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 Namaste & Aum Namah Shivaya!
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| Welcome to Karnali. I, Vaishali Patel Shah, would like to take this opportunity to introduce myself. |
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| Talking about me, from early childhood I had fascination for Himalayas and religious things. I have always been desirous of visiting holy places in upper mountains of the Himalayas and because of my religious bent and keen desire to visit holy places, I could visit many places including Gangotri, Gaumukh, Tapovan, Yamunotri, Kedarnath, Badrinath, Amarnath Vaishnodevi etc. |
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When I visited Himalayas for the first time at the age of 12 for a yatra, I was more excited by the amount of adventure involved – trekking, hiking, being so close to nature. Slowly, this adventurous feeling gave way to devotion and reverence, which carved path to my first yatra to Kailash Mansarovar in the year 1994.
Being an artist by academics, I used to spend hours to draw and sketch beautiful mountains, rivers, waterfalls, trees, and some local people’s portraits during my trips to Himalayas. I have exhibited my paintings on ‘Himalayas’ at several exhibitions in India.
I was 18 when I performed my first pilgrimage of Kailash – Mansarovar, making me the youngest female to perform this Yatra then. Compared today, the yatra was more physically challenging 15 years before. We had to trek nearly 400 km (250 miles) to complete the yatra. Since my first yatra in 1994, I have been fortunate to perform it many more times. After each yatra my mind used to be submerged in thoughts of mighty Himalayas and used to have a very satisfactory and enduring feeling.
Gradually, it occurred to me to help others to perform this yatra and I started with giving information about this yatra to pilgrims from my home stated of Gujarat. I used various media – paintings & photograph exhibitions, slide-shows, newspaper articles etc. to spread the awareness and information on yatra. Subsequently, I started organizing yatra and traveled with my groups to better serve them during the yatra. I am very excited to be part of this beautiful work that not only gives me an opportunity to meet lots of wonderful people from various parts of the world, but also allow me to accompany them to fulfill their utmost desire to perform the yatra.
At last, I wish that I may succeed in a humble attempt of showing you benefits of: taking mind away from worldly affairs to meditation, going away from noisy life of city to life of solitude and clean air, from worldly affairs to heavenly heights, from darkness to light. In short, experience of indescribable bliss.
Thank you,
Vaishali Patel Shah
Please click on the links below to view
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