The Open Road

The Global Journey of the 14th Dalai Lama.

The Open Road by Pico Iyer.

The NYT review here and a conversation between the author and Dalai Lama here.

Thank you CIHTS for bringing this and other gems to my life.   

Peter Matthiessen's The Snow Leopard - I had thought - would be hard to top : a travel writer at the peak of his craft climbing the heights of the Himalayas, exploring Buddhism with an openness that Buddhism warrants, and taking us deep inside ourselves. Pico Iyer is as good, if not better, as he takes us on a journey with the Dalai Lama. Both these books took me back to the days I put in at Bir with Jono Lineen's Into the Heart of the Himalayas. Himalayan heights, Buddhism and inner journeys have been intricately woven in each of these classics. 

Pico Iyer reminded me that good travel writers travel deep within; they make us pause and delve deep as well. In this they are akin to icebergs - the journeys on the surface are a small, very small portion. His Sun After Dark left a deep impression on me but here, he surpasses himself as he talks about simplicity, metaphors, that ability to say "I don't know" and a lot else. 

He also brought out that these authors take us from one period to another and back, or from one place to another and back, effortlessly, and with such finesse that we do not experience any speed-breakers during the drive. The flow is buttery smooth. 

And, of course, he underscored that they are voracious readers as well.  Every few pages I would come across a line that would have me slow down, pause, think, smile, connect and wonder. In some ways this is perhaps how the author's journey with Dalai Lama has been. 

A few of these below.

Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view 

~ Emerson

Be not simply good, be good for something

 ~ Thoreau 

It takes more courage than we imagine to be perfectly simple with other men 

~ Thomas Merton

Hate was just a failure of imagination 

~ Graham Greene

The great home of the soul is the open road 
~ D H Lawrence