangzhou The best French meal I have ever had was, perhaps unsurprisingly, in a small bistro in the 3e arrondissement, but the runner-up was somewhere rather different: Tianjin, a port city in northeastern China. But this is not as unexpected as it might be at…
How Mongolia’s Foreign Policy Navigates Its Renewable Energy Ambition
Bolor Lkhaajav is an international relations researcher and writer The phaseout of coal-fired power has been progressing in many countries and for a country like Mongolia – a major coal exporter and consumer – this means only one thing, a transition to clean energy must be pursued. Mongolia’s plan to reduce its overdependence on coal, in…
The Tiramisu Mountains: When Seas Vanish and Landscapes Are Born
Daniel Kordan is an internationally renowned photographer who runs photography workshops, tours and expeditions around the world Around four billion years ago, Earth’s oceans formed – born from frozen water delivered by cosmic bodies and from condensed steam that fell as endless rain. From that moment, nothing on this planet has stood still. Today, oceans…
The Golden Melons of Samarkand
Anna Ansari is an Iranian-American cook and writer focusing on the intersection of food, family, and history The following is an edited excerpt from Silk Roads – A Flavor Odyssey with Recipes from Baku to Beijing (DK, 2025). It all started with a melon. The melon in question was an attempted souvenir from a three-week,…
Reassessing the Security Implications of Pakistan’s ICBM Programme
Marcus Andreopolous is a Senior Research Fellow at the Asia-Pacific Foundation, and an expert with NATO’s Global Threats Advisory Group Towards the end of June, Lindsay Ford, a former Biden Administration advisor on South Asia, warned of an emerging nuclear threat to the US from Pakistan. Ford argued that growing paranoia in Islamabad, triggered by…
The Literary Traditions of Brunei Darussalam
Kathrina Mohd Daud and Ampuan Brahim bin Ampuan Tengah When Brunei Darussalam appears in global media, it is usually within the context of one of three points of emphasis: the perceived extravagance of the monarchy, the implementation of Shariah law in 2013, and dismissal as a somewhat unknown and perhaps exotic jungle island. It is…
K-pop’s Rise: Asia and the Globalised World
Adonis Li is a Lecturer in East Asian History at the School of Humanities and Heritage, University of Lincoln and a recent recipient of an RSAA Travel Award Korean popular music, often referred to simply as K-pop, is truly a global phenomenon. Earlier this month (August 2025), the song ‘Golden’ from the soundtrack of Netflix…
Kyrgyzstan and the Future of Tradition
Joe Luc Barnes is an author and journalist writing on the countries of the former Soviet Union Cholpon Melisbekova rests her komuz across her lap, the carved wooden instrument worn smooth by years of practice. “When I was little, in the 2000s, I was embarrassed to carry it with me,” she tells me. “Now I…
Returning to Sri Lanka Through a Travel Memoir
Razeen Sally is the author of Return to Sri Lanka: Travels in a Paradoxical Island. He taught international political economy and international trade first at the LSE and then at the NUS. I am “half-half”, the firstborn of an Anglo-Welsh mother and Sri Lankan-Muslim father. They met on a ship in 1955; my mother came…
Burma: An Era Past
Most recently a Director of VanEck in New York, Tom Butcher has travelled extensively, particularly in South and Southeast Asia. Pagan was a logical and important waystation as I made my journey from South Asia through to Southeast Asia, fishing and looking at temples. I had kicked off my minor exploration of Buddhism in Pakistan,…
Looting the Silk Road: the re-discovery of Dunhuang
Sean Paterson is a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society living in Guangzhou A small town in Gansu is having something of a moment. Dunhuang, famous for its treasure-troves of Buddhist art and hoard of ancient manuscripts, and for the underhanded way that foreign adventurers pilfered huge quantities of both, is back in the limelight….
The Heartbeat of Iran
Tara Kangarlou is an Iranian-American global affairs journalist who has produced, written and reported for NBC, CNN, and Al Jazeera America. She is the founder of the NGO Art of Hope, an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University, and the author of The Heartbeat of Iran. If there’s one truth I’ve come to hold sacred through…
Could Green Industry Unite the BRICS and Save the Planet?
Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat is the Director of the China-Indonesia Desk and the Indonesia-MENA Desk at the Center of Economic and Law Studies (CELIOS), Bhima Yudhistira Adhinegara is Executive Director of the CELIOS and Yeta Purnama is a Researcher at the CELIOS. When the BRICS group expanded in 2024 to include Indonesia, the United Arab Emirates, Iran,…
Navigating the Transition: India’s Role in Global Energy Security
Manish Vaid is a Junior Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation India stands at the epicentre of one of the world’s most complex energy transformations. As the world’s third-largest energy consumer, India faces an unprecedented challenge that extends far beyond its borders: satisfying the energy needs of 1.4 billion people while simultaneously honouring its commitments…
China’s road to Central Asia: the re-development of the Hexi Corridor
Sean Paterson is a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society living in Guangzhou Hong Kong is often referred to as ‘the gate to China’, and even today, it’s common to hear the broader Pearl River Delta megalopolis referred to in similar terms. Some might say the same of Shanghai. However, those who focus on the…