Popped into a local picture framers to get a quotation for mounting a
map for my boss.

Like many of the businesses in West Kensington this is owned by a
Iranian - and as I spread out the map, I admired the beautiful lute he
moved aside.

This, he said, is a Tar <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tar_%28lute%29>,
made of mulberry wood, with goatskin, deer antler, camel bone and sheepgut.

And he played it for me, and audience of one in a quiet little workshop
in West London.