snowmass recreation CENTRAL ARUNACHAL S TRIBAL GROUPS The variety of tribal peoples in central Arunachal Pradesh is asto

All Dirang s commercial services are in New Dirang, with a strip of cheap hotels, eateries and sumo counters around the central crossroads. Tourist Lodge (%200176; d 825), a kilometre south and overlooking New Dirang, is a basic but friendly family hotel in an old-style hill house crowded with potted plants. Nicer is the next-door Hotel Pemaling (%207265; s/d 1815/2420), which has shiny rooms, excellent snowmass recreation service and a very pleasant garden where you can enjoy the views towards the sometimes snow-bound Se La and the high Himalaya beyond.

CENTRAL ARUNACHAL S TRIBAL GROUPS The variety of tribal peoples snowmass recreation in central Arunachal Pradesh is astonishing, but although the Adi (Abor), Nishi, Tajin, Hill Miri and various other Tibeto-Burman tribes consider themselves snowmass recreation different snowmass recreation from one another most are at least distantly related. Over the last few decades Christian missionaries have been highly active throughout the Northeast and in the process have brought huge changes to the region s traditional cultures, religious beliefs and ways of life. Despite this, some aspects of the traditional snowmass recreation lifestyle are just about holding on and many people continue to practise the traditional religion of Donyi-Polo (sun and moon) worship sometimes at the same time as proclaiming themselves Christian. For ceremonial occasions, village chiefs typically wear scarlet shawls and a bamboo wicker hat spiked snowmass recreation with porcupine quill or hornbill feathers. A few old men still wear their hair long, tied around to form a topknot above their foreheads. Women favour snowmass recreation hand-woven wraparounds like Southeast Asian sarongs. House designs vary somewhat. Traditional Adi villages are generally the most photogenic with luxuriant palmyra-leaf thatching and boxlike snowmass recreation granaries stilted snowmass recreation to deter rodents.

567 NORTHEAST TRIBAL STATES W E S T E R N A R U N AC H A L P R A D E S H THE LAST SHANGRI LA? Recently the government of Arunachal Pradesh has opened up a couple of new areas to foreign tourists. Possibly the most exciting of these is the road from Along to the small, snowmass recreation remote town of Mechuka, close to the Tibetan border. In the past the Mechuka valley, which until recently had no real road connecting it to the rest of the state, was called snowmass recreation the forbidden valley or even a Last Shangri La. Populated by the Buddhist Memba peoples, Mechuka, sitting on the banks of the West Siang River, lives up to its Last Shangri La status and is notable for both the 400-year-old Samten Yongcha Monastery and the stunning landscapes surrounding the town, which culminate in a massive hulk of snow- draped mountains running along the border. For the moment tourist facilities (and tourists!) remain virtually non-existent but sumos now ply the 180km from Along ( 300, seven hours, 5.30am). The only accommodation is the Circuit House, but if that is unavailable then it s likely that local people will put you up be generous in your donation. the owners of which have realised that it is possible to buy new tins of paint a fairly revolutionary thought for many hotels in the northeast. Otherwise try the plusher