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The Waiting Land |
p.147, l.4--
There is a certain flavour peculiar to Nepalese functions that I
can never define in a word; it is made up of casualness, gaiety,
indiscipline and a wonderfully unsophisticated spontaneity--which
mixture might be expected to provoke among Western spectators a
patronising amusement. Yet somehow it doesn't, because in spite
of everything these functions are adequate. The Nepalese are not
trying to do something and failing--they are just not trying. And
the chief impression received is of an elated unconcern and freedom
--probably nothing will go according to plan, but anyway the plan
didn't matter much in the first place, so who cares?
p.179, l.12--
They are at the furthest possible remove
from the industrial areas of Europe where scraps of countryside, dis-
figured by pylons and wire-fencing, are only grudgingly tolerated
by those to whom financial profit comes first. Here in the Himalayas
it is Man who is just tolerated, in meagre communities at infrequent
intervals, where the mountains relent enough for him to survive by
the ecxercise of heroic labours--and also by the exercise of much
more intelligence than is recognised by those theorising agricultural
advisers who come East in droves, laden with university degrees, and
who would be dead within a month if left to fend for themselves on
a potentially fertile HImalayan mountainside.
p.182, l.1--
Moreover, this incompatibility was now being aggravated
by an aversion to the falsification of mountain photography. In
such surroundings even the most expertly-wielded camera cannot
help but lie, and once the reality has been seen the preservation of
fragments seems futile. Also it distresses me to break up visually
the wholeness of a Himalayan landscape in an effect to see it as a
series of 'good pictures'. So I soon freed myself from my camera
and surrendered to the purity of the light, the foaming strength
of the already distant river, the heaving complex of mountains on
every side and the tantalising cleft that leads to Tibet, drawing one's
eye to that ultimate glory of snow-peaks blazing coldly along the
near horizon.
p.196, l.14--
Were I only allowed a single adjective to describe Nepal I
would have to use 'varied'. No two villages are quite alike in
languages, dress, customs, attitudes, architecture or surroundings,
and one could not possibly refer to 'a typical village' of thihs region.
Doubtless the isolation imposed by the terrainon teach settlement
is responsible for this most pleasing diversity, which makes one
realise anew how horribly our Western uniformity impoverishes
life. And an equally rich variety is found in the landscape; at every
turn one is confronted by new, tremendous vistas of unimaginable
beauty as though Nature, when creating these mountains, had
been exercising the subtle imaginative power of a great musician
elabocating on a simple basic theme.
p.200, l.4--
As soon as we arrived here I sat in the window-embrasure to
enjoy one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. This house
--at 10,400 feet--faces due west, and I was overlooking rage after
range of dusk-blue mountains, beyond which the ghostly snows of
the distant Dhauligiri Massif were just visible against a crimson
horizon. Above this sunset flare was a blue-green ocean of space,
in which the golden boat of Venus sailed alone; and higher still
the zenith was tinged pinkish brown. Truly this was a most noble
scene, so still with peace and so vital with beauty in the ebbing of
the day.
p.206, l.12--
We achieved yet another marathon today, which got us here
ahead of schedule--and what a welcome I received from Tashi!
Like most Tibetans she is very soft-spoken so she didn't bark or
yelp, the only audible sign of rejoicing being that peculiar,
rapidsniffling noise with which she always greets my returns; but for
the first few moments it seemed that she would wriggle out of her
skin with joy, or that her over-wagged tail would come adrift--it's
nice to be so important to somebody.
p.206, l.-5--
Overtaking Mingmar I said, 'What on earth is happening? The
light's gone funny, and it's so cold!' To this obtuse question a
native English-speaker might have been forgiven forreplying that
nothing was happening on earth; but Mingmar merely said, 'The
moon is having a meal.' I stared at him for a moment, wonderin
g ifhe were going dotty--and then I realised that the dottiness was on
my side, for when he pointed to the sun I saw that about a quarter
of its surface had already been obscured by the 'hungry' moon.
p.210, l.-9--
Early on the morning of 29 November(1965) Sigrid drove us to
Gaucher Airport and soon we were flying parallel to one of the
most magnificent sights in the world--the Himalayas seen from
the air on a clear winter's day. To east and west they stretched as
far as the eye could see, a wild symphony of remote whitenes
s,beautiful and terrible beyond all imagining. Yet, curiously, t
hiswas as imperfect an experience as seeing a tiger in a zoo. Better
one glimpse of one peak from the top of a pass that has been
struggled against than the whole of this facile, faintly sacrilegious
survey from the artificial comfort of an aeroplane.
p.211, l.8--
Only after landing in India did I realise how efficiently Nepal
insulates its guests against the twentieth century. Unless one
belongs to Kathmandu's International Set (which most successfully
evades the real Nepal) one unconsciously withdraws, within hours
of crossing the frontier, from all the complications of our world. At
first a bland fatalism diminishes their importance and then, as one
succumbs to the natural isolation of the Kingdom--an isolation
now less physical than mental--their reality comes to mean no
more than that of Outer Space. Vietnam, war in Kashmir, famine
in India, the pound doing odd things in Britain--all quickly recede
into the realm of 'What-doesn't-matter-because-nothing -can-be-
done-about-it'. Perhaps it is callous to recline comfortably on this
indifference. But the fact that in our world millions of citizens
are subjected daily to selected details of crises in sixteen different
directions seems more likely to dement the citizens than to aid the
crises. So now it felt strange indeed to be again Outside, where no
mountains of indifference enclose vallyes of calm.
p.213, l.-10--
Already our forward-looking, past-despising 'experts' are
striving to help Nepal 'to make up for lost time' by discarding
the sound values that lie, half-hidden but still active, beneath
'pagan superstition'--and that would provide a firmer foundation
on which to build the new Nepal than our own mass-production
code, which makes a virtue of unnecessary earning for the sake of
unnecessary spending.
Perhaps nowhere in Asia is the contrast between a dignified,
decaying past and a brash, effervescent present as violent as in
Nepal; and one knows that here too, eventually, the present will
have its shoddy triumph. Yet even when the Nepalese way of life
has been annihilated the Himalayas will remain, occasionally being invaded by high-powered expeditions but preserving an inviolable beauty to the end of time.