Metroscope's latest container full of Moroccan goodies was due to arrive in August but unfortunately events conspired against us. We had an unexpected delay in Morocco due to a tragedy in the family of one of our main suppliers. All we could do was convey our sympathies and tell them not to worry about us. The delay was then compounded by congestion in a number of ports and the shipping company we use, Meditteranean Shipping Company, then gave our container a holiday for a few weeks here and there. So after a couple of weeks in the port of Casablanca, the container was shipped south to Las Palmas in the Canary Islands and stayed there for about 18 days. It was then shipped back north to Valencia in Spain, where it stayed for a week, and then at last it was loaded on to another ship. We've been asssured that there will be no more holidays for our container and that it will be coming directly to Melbourne. However it's not due to land until 30 October and then it has to go through customs and fumigation. We're keeping our fingers crossed that we'll have it in the 2nd week of November. We probably wouldn't be complaining too much if it was us that was holidaying in the Canary Islands or Morocco!

We've been anxiously waiting for this shipment as we have lots of lovely new things like Moroccan tea glasses and teapots, tagines (both cooking and serving), beautiful hand-painted Moroccan ceramic platters and bowls, mosaic tables (different sizes, colours and designs) and hand-painted wooden tables, lots of new Moroccan lanterns and mirrors. We do apologise to those of you who are waiting for specific things.

In spite of the delays, we still have a good range of mosaic tables, chairs and lanterns, some hand-woven cushions, babouches and mini-tagines available.

We have also been fortunate to source some lovely Tunisian products - some excellent cooking tagines, some large hand-painted couscous bowls (they also make good salad bowls), terracotta birdcage lanterns, and some very tasty preserved lemons (which are also much cheaper than many well-known brands on sale). These items are in stock now, and some are pictured in this newsletter, so do come and have a look.

From October we will be extending our opening hours from the usual time of Saturdays from 10-5.30 to include Sundays from 11-5.30. And if those times don't suit, we are happy to make a special viewing appointment.

Another new development - to help those novice tagine chefs out there - we will have a new section on our website devoted to Moroccan tagine recipes and we will be adding a new recipe each month. September's recipe is chicken tagine with olives and preserved lemons - which has become a favourite in our household.

We'll let you know when our new stock has arrived.