The oldest range of mountains in India is the Aravalli Mountain Range.  Many of those traveling in the country spend some time in the Palace hotel India offers, in order to take full advantage of the trails and the hikes throughout mountains.  This is a section of the outdoors that is a paradise, filled with the beauty that has been attracting travelers and hikers from around the world for many years.  All in this one range one will hike through jungles that are dense and rich with wildlife, lakes, and areas of open meadows.  The range is three hundred miles, stretching from the North to the Sought, in the Western region of the state of Rajasthan.

When one progresses North along the trails the terrain becomes rocky and more isolated.  Ancient folds in the mountains were created during years of erosion.  One while find action and adventure in these mountains, and is well known for the variety of the topography adding to the experience, much in the same way as the diversity of the terrain found in the Grand Canyon of the United States.  As one hikes down through the desert, one experiences the changes and how in one turn of a corner, the scenery will go from brown rocks and gravel to crystal blue water and vines climbing up the Canyon walls.

Mount Abu is located within the range, as well as the temples of the Jain religious sect in Ranakpuri.  There is also a sanctuary for wild life, and the dense jungle trees and plants provide a habitat that supports many species of animals and birds.  There are some areas that have been affected by deforestation, but for the most part the range has been well protected and preserved.  The erosion continues and has resulted in the levels being disturbed enough to affect the rivers, sending them in different directions over time.  Many of the groves or forest located throughout are now protected areas such as Dev Bani, Dev Ouranya, and Askankar Bani.  These are sacred locations, and the mountains themselves are respected by the humans, for the history and the influence they have added to that history of the relationship between the human world and the world of nature.

The city of Manhattan and the people living there are dedicated to the continued developments and improvements made to the parks located throughout the city, and to the city streets themselves.  Some of those projects span one hundred years, as in the constant updating and renovations made in the park along the East River.  One such project has been happening for fifteen years, and that is the planting of trees throughout the city during April.  Million Trees NYC has teamed up with Adrian Bebepe, the commissioner for the city parks, and Gary Bagley, the Exec. Director of the organization called New York Cares.

The goal is that, within the next decade, one million trees will be planted, putting back twenty percent of the natural forests that were removed throughout the history of the city and creating not only a more pleasant atmosphere, but a more healthy one as well.  Healthy for the souls and healthy for the bodies of all those living and working in the businesses, the city streets, and the small hotels.  New York citizens are well known throughout the world, as those most willing to come together when their city or any of her people are in need of help and this occasion was no different.

More than 5,000 people were out last month, all volunteers, located throughout the city’s parks, tending to the landscaping there, while another 1,300 people planted trees throughout the city.  In one day, twenty thousand trees were planted.  In one day!  That is the number of trees that are in Central Park, an amazing feat and an inspirational one as well.  In the Bronx, citizens planted fifteen hundred trees in Claremont park.  Brooklyn’s Spring Creek Park received two thousand trees.  Staten Island was not left out, as two thousand more were planted there.  On this one day, not only were the trees planted and tended but other areas of the city were as well.  Many volunteers worked fixing up the city’s paths, spreading mulch in the gardens of the parks, and painting fences.

To travelers all around the world, Bangalore restaurants are some of the best in the region.  In a city where culture and technology meet and continually re-define each other, there are always innovations in the cuisine, but also long traditions that one can depend on.  A place that has been shaped by migration in a way that is like no other, Bangalore has seen a brain drain, when the young were leaving for economic reasons, and a reverse brain drain, where they started to return for the same reasons.  It’s an interesting place of interesting contradiction, and the cultural expressions here are likewise steeped in old-world traditions and new-world technologies.

It is in this setting that a remarkable new installation, “Digital Palimpsest,” comes to Bangalore.  Organized by the French Embassy in India, Fil d’Ariane, Point Ephemere, Alliance Francaise, and the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technoloy, “Digital Palimpsest” is a fascinating interactive installation.  Designed and created by B2Fays and Mathieu Constans, this work is engineered to make works of electronically-generated visual art that are then modified by the viewer’s participation.  The spectator’s image is projected into the work, and electronic impulses measure the body movements and vocal impressions to change the work while it is in motion.

This exciting new work is part of a global trend toward digital art, and it would be no surprise to find it in Bangalore, with a reputation for being on the cutting edges of technology.  The French artists developing the work are also participating in an exciting collaborative action that moves the work to muti-national proportions.  It is very interesting to note that the social landscape of Bangalore, shaped by a shifting identify based on leaving and returning, with constantly transforming versions of self, finds itself metaphorically represented in this work.  In a kind of marriage of art and life, the impressions left by the visitor are impossible to control, and difficult to measure, but absolutely there in the landscapes of living memory.