Himalaya Bound: One Family's Quest to Save Their Animals-And an Ancient Way of Life

by Michael Benanav

Overview

A gorgeous work of literary journalism that follows a nomadic family’s fraught migration to the high Himalayan plains, as a changing world closes in around them.

Following his vivid account of traveling with one of the last camel caravans on earth in Men of Salt, Michael Benanav now brings us along on a journey with a tribe of forest-dwelling nomads in India. Welcomed into a family of nomadic water buffalo herders, he joins them on their annual spring migration into the Himalayas. More than a glimpse into an endangered culture, this superb adventure explores the relationship between humankind and wild lands, and the dubious effect of environmental conservation on peoples whose lives are inseparably intertwined with the natural world.

The migration Benanav embarked upon was plagued with problems, as government officials threatened to ban this nomadic family—and others in the Van Gujjar tribe—from the high alpine meadows where they had summered for centuries. Faced with the possibility that their beloved buffaloes would starve to death, and that their age-old way of life was doomed, the family charted a risky new course, which would culminating in an astonishing mountain rescue. And Benanav was arrested for documenting the story of their plight.

Intimate and enthralling, Himalaya Bound paints a sublime picture of a rarely-seen world, revealing the hopes and fears, hardships and joys, of a people who wonder if there is still a place for them on this planet.

Laced with stories of tribal cultures from India to Yellowstone, from Jordan to Kenya, Benanav deftly wends through the controversial terrain where Western ways of protecting the environment clash with indigenous understandings of nature. Himalaya Bound celebrates and mourns an ancient way of life, while revealing an unlikely battleground in the fight to save the earth.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781681776224
Publisher:	Pegasus Books
Publication date:	01/02/2018
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Michael Benanav writes and photographs for the travel section of The New York Times and other national publications, including Sierra and Lonely Planet. He has also worked as a mountain and desert guide in the American West. He lives in northern New Mexico.

Table of Contents

Family Tree vi

Map of Migration Route ix

1 Into the Forest 1

2 Over and Out of the Hills 30

3 Waiting by the River 49

4 Under Arrest 84

5 The Fork in the Road 115

6 Not the Life of a Fool 137

7 The Forest Gate 150

8 Many Days to Dodi Tal 157

9 The Storm 185

10 The End of the Trail 201

Epilogue 213

Selected References 227

Acknowledgments 229

Editorial Reviews

"The author makes a strong case that the careful use of resources by the nomads actually improves the ecology. The personal relationships the author forms here are what makes Himalaya Bound so enriching, so join this migration yourself. The rewards are there to be harvested."

The Providence Journal

"A compelling piece of literary journalism. Benanav celebrates and mourns an ancient way of life."

Santa Fe New Mexican

"For many years, Benanav has found himself irresistibly drawn to nomadic wanders in the hope that traveling in their company might enable him to grasp a set of elusive truths. Here in Himalaya Bound, Benanav chronicles an epic migration and how the Van Gujjar have preserved an intimate, touching, and vital link to the animals that sustain them—and to the land they call home. A vivid portrait and a poignant reminder that long ago, all of humanity was wild, nomadic, and free."

Kevin Fedarko

"At its core the issue is how we conceive of nature: as necessarily separate from humans, or as bound up with those who have shaped it. This debate is playing out as Benanav arrives in the Shivaliks, as it will for much of the journey. At stake is not just the year’s migration but the future of the family and the tribe’s way of life. A tender and timely portrait."

Minneapolis Star Tribune

"In Himalaya Bound, Benanav is again in the far reaches, this time following a nomadic family of water buffalo herders of the Van Gujjar tribe in northern India. The family comes alive in Benanav’s telling, each a fully fleshed character built from his connection and love for them."

Bozeman Daily Chronicle

"Reaches to the heart of a sensitive and complex issue. Benanav paints an intimate portrait of his new-found friends, of how they live and play, think and pray."

The Geographical Review

"Benanav deftly weaves scientific and historic context into the story of one family and one migration. As he does, he also shares an American’s perspective of this radically different way of life. The result is a compelling, thoughtful tale that encourages readers to examine their lives and impact upon the earth."

January 2018) BookPage (Top Nonfiction Pick

"A powerful and moving story of travel, mountain culture and human relationships. His writing is sensitive, insightful, and unsparing and reveals the complex and tenuous lives of migrant people and their deep connection to a forest environment. In the best tradition of writers like Bruce Chatwin and Gretel Ehrlich, Himalaya Bound recounts a multi-layered journey into uncertain terrain, where no GPS would dare to wander."

Stephen Alter

Benanav deftly weaves scientific and historic context into the story of one family and one migration. As he does, he also shares an American’s perspective of this radically different way of life. The result is a compelling, thoughtful tale that encourages readers to examine their lives and impact upon the earth.

BookPage (Top Nonfiction Pick

Benanav reveals that for the last 1,000 years, the so-called caravan of white gold has plied the desolate sands of the Sahara to hack rock salt. It's a way of life that has hardly changed in the millennium since the salt caravans began. Fascinating.

Booklist (Praise for Men of Salt)

Benanav reveals that for the last 1,000 years, the so-called caravan of white gold has plied the desolate sands of the Sahara to hack rock salt. It's a way of life that has hardly changed in the millennium since the salt caravans began. Fascinating.

Booklist

11/01/2017
The numbers alone are astounding: one extended family of 25 climbing 11,000 feet over 125 miles in 40 days with 83 water buffaloes and a few horses, bulls, and dogs. The Van Gujjars complete this trek twice a year from their winter home in the jungles in Uttarakhand, India, to their summer grazing lands in the foothills of the Himalayas. When Benanav (Men of Salt) joined the immensely hospitable Van Gujjars for this migration, the difference was the threat from government agencies that they would not be able to access their ancestral grazing lands owing to environmental concerns for National Parks. Benanav expressively shares the social customs, norms and everyday struggles the Van Gujjars face from intricate marriages with implications across villages, timing travel to maximum fodder available, tending to a calf with an open leg fracture, and most nerve-racking of all, dealing with devious government bureaucracies to continue their way of life. As much an armchair adventure as a philosophical reflection on environmentalism, national parks, and their often unstated impact. No matter one's views on these topics coming into this account, readers will reexamine their thoughts and beliefs throughout. VERDICT A wide variety of readers will enjoy this insightful and absorbing work.—Zebulin Evelhoch, Central Washington Univ. Lib., EllensburgU.S.-China relations, editing as an invisible art, curating royal bloodlines & political dynastiesprofessional media

Library Journal

2017-09-28
A photojournalist and wilderness guide explores tensions between the conservation impulse and the lives of imperiled nomadic herders in this sympathetic but balanced account of their arduous days on the trail.In 2009, Benanav (Men of Salt: Crossing the Sahara on the Caravan of White Gold, 2006) traveled with the Van Gujjars of northern India, a forest-dwelling tribe of water buffalo herders, as they made their seasonal migration from the Shivalik region into the high alpine meadows of the Himalayas. Sharing the simple pleasures and hardships of an extended family, the author came to understand how pressure to abandon their wild grazing lands and freedom for sedentary lives in villages threatens the tribe's existence. That Benanav is drawn to nomadic peoples is clear, as are his sympathies, but this does not prevent him from investigating complex ethical and environmental issues pitting forest department and national park officials against the traditions of nomads whose stewardship of the contested lands may hold a key to their survival. He compares the Van Gujjars' dilemma to that of peoples displaced worldwide, including those forced to move during the creation of some American national parks. Benanav also reveals a surprisingly egalitarian and tolerant Muslim subculture whose greatest concern is for their animals and how the very publicity supporting their cause has opened them to approaches by Islamic fundamentalists. The author maintains a straightforward journalistic tone, keeping his emotions largely in check but calling out the more abusive forest department figures for disregarding laws ensuring nomadic rights. On three return visits over the subsequent years, he saw progress, yet the conflicts remain unresolved. Benanav's avoidance of excess description makes his occasional passages of evocative language all the more powerful. In the end, his portrait of the land and its little-known nomads is impressively closely observed.An involving, often touching story of an admirable people as well as a cautionary tale about the effects of rapid change and counterproductive conservation efforts on traditional societies.

Kirkus Reviews

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