Comfortably Numb

Sheila Kumar's Storehouse

Published on: 02/5/20 6:53 AM

Book review: A Step Away From Paradise by Thomas Shor

A Step Away From Paradise by Thomas Shor (Penguin Ananda Books)

We have been taught from the earliest age to separate fact from fiction. We can read Alice in Wonderland, marvel at it yet know Wonderland doesn’t really exist. We suspend  the line between fact and fiction, and we assume that is what Lewis Carroll did. He could write his books about Wonderland and still maintain his position as a respected Oxford don.

Imagine what would have happened if Lewis Carroll had proclaimed the reality of Wonderland and launched an expedition?

That is what this book is about. In 1962, Tibet`s Tulshuk Lingpa set out to climb a remote Himalayan mountain at the Nepal-Sikkim border,  to find the hidden land of immortality.  Fifty years on, Thomas Shor tracks down the surviving members of this expedition and hears fascinating details about the Hidden Land of Beyul Demoshong.

What would you say to the typical Westerner, the author asks, who would argue that there are no hidden lands to be found, that by now satellites have photographed and mapped every inch of the earth?

So far, Rigzin replies, even great scientists can only see germs with microscopes…with only their eyes, these microbes would have remained invisible. Beyul is much the same. For the practitioner of Buddhism, the instrument is consciousness itself. We develop our consciousness so we can see what does not appear to the common eye. No machine will show you Beyul. None will take you there. Only those who have developed their consciousness have a chance of entering Beyul. If everybody could go, why would it be called the Hidden Land? It would be called the Open Land.

So, that`s the Tibetan viewpoint. Now here`s a Western one, from when Thomas Shor goes to Oxford, meets Saul Mullard who`d been researching information pertaining to the founding of Sikkim. I`ve been to the beyul, announces Saul casually,  then proceeds to explain that beyul is very much grounded in the geographical features of west Sikkim but dependant on a state of mind.

Imagine, says Saul, that the Tibetan on a high arid plateau where everything is windswept and there  is  no vegetation, goes to Sikkim where there are these fertile valleys, a land free from strife, quite the hidden kingdom.

The Himalayas have always been places people have run to,  to get away from persecution. Arriving from strife-ridden Tibet, you cross a high pass and  down into the green valleys you come to place like Tashiding. This is a hill of jewels, with all the flowers growing on it.

Quite a little gem of a book.

Related Links:

Book Review: The Himalayan Arc Edited by Namita Gokhale

Book review: Wild Himalaya by Stephen Alter

Book review: Himalaya, an Anthology edited by Ruskin Bond and Namita Gokhale

Book review: Walking The Himalayas by Levison Wood

Book review: Sikkim by Andrew Duff

Book review: Where the Indus is Young by Dervla Murphy

Book review: Becoming A Mountain by Stephen Alter

Book review: Nanda Devi, a Journey to The Last Sanctuary by Hugh Thomson

 

A Buddhist questA Step Away Fom ParadiseBeyulHidden LandThomas ShorTulshuk Lingpa

Sheila Kumar • February 5, 2020


Previous Post

Next Post

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published / Required fields are marked *