Inspiring Travel Writing from Justine Hardy
Justine Hardy was born in England, trained as a journalist in Australia and has been working in and out of India for ten years on both foreign and Indian newspapers.
She is also an author and documentary-maker; her titles include "The Ochre Border: A Journey through the Tibetan Frontierlands" (1995); "Scoop-Wallah: Life on a Delhi Daily" (1999) and "Goat: A Story about Kashmir and Notting Hill" (2000). Recent titles include "Bollywood Boy", a look right inside Hindi film, 2002, and "The Wonder House", a novel set in Kashmir, 2005. Justine's latest offering is “In the Valley of Mist” (2009), the story of one family living through the changes in Kashmir over the past 20 years.
Justine's areas of specialist interest span the conflict in Kashmir since 1989; Tibet and the Tibetan Diaspora into India; India's spiritual tourists; Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam in India and Yoga.
And you can win a copy of Justine's latest book In the Valley of Mist in this month's competition.
Articles by Justine Hardy
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Alónissos - The Silent Island
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Justine Hardy
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Greece
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Aegean Islands
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Alonissos Island
The man in the bicycle shop put his hands on his hips and stuck out his moussaka belly with pride. He slapped it and smiled at the solid sound. "Tomorrow it is going to rain and that is good for the plants and for the air and it is good for you too...
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Ghee and Nike
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Delhi Region
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Delhi
The gym phenomenon has hit middle-class, broad-beamed India. There may well be a bit of prurience, a titillation for the outsider to be ringside while, once again, West clashes with East: this time it's a death match between ghee-nurtured cholestrol...
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Shopping and Faking
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Delhi Region
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Delhi
Of course it was a good idea. How could it not be? Save thousands and wallow amongst the sensuous stench of Delhi with all the technicoloured paraphernalia of India thrown in as a bonus. Picture the scene: in Central London, a shop selling...
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Yoga Holidays
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Kerala Region
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Varkala
Yoga has returned to the limelight, coinciding nicely with modern man's feelings of spiritual emptiness and physical exhaustion, arriving just in time to rescue us from darkness in our higher chakras and rigidity in our lower backs. The image of...
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Before You Die: The Kashmiri Himalayas
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Kashmir
Watch the Kashmiri Himalayas turning from blue to rose to lavender in the last light from the front of a houseboat on Nagin Lake in Kashmir. Justine Hardy
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Before You Die: On a Warm June Saturday Evening
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Justine Hardy
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United Kingdom
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Cotswolds
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Gloucestershire
Sit on the bench next to the war memorial on a warm June Saturday evening and watch the ladies' bowling team of Blockley, Gloucestershire, performing on the green below. Justine Hardy
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Before You die: Lie on the roof of the Blue House
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Uttar Pradesh
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Spiti
Lie on the roof of the Blue House in Mudh Village in the Pin Valley in the Spiti region on the Indo-Tibetan border.
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Letter from Delhi
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Uttar Pradesh
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Agra
‘Tamasha’ is a Hindi onomatopoeia. It’s perfect. It means ‘a drama’, and there’s nothing the Indians like more than a good drama. When they are at their bellicose best you can pick the word out, scatter-gunning conversations like a shoot out at the...
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Letter from Goa
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Justine Hardy
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India
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Goa
There is a modern sickness in Goa, the coconut palm-petticoated tourist trap on the west coast of India. It is the same febrile condition that has eaten into parts of Thailand, most of Ibiza, once innocent pockets of the Himalayas, in fact in most...
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India Round-up
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Justine Hardy
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India
It's lost its charm I'm told. Tour operators say the infrastructure sucks, service is a joke and top end hotel prices are seriously out of whack with the rest of the country.Perhaps this is why the good minister's assistant's assistant is sitting in...