2003-08-20 – I’m currently looking for the *Music of Islam* set of CDs (CD:275316). As you can see the 15CD set costs CHF 410 (USD 295). Ouch!
While searching infos about these CDs, I found a book examining the “Significance of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings in the Islamic Context” ¹. Well, they also offer the *Music of Islam* set ². Strangely enough, some of the CDs are missing.
The CDs are by *Celestial Harmonies* ³. I’ve sent them mail asking for shipping costs to Switzerland. Their set costs only USD 199, so depending on shipping and taxes, it might be cheaper to buy it from them directly (only CHF 275!)
In Germany I’ve seen it for EUR 254.62 ⁴, but that’s even more expensive than buying in Switzerland directly (about CHF 429).
I love http://xe.com for the exchange rates.
_You know, I go there myself *every* day to watch the Canadian dollar against the CHF. I find the race between those two more interesting than the CAD against the USD because if they ever go out of sync more than a few percentage points, something serious is happening. – SunirShah_
2003-08-21 – I heard back from the Celestial Harmonies’ “European Mail and Internet Order fulfilment partner” in the UK – DiscorD Distribution ⁵. They ask for GPB 199 + GPB 1 shipping and handling. On the original site, they offer the entire collection for USD 199. GBP 199 is USD 115 more expensive. The astonishingly low shipping rate of GBP 1 for shipping and handling is **not** going to compensate for this huge price difference.
Now compare that to the price I’d pay here in Switzerland: CHF 410 is about GBP 180. And that is without any additional taxes. When ordering from outside of Switzerland, I expect to pay around GBP 10-20 for taxes. In order for the british DiscorD Distribution to be competitive, their price would therefore have to be significantly below GBP 160.
Strange how in the age of the Internet and Globalization old-fashioned shipping charges and taxes hamper global trade. 😄
2003-08-22 – I ordered the CD set here in Switzerland ⁶ for CHF 410. Got a confirmation mail.
2003-08-28 – It is out of stock here in Switzerland. I will have to wait.
2003-11-06 – At last!
2004-11-22 – I discovered that booklet for volume 13 is the wrong booklet... 😢
I sent them some mail:
To: celestial@harmonies.com Subject: Booklet for Music of Islam, Volume 13 From: Alex Schroeder <alex@emacswiki.org> Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 22:15:43 +0100
Hi,
I bought the complete set of Music of Islam from a Swiss Internet shop (www.cede.ch) and have been very happy with it so far. Today I played volume 13 again (music from Pakistan) and wanted to look at the booklet. To my chagrin I found that vol. 13 (and only vol. 13) seems to have the wrong booklet. It seems to be some sort of “generic” booklet for a CD of “samples” from the entire collection. It starts with an index of 15 songs, one each from the various CDs. I don’t have this “sample” CD because I bought the entire set.
Is there an easy way for me to get the text for the vol. 13 booklet? If you could send me a text file or a PDF file, that would be awesome. If not, I will have to complain to the Swiss shop, they will complain to your distribution partners in England, and they in turn will send the very same request to you.
I sure hope we can find a quick non-bureaucratic solution to this tiny problem. 😄
Anyway, thanks for producing this excellent collection.
Cheers, Alex Schroeder Zuerich, Switzerland