Tag Archives: UNESCO The earthquake in Nepal in April 2015 killed more than 8,800 people in that country, injured nearly three times that many, and left nearly 3.5 million homeless. As a further blow to the national psyche, numerous precious historical religious buildings were damaged or destroyed. Many of these were contributors to the 1979 UNESCO World-Heritage listing […]  Riding the rails is my favourite way to travel. Being able to move around at will, or nestle in a seat or a berth, while watching the world chug past the windows, is just magic to me. It was summer – many years ago now – and we had several weeks in which to explore […]  Today is Holi: the much-loved Hindu ‘festival of colours’. In India and Nepal, Holi is celebrated for a night and a day: starting on the full-moon evening of the month of Phalguna or Phalgun on the Hindu calendar. This usually falls somewhere between the end of February and the middle of March, according to the […]  Sometimes, it would be nice to have a tour guide. Someone, for example, who speaks English and the local language, and who knows where the ticket-office is. Someone who can give you an idea of what to expect, and can tell you a bit about what you are seeing. If I had been willing to […]  Kumbh Melas are among the largest religious gatherings in the world. According to the BBC News, which published pictures of the 2001 Allahabad Kumbh Mela taken from space, that particular mela was “probably the largest human gathering in history”. The more recent mela in Allahabad (Prayagraj) in 2013 attracted an estimated 120 million devotees over […] |
|
