10th Century Arabia, or the 1,001st Tale

The first place was an out of the way spot, amid onion spires and sand dunes, a bazaar just outside Baghdad. On her obstinate camel rode Scheherazade. Every day she rode out from her palace, wrapped in only the finest of silks, gauzy enough just to give a hint to the most enviable form Allah ever fashioned, and the Sultan owned, to peruse and purchase the priceless baubles of the great market.

Big, bare-chested, blackavised men bedecked in bejeweled turbans and swinging scimitars accompanied her on her journey.

Soft as flying carpet you settle yourself over the scene.