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Baltit, the capital of Hunza
The city came to be called Karimabad from
Prince Karim, the present Aga Khan.
Facts F
History
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Diary F
People
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 There
many question marks about the people of Hunza. Keays summarises them as
follows: "Blue eyes, fair skins and blonde or reddish hair were said to
be commonplace amongst all the Dards. With feature that were nothing if
not European, was it possible that here were the long lost descendants
of the Greeks who had crossed Asia with Alexander the Great? Or, since
even Alexander's day there were reports of a similar people, were they
perhaps remnants of the original Aryan race from which all the
Indo-European peoples were descended? And was there perhaps substance in
the myths that placed the garden of Eden somewhere in the valleys of the
Hindu Kush?" G. W. Leitner in 1830 said that "I do not palliate the old
Hunza Practice of lending one's wife to a guest or of kidnapping good
looking strangers in order to improve the race." Puzzling, isn't it?
The origins of the separate Hunza and
Nagar Kingdoms are obscured by legend, but they are probably offshoots
of Gilgit's Trakhan dynasty. From a marriage of royal cousins of that
dynasty in the 15th century came twin sons, Maglot and Girkis, later to
become the rulers, respectively, of Nagar and Hunza. From infancy, so
the story goes, the little princes had a mutual hatred, and as kings
they led their people into frequent bloody battles with one antoher.
 Baltit
Fort (details), a potent symbol of Hunza's history and idendity.
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 [21 Aug. couvert Baltit Hotel Hunza]
Golden Mountain (7400m), Hopper Mountain et son glacier,
Castle Min-Khan (Baltit Fort)
Ermite dans la chambre du fond, sans
doute pour écrire un livre. Pitoyable guide au chateau. Je ramène un
souvenir gratuit, ma chute sur le glacier. Méfiance du guide
pakistanais, semble beaucoup mieux s'y connaitre en armes qu'en histoire
locale...
 Thé
au Darbar Hotel. Deux hommes dansent, quelle tristesse comparé aux
superbes danses de Turfan. L'Islam comme pratiqué par ici commence à me
sortir des naseaux, en fait tout système qui oblitère la moitié des
agents du dit-système. Confirmé par la "Pakistan Blaphemy Law (BBC 22
Aug.) Un professeur d'université condamné à mort sur dénonciation de ses
étudiants...
Have a look at
Hunza culture and ideology.
 Jeep tour
to the Glacier |
Views F
Landscape
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Orientation F
Maps
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 Check
out the photo album.
At
over 8,000 feet above sea level, on a narrow ledge between the gloomy
chasm of the river and the sheer backcloth of glacier scarred rock,
Hunza is like some forbidden fairy-tale garden. Vines smother neat
little houses, they wind their way up the loftiest poplars and cascade
down from the topmost branches. The earth is strewn with mulberries and
on every flat stone a carpet of yellow apricots lies drying in the
dazzling sunlight. |
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