Grand Canyon - Ruins

Grand Canyon is not all about nature and its wonders. There are many reasons to visit this natural world heritage site. Being an ardent traveller, nature lover, history enthusiast and an individual who intimately feels for the oppressed populations, I have a lot to look out for in the Grand Canyon. The first is of course, the natural beauty and the adventure possibilities the canyon offers.

Everytime I visit any historical location in the US. Everywhere, an intense sense of rage and frustration descends upon me because of the terminology which is used by the government/ national park service folks. There is a constant drumming of the fact that there were "Indians" or "American Indians" or "Native Indians" here before the Europeans landed and took over the country. This is grossly wrong, there were large native populations in this country and each one had their own nation, such as Apache, Choctaw, Hopi, Pueblo, Comanche, etc.

I'd like to present this picture of a ruins of a settlement in the Grand Canyon. According to some signage, this picture depicts the dwelling of some Native American tribes during 1,000 BC. Of course the signage says "Indian" while refering to the tribes. I understand that 500 years ago when Columbus landed here, he thought he had landed in India and called the people Indians. But since then the world has changed, there has been knowledge explosion thanks to the internet and other communication technologies. Despite these changes, the only thing that seems to persist is that "Native Americans" continue to be called "Indians". I can only infer this mis-nomer as an effort to degrade us, the real Indians from India.

Way back in 5,000 BC India had a glorious civilization and much more advanced society in terms of urban development, roads, art, architecture, culture, language, metallurgy, etc. Some of which have not been replicated to this date by any other civilization... not even the so called "Scientifically Advanced" first world nations. But these people continue to misrepresent India and our people in various forms. Be it in history or in the media such as the recent Oscar-awarded movie "Slumdog Millionaire" and the people who consume such media happily believe this.

I wonder when the "West will Learn".

Grand Canyon Monuments

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Originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

This is another recreated monument on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. One thing strikes me about the US. When the Europeans started arriving in droves into this continent, they hated native Americans and started killing them without question. This resulted in bloody wars and lots of people were killed, especially on the native American side.
But now few hundred years later it is a fashion among European-Americans (White Americans) to say that part of their ancestry is "Choctaw" or "Cherokee" or "Apache" or "Pueblo" or something like that. Another thing that has been done to get more money and attract tourists is to rebuild the old monuments along tourist spots such as Grand Canyon. This will accomplish twin purposes... one successfully covers up the Atrocities meted out to native american populations by invading Europeans and two generates tourist revenue. It is a total "WIN-WIN" situation.

River View @ Grand Canyon's South Rim

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Originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

This is perhaps the most fascinating view of the Grand Canyon that I got to see. I shot this picture at the far end of the South Rim of the canyon near the "Native American" Watch tower and other monuments. The unique feature of this view is that the can yon can be seen in its full glory. Not only can one see both the rims but one can also see its depths where the Colorado river swirls along.
Taking in this view I wish I could just jump into the Colorado river for a refreshing swim to escape the desert heat of Arizona. The azure waters of Colorado are definitely inviting.

Ancient Monument or Modern Store?

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Originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

I shot this picture at the South Rim of Grand Canyon National Park. The first impression I got when I saw this building was that this must be some ancient, Native American ruins. But on getting closer I noticed that this is actually a recent construction or rather a recreation of an ancient building using the materials found here.
Currently a part of the building hosts a souvenir shop where all kinds of Made in China trinkets are sold to visitors and tourists.

Tusayan Museum, Grand Canyon

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Originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

This is picture of the entrance of one of the several museums located on the south rim of the Grand Canyon. When I first saw the building, I thought that this must be a very old building renovated to house the museum. But I was wrong, according to a local official, this building was re-built in the style of the ancient buildings using locally available material and some debris of the old ruins.
Though the exteriorl of this building makes it appear like a ramshackle hut, the insides have all the modern comforts such as fire place, air conditioning etc. It is definitely worth a visit.

Grand Canyon: A preferred getaway

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Originally uploaded by srinidhilv.

Since early adolescence I had been awe struck by the sheer beauty and enigmatic presence of Grand Canyon. The frothing Colorado river beckoned me to raft on its waters and the deep ravines and remote crevasses along the Canyon has held some kind of mystery to me.
In 2007 when I landed in the US one of the first major destinations I visited was Grand Canyon.

When I saw the extreme level of commercialization and urbanization that have been put in place around the Grand Canyon, I was rather disappointed. I expected to find some Native Americans still attired in traditional clothes, riding horses and manning visitors. But things have changes quite a bit and I don't know whether it is for the better.

One way to look at it, with modern infrastructure, lot more people visit the place and the state and hundreds of people earn their living thanks to this. This provides access to the old, weak and challenged. But on the other side, considering the nature and the original inhabitants (Native Americans), the commercialization has pretty much uprooted them people and transformed the nature. I wonder what it will be like after 20 years.

Ever heard of the city of Kingman?

I first landed into US at Los Angeles and then we drove down to Dallas, where I currently live. Enroute we visited several cities, tourist places and interesting and unheard of destinations. One of the places is Kingman sited close to the Grand Canyon. Kingman's claim to fame is not its proximity to Grand Canyon. For one thing, the city is sited on the historic Route 66, this is the city where 36,000 gunners of the US Army were trained for World War II in the Kingman Army Airfield. After the war in 1946 this training base was converted to a storage depot with the main role of destoying thousands of airplanes and melting them into aluminum ingots. Kingman was one of five sites chosen for the task which took 2 years to complete and yielded 70 million pounds of aluminum. In all 7,000 airplanes were destroyed or melted in the city. The few planes that escaped destruction are either flying in private clubs or in the museum as World War II memorablia. The entire history has been well recorded in the Kingman Army Airfield Museum in the town.

Founded in 1882, Kingman is sited in the ruggedly beautiful Hualapai Valley between the Cerbat and Hualapai mountain ranges. Founded mainly as a railroad habitations near Beale’s Springs along the then newly constructed route of the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad, Kingman has come a long way and currently acts as a base for tourists visiting Grand Canyon and has over 50 inns, hotels, motels, bed & breakfasts, campgrounds & RV Resorts.

The museum I liked most is The Mohave Museum of History and Arts. Promoted in 1961 with the sole aim of preserving what is remaining of the heritage of Northwestern Arizona and to display it to public. The museum is a private owned not-for-profit organisation and is funded by revenues derived from visitors, memberships and contributions. The attached library has a fairly vast collection of documents, manuscripts, maps, and photos about Mohave County and the Southwest.

Some of the objects on display at the Mohave Museum





Every city in America, even suburbs, have their own official website, which acts as their main marketing platform giving all the information and inviting people to visit the place, relocate to the community etc. This concept of having websites is slowly developing in India there are nic.in sites for every district and city but then they are simply not alluring enough to motivate people to visit.

The official website of the city of Kingman says that its urban population in 2000 was 20,069 and an estimated 15,431 living outside city limits, making it a total of little over 35,000. For such a small population the city is quite large. Something I have liked about the US is the facilities installed by the goverment in every small town. The opportunities available for every individual to make it big is the same irrespective whether one lives in New York or Kingman. I am quite sure most Americans wouldn't have heard of Kingman, lesser would have visited it. For a population of 35,000 odd there is almost every facility one could need to live there. An airport, golf course, chamber of commerce, visitors bureau to promote tourism, sports complexes, museums, schools and even a court. Even trash collection is managed by the city council and done professionally leaving the streets squeaky clean. It makes me wonder when such facilities will be created in small towns in India.