Not about politics (or blame) on my part, but disbelief about how casually momentous decisions were made – I learned only recently (last 10 years perhaps) about the Radcliffe line (even though we were steeped in Indian history growing up, both in school and in the environment, as might be expected of a young country).
I almost fell off my chair when I found out that the guy who made the decision on where partition occurred had arrived in the country something like a month prior and had no familiarity with the subcontinent.
But the politics must have driven the haste of that process, and as we have seen globally, no colonial power losing ground wants to leave peace and harmony in their wake – not just the UK, and not just back then.
The WSJ had a fantastic pull-out maybe a decade ago with a before & after map of the middle east; I’ve been kicking myself since that I didn’t save it or take a photo at least. It was an attempt to bring historical context to present day struggles. I’d love to find something similar that focuses on each region, from Asia to Africa to Europe, because there’s so little interest anymore on teaching or propagating the history that brought us to where we are now.
For example, I didn’t know about the background of the Federation of Malaysia till @klyeoh brought it up in the OP, which led me to read more on it.
And, to bring it back to food, the pathways of food from one place to another, the overlaps it created, and the new cuisines it gave rise to. We had a bit of back & forth on the WFD thread a few days ago about the origin of the word (& dish) kheema / qeema / kyma which is entrenched across the subcontinent, but also in Greece and Turkey. Not the usual path of curry discussion, haha, though still about conquerors, conquest, and some of the positives left behind in the form of deliciousness.
