Eternal India Encyclopedia

ETERNAL INDIA encyclopedia

A GREAT DESTINATION

of Rajputana no less than to the inhabitants of the Gangetic valley, the Himalayas have been the symbol of India. The majesty of the snowfed peaks, visible from afar, the inaccessibility of even the lesser ranges, the mysteries of the gigantic glaciers and the mag- nificence of the great rivers that emerge from its gorges have combined to give to the Himalayas a majesty which no other mountain range anywhere can claim. You ask me, my dear sir, for a description of India, and suppose that this must be an easy task for one who has now spent almost ten years in the country. If you will be content with a mere sketch I shall seek to meet your request, but I must beg you at the start to change your present opinion into one quite the contrary....The cus- toms of the different peoples, their manners, their opinions, their religion, their rites and ceremonies, their vices and virtues in short the whole character and behaviour of the various nations — can be depicted only with the aid of a shrewd and understanding eye, one accustomed to minute and calculating observation, so that from the varied points of view thus offered we can select those which enable us most readily to comprehend the whole subject. There is not one Indian people, but many. There are slant-eyed Tibetans up in Ladakh, light-skinned Kashmiris of Central Asian stock in the far north, heavy-set and stocky Bengalis in the east, negroid aboriginals in the north-east, dark-skinned Tamils in the south, and all manner of Aryan, European, Arab, Semitic and Mongol permutations throughout the north and down the western coast. The amazing thing is that this wide-ranging amalgam of races, religions and cultures — dissimilar in hundreds of ways — have succeeded in becoming a single nation -K.M. Panikkar. — Lassaro Papi, 19th century Italian man of letters

Sanskrit saying which says "a hundred divine epochs would not suffice to describe all the marvels of the Himalayas." For trekking or mountaineering there is nothing to match the Himalayan region in the whole world. .

QUOTES The short - term visitor is almost bound to be disappointed if he attempts to see too much, learn too much or build a whole picture out of the few pieces of the jigsaw... Go out, but let India come to you. She comes slowly. Trek in the foothills of the Himalayas, climb a mountain, photograph wildlife.... observe a holy festival.... concentrate exclusively on what you have gone to India to do... There is only one India... The land of dreams and romance... of fabulous wealth and fabulous poverty, of splendour and rags ..................... The one sole country under the sun that is endowed with an imper- ishable interest for alien prince and alien peasant, for lettered and ignorant, bond and free, the one land that all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for all the shows of all the rest of the globe combined. The geographical feature which dominates India most is the Himalayas. There are no mountain ranges anywhere in the world which have contributed so much to shape the life of a country as the Himalayas have in respect of India. It is not only the political life of the people of Hindustan, but the religion, mythology, art and litera- ture of the Hindu that bear the imprint of the great mountain barrier. To the Hindus the Himalayas have been a perpetual source of wonder and veneration. To the peoples of the south, a thousand and five hundred miles away, to the men of the sea coast, to the dwellers of the desert land -Paul Scott, The Raj Quartet. -Mark Twain, after visiting India in 1901

— Frank Kusy