"A perfect falcon has landed on yiur shoulder, and become yours."
                                                --Jelaluddin Rumi, The Seed Maker

"I wrote this book
(1) to inform the reader about the Teahouse's art, architechture, and gradens, and to use the building as a point of departure for exploring Persian/Tajik aesthetics, history, and culture. Perhaps by contemplating this piece of orientalia in our midst, we may be better comprehend and appreciate Muslim cultures, which, for most Americans, are a maelstrom of religious and political intrigue, distrust, confusion, and misunderstanding;
(2) to explore the message of the gift. Like the Taj Mahal, which Shah Jahan built as a love letter to his wife Jahan, the Teahouse is a message-carrying building. Probing beneath its fine art and architecture reveals messages that touch on the meanings of community, friendship, pleasure, and time;
(3) to provide information about and to honor the many 'citizen diplomats' in Boulder and Dushanbe who worked so tirelessly to facilitate a unique exchange of buildings; and
(4) to provide information about the efforts of Boulder-Dushanbe Sister Cities to reciprocate for the Teahouse by providing the citizens of our Sister City with much-needed resources and to connect people in the two Sister Cities."  (From the Introduction)

"Many visitors to the Boulder Choihona report experiencing something of a spiritual feeling there...the ambiance is serene and conducive to meditation and rest. (From p.65)