Mountains, Monasteries, and Myths: What I Discovered While Living in My Darjeeling Family Home (Catapult)

On a chilly Darjeeling morning, I sit in my grandmother’s living room. Billowy clouds sail past the 28,000-foot-high peaks of Mount Kanchenjunga, fifty miles distant as the crow flies. Sunlight spills through the lacy curtains, illuminating the thangka scroll paintings of the Buddha’s life that hang on the wooden walls.