From Heaven Lake

Travels through Sinkiang and Tibet

Vikram Seth

A Penguin Book

Non-Fiction / Travel

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Many a line in the book is stunning, share some below

Some of these stayed with me without telling me why,

Some had me think if I think and / or could think on these lines,

Some made me wonder how he wrote - as in - put these sets of words together,

Some had me react “of course this is it” ~

The status of a ‘foreign friend’ or ‘foreign guest’ in China is an interesting if unnatural one. Officialdom treats the foreigner as one would a valuable panda given to fits of mischief. On no account must any harm come to the animal. On the other hand, it must be closely watched at all times so that it does not see too much, do too much on its own, or influence the behaivour of the local inhabitants.

John would make, I think, an ideal travelling partner, with his practical manner and his sound core of madness.

I recall drinking sherry in California and dreaming of my earlier student days in England, where I ate dalmoth and dreamed of Delhi. What is the purpose, I wonder, of all this restlessness? I sometimes seem to myself to wander around the world merely accumulating material for future nostalgia.

He has an intuitive practicality. His truck has grown so much a part of him that the occasional repairs he makes are carried our almost unconsciously, as if he were scratching his arm. The truck could be rattling along with 15 loud mechanical noises merging in counterpoint: Sui is unconcerned. A 16^th, seemingly harmless, joins them: he is instantly alert, pulls the truck over, jumps out of the cabin and prods about the engine, unscrewing caps, checking for oil and water, plugging leaks, joining wires. When he gets back into the cabin and starts up again, the 16^th noise has disappeared.

If you were to be born tomorrow, would you prefer to be born in China or India? – If I could be guaranteed the luck place in the Indian sweepstakes that I at present occupy, there is no question as to what my answer would be; even if I were poorer than the average Chinese child, I would still prefer to be in India. But if I were born to the inhuman, dehumanizing misery in which the poorest third of our people live, to the squalor and despair and debility that is their life, my answer would not be the same.

So fervid and overwhelming is the experience that when I am finally extruded into the sunlit exit, I find myself trembling.

It is curious how wealth makes some people pleasant, by doing away with worry and petty frustration; and how it makes others abominable.

Those who don’t know a language are often most expressive in it.

I marvel at those travelers who, out of curiosity or a sense of mission, wander through unfamiliar environments for years on end. It requires an attitude of mind more capable of contentment with the present that my own. My drive to arrive is too strong.

Flute music always does this to me: it is at once the most universal and most particular of sounds. There is no culture that does not have its flute –

Book reviews

Thanks

Vikram Seth for teaching me of English in such an endearing fashion.

Aasheesh Pittie for lending the book; was able to finally read it after trips to book-stores and online meandering.

Of another Vikram Seth book