Tag Archives: religion The best way to immerse yourself in a new culture is to spend time where local people congregate and worship. In the early morning of my first day in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, I took a taxi across the busy city centre from my hotel in the east, to the country’s largest monastery, Gandantegchinlen (“the great place of complete joy”) Khiid, west of city […]  “The palace of great happiness or bliss.” That is how Pungtang Dechen Photrang Dzong translates from Bhutanese. Also known as Punakha Dzong, it has been an auspicious fortress for many years. Punakha Dzong was the seat of the Government of Bhutan until they moved the capitol to Thimphu in 1955. It is still the administrative centre for the Punakha District, and houses a number of precious […]  Bhutan, that once-secretive, still-exotic, Himalayan Kingdom, is a sensory feast for the photographic enthusiast. The story that tourist numbers are strictly limited is over-stated. But, they are self-limited by the fact that, other than Indian nationals, all foreigners need to arrive by air – and for a long time only Drukair flew in and out. Today Druk has five airplanes, […]  There are countless deities in the Indian pantheon. Sometimes it seems that the number of religions and cults is almost as high. Scattered around the Western Thar Desert of India and Pakistan are villages of people calling themselves Bishnois. Followers of “Jambhaji”, as Guru Jambheshwar of Bikaner (b.1451) became known, these people are predominantly descended from Jat peasants and Rajput warriors from the north: Haryana, […]  You have to be early, and you have to be quick, to catch Theravada Buddhist monks on their morning alms rounds. For over 2,500 years, since the Buddha decided that monks and nuns should not cook or store their own food, Buddhist monks have walked alms rounds. The practice was intended to free religious monastics from the worldly burden of cooking […] |
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