Of
Bonds, 'the Word' and Trade
by Jeff Fuchs
PHOTO © BY JEFF FUCHS
“There
are no straight lines through the mountains.” This ‘truth’
rumbles out of Lobsang’s mouth, a mouth that seems as unyielding
and direct as the words that pass through it. I have heard these words
before from ancient traders who still remember a time when mule and
camel caravans wound their way to and from the great market towns
of Asia and the Middle East. The words are a testament to the astonishing
geographies involved and gives an inkling of the character necessary
to pass unscathed along the ancient trade routes.
...continued
Beauty
and Power on China's Silk Road
by Sam Crane
The tour guide
opened the door and we stepped into darkness. It took a moment for us
to adjust visually but slowly, slowly the interior of the small cave
came into view.
In front of us stood a statue of Buddha, about three meters high,
surrounded by swirling painted blues and reds and browns — flanked
by two smaller statues of guardians. The light from the open doorway
fell on
the Buddha and suffused throughout the space. As our eyes moved upward
to the ceiling, angled inward from all four sides, we were met with
the menacing image of an asura, a wrathful, demon spirit. Around
him rose flame-flowing shapes of blue and ochre and beige, interspersed
with animal-like figures, all brushed onto the plaster-white surface.
On the other ceiling panels was a profusion of characters and forms
in various shades: hunting scenes and acrobats and apsara,
the flying spirits symbolic of this place. Along the side walls were
small images of Buddha, repeated hundreds of times in colorful symmetry.
We stood transfixed between the roiling and riotous ceiling and the
orderly proportions of the multihued walls.
...continued
KJ
Special On-line Feature:
When the Envoys Returned
Poem by Deborah Kroman
after reading an account of 8th century China by Huang Shengzheng
After thirty years of cresting mountain-high surges,
the envoys brought back eagle-wood, ambergris,
and an essence distilled from rose petals.
They needed water to rock them to sleep,
so at dusk they rowed downstream.
The blind envoy smoked his pipe
as his friend described how deer came
to the water to drink. Their memories unfurled like sails.
A Greek scholar had told them it was forbidden
to capture a crane, instead they brought back
unicorns, lions, and peacocks.
Cranes flew together in rippling rows.
At dusk cranes already on the sandbar
called to those high above. Once heard,
their trumpeting stayed in the mind forever.
Only cranes flew high enough to carry souls to heaven.
In the palace where everyone whispered, and the walls
muffled the vendors’ cries,
the blind envoy itched for one last journey.
His friend described the cranes’ mating dance,
how the males spread their wings and leapt
above the indifferent, grazing females. No one had seen
the cranes’ nesting grounds. They flew further north
than the boundaries of the known world.
[This poem connects not only with Silk Roads, but also with articles in our upcoming special theme issue on Biodiversity, KJ #75. Superbly adapted to a wide range of habitats, migratory cranes have existed for around 60 million years...]
KJ
Special On-line Feature:
Into Dasht-e Kavir:
Notes From the Great Salt Desert
Story and photos by Steven Tizzard
PHOTO © BY STEVEN TIZZARD
In Iran it is the year 1388, a new year, the spring, the month of Farvardin. It is the celebration of Norouz, a Zoroastrian festival that has survived, despite being usurped in this land by Islam, its heir; despite being turned outlaw for a time in the most vigorous days of the Revolution. This celebration of the vernal equinox flourishes again, the most important holiday in ancient Persia and modern Iran. This protean reverence to the re-birth of spring pre-dates enlightened imperial greatness under the two Dariuses and Cyrus. Indeed, the Prophet Zarathustra may have plagiarised existing practices in forming the first monotheism. The precise origins of Norouz are
lost, an unrecorded mix of myth and whisper, from a time before
the Aryans migrated from southern Russia to the Iranian plateau.
Perhaps it comes from even earlier, when man, cognisant of the
seasons, their importance, and of time itself, began worshipping
one power through the elements: water, fire. The desert is an
escape from the commerce of national holidays, the tourist hordes,
the suffocation of gazers, greeters, new acquaintances. It is
the only place to flee.
...continued
KJ
Special On-line Feature: DISPATCHES
A Minute and 100 Meters Down the Road
by David Maney
PHOTO © BY
DAVID MANEY
Urumqi,
Xinjiang, Sept. 3, 2009. The soldier outside the station had one
hand on the barrel and the other on the butt of his shotgun. There
were two military trucks by the bus stop and two soldiers in the
back-right seats of every bus leaving Urumqi station.
Welcome to west China.
I arrived via long-haul train, 40 hours
and just under 4,000km in a hard-seat, from Beijing, where rumours
were circulating about the extent of the military presence, needle
attacks, Uighur and Han street gangs, and the validity of the reports
coming out of Xinjiang. After four days I left with more doubts
about why ethnic tensions in Urumqi arose and how they could be
resolved.
...continued
