All Creatures Great & Small

The writings of explorer-authors form a bridge between our urban world and the world of nomads and other rural communities who live by different life models.

Reading about those gives me an idea of what I am missing and makes me lust for theirs.

They are close to the earth. And not afraid of the outdoors. They know how to birth their sheep and camels. They know how to find their way with stars. They know how to light fires and build homes. They know how to get by on very few resources. As a community they have it all worked out.

And their laws of transaction are different.

In Buddhist lives, money is not the currency they are pursuing – it is karma.

In Arabian nomad lives giving hospitality is a right and not accepting it is akin to insulting the host. To offer something in return is unacceptable and the only way to pay off one’s debt to life is to pay it forward to another – to anyone in need with the circle of life extending to include everyone and to cover inter-generational give-and-take.

With such mind-opening ideas, is it not reasonable to be completely enticed into their world like Alice through the looking glass?

And so I pursue them. In real life. And in imagination.

Through their works of art.

Here is another work created with soul by the Qashqai Shekarlu tribe who lived as close to their animals as nomadic pastoralists and travelled twice a year with their flocks for about 400km between the summer pastures and winter pastures.

How engaged with their animals they were, is clear by the inclusion of these creatures in their art: