While providing an intimate look at Ladakh's traditional culture, Ancient Futures raises important questions about the psychological, social, and environmental costs of modernization. 

Ladakh is a place of few resources and an extreme climate. Yes, for more than a thousand years, it has been home to a thriving culture. Traditions of frugality and co-operation, coupled with an intimate and location-specific... (more)

Lying athwart some of the world's highest mountain ranges at the meeting-point of central and south Asia, Ladakh at the same time represents Tibet's endangered civilization, and constitutes a crossroads where Islam and Buddhism have met and blended to form a unique culture. This book contains a comprehensive account of the land and its people including a detailed analysis of recent political and economic change.

In between the sea and the plains of Bengal, on the easternmost coast of India, lies an immense archipelago of islands. Some of these islands are vast and some no larger than sandbars; some have lasted through recorded history while others have just washed into being. These are the Sundarbans - the beautiful lands. Here there are no borders to divide fresh water from salt, river from sea, even land from water. The tides... (more)