The place in question is my go-to shawarma place, where I go whenever I do not have time, or cannot be bothered to make food myself. The place is owned by an Azerbaijani, and here they make shawarma (Шаурма), as well as other foods from Azerbaijan and the Caucasus. One day when I went there, the owner found out that I’m studying Russian, and we began to talk in Russian. He asked if I wanted to practice, and I enthusiastically agreed! He proceeded to examine my knowledge of Turkish and Ottoman history.

He asked me what the longest lasting empire was, and I of course answered the Ottoman empire (even though it can be debated whether this one actually is the longest-lived one, but this was neither the time nor the place for a historiographic discussion). I was also shown the helmet of Aleksander Nevsky, a medieval Russian hero and prince of the principality of Muscovy, and asked why there was Arabic writing on this helmet. I tried to answer, in broken Russian, that I thought it had something to do with golden age Islamic society being very advanced at this time, but was cut off, before he lectured me, that it was because the most powerful and advanced people of this time were the Turks. And thus, Nevsky wore the helmet because great prestige was associated with Islamic and Turkish craft.