Word: valley
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Hilton professed that Shangri-la is not on any map, but that hasn't stopped numerous countries?Nepal, Ladakh, Sikkim and Bhutan, among others?from claiming to harbor the verdant Himalayan valley in the shadow of a glacier-clad peak, shaped like a pyramid. The People's Republic of China is the latest to jump on the bandwagon, announcing in 1996 that it had found Shangri-la in the mountainous Deqin prefecture of northwestern Yunnan province. Not to be outdone, Sichuan, its equally scenic neighbor to the north, has since claimed the title for its Yading Nature Reserve...
...served as a bridge from the communities' isolated, subsistence past to the "relative affluence and sophistication that they enjoy today," writes Tenzing. A Sherpa, working as a high-altitude climber, can make four times the average annual wage of a Nepali. Namche Bazaar, the trading capital of the Khumbu Valley, once comprising a few dozen mud houses, now features neon lights, sophisticated communications systems and blaring rock music. The Khumbu is dotted with medical clinics and schools. But the climbing and trekking industry has brought with it the erosion of the traditional trading and farming life and the ills...
...comes the sound of short, methodical bursts of automatic fire. It's nothing to be concerned about, local soldiers posted on the top of the ruins say, just secret training by American special forces and the British Special Air Services (sas). They have horses and motorbikes in a secluded valley a few kilometers away, apparently, and are practicing maneuvers. There are no al-Qaeda around here, soldiers say. They must be training for some other...
...unmarked Chinook helicopters with machine guns mounted on their noses circle low over the valley and land at the airport. The soldiers in them are unhappy to see journalists; their colleagues are obviously chagrined that the local guard at the perimeter of the airport had cheerfully beckoned us in. The troops are holding a secret training session. The sas commander, a young man from the north of England with shaggy red hair, suggests that the airstrip is too dangerous for us, and offers, insincerely, to drop by for a chat later. His American counterparts make a brief appearance later...
...Despite periodic vandalism, theft and iconoclasm, Bamiyan's Buddhas survived for nearly 18 centuries. Genghis Khan did not touch them?he was quite tolerant of other religions. The Shia Muslim Hazara who live in the valley protected them, and adherents of Sufi Islam, a mystical sect with a wide following in Afghanistan, see echoes of Buddhism in their own practices. But last March, Taliban commanders flew in by helicopter. A public meeting was called, and the main speaker, then-Defense Minister Obaidullah Akhund?who reportedly surrendered to the new government last week and was set free?read a decree...