Snow Leopards (Explore My World)

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The Nepalese travel for money, are often unreliable in a way that would be fatal in these wilds where no phone can reach, and an injury or lack of heat is always possible.

Darla has been Rodney’s companion and assistant for many years and this book tells in detail the hard work their team did, not only in the field with the wild cats but also the tireless fund raising to get money for snow leopard conservation projects at a time when few people in the west had even heard of these beautiful cats. They are tough, though, often traveling with little clothing, barefoot or in sneakers across the snow.

He comments on the degradation of the environment that he sees - trees felled for firewood causing soil erosion for instance and I wondered if he had read the 1972 " Limits to Growth" or CIA reports based upon it, or if his vision of the Nepali countryside was coloured by his mourning face - but of course it needn't be either or, it could be both.

The book is about a delightful threesome of child heroes who battle the villains of ‘Progress’ and ‘Development’ in the Himalayas. Interwoven are reflections on the history of (mostly Zen) Buddhism, his own acquaintance with zen practice and heartwrenching remembrances of his late wife and her death from cancer. In many ways it became clear that we were bearing witness to climate change, to human beings' role in the devastation of the planet, as PM ultimately was also doing. N For two months of 1973, from late September to late November, Matthiessen joined zoologist George Schaller on a journey from the Nepalese Himalayas to the Tibetan Plateau to study Himalayan blue sheep.It is emblematic of the spirit of this book that Matthiessen talks of never having looked at a snow leopard with his own eyes on the trip, but feeling no sense of loss, because in a larger sense he has "seen" it. Snežný leopard zostane ešte hodnú chvíľu so mnou a ak sa časom prirodzene vytratí, s úctou a láskou si ho opäť pripomeniem. The power of it is such that, a couple of weeks ago, walking before the rest of the world was awake, in a city park after a snowfall, I saw a pure cobalt sky and brilliant, glittering snow with Peter Matthiessen eyes.