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Acknowledgments Ten years have passed since I began the research for this book, and my debts have mightily accumulated. First, my thanks to my three primary informants, Pāgal Bābā, Rādhā Giri, and Mukta Giri, who has since passed away. Their support for and patience with this project in both India and Nepal made it possible. I also offer my thanks to Pāgalānanda, the first yogī I knew, and his respected guru-brother, Dr. Tyāgī Nāth Bābā, at Paśupatināth, and also Nānī Mā, in Sainj, Uttaranchal, for teaching me so much. My gratitude to the President’s Council of Cornell Women and the Cornell University Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies for early support, and to Cornell’s Department of Anthropology for being my home base while researching the book and writing the dissertation that preceded it. All four of my dissertation committee members, David Hines Holmberg, Ann Grodzins Gold, Natalie Melas, and Christopher Minkowski, guided my work with exacting gentleness, in four disciplinary languages. Professor A. Thomas Kirsch started my training as an anthropologist of religion, and his memory has shaped the contours of this book. Deep thanks go to the American Institute of Indian Studies, first for funding much of the research, and then for awarding the manuscript the Elder Prize. Frederick Asher, Pradeep Mehendiratta, Purnima Mehta, Ralph Nicholas, and Susan Wadley provided constant and genuine support throughout the process of the book’s research and publication . Thank you to the Awards Publication Committee and to two anonymous reviewers for their faith, and also Ernestine McHugh for xii • Acknowledgments her warm response and helpful suggestions. At Indiana University Press, I thank Rebecca Tolen for the work of a masterful editor, and Laura MacLeod and Neil Ragsdale for their help. Kevin Bubriski and Bernard Hausner graciously provided photographs, and the School of Anthropology at Oxford offered generous support at the last moment, for Laurie Winship’s professional index. For thoughts, experiences, hospitality, and introductions that made this research possible, thank you to masters of the scene: the late, great Jasper Newsome aka Rām Giri and his guru-brothers in Ānanda Akhāŗā, Man . galānand Giri, the late Ali Bābā, the mad Macchendra Giri, Paul Giraud, Rampuri, Shiv, Cynthia Gould, Dudh Bābā, William Forbes, Caitanya from Lubljiana, Caitanya from California, Beppe, Ishtar, Chandeen , Denis and Alain, the late and loved Bhaskar Bhattacarya, and Dolf Hartsuiker. For help with yogic interpretation and instruction, my gratitude to Mrs. Menaka Desikachar, Kausthub Desikachar, and Shaheeda at the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram in Adyar, and to the late Harish Johari in Hardwar. Many, many loved ones have supported the research, writing, and completion of this book. Thank you to my late teacher, Kunzang Dechen Lingpa, and my parents and sister, Bernard, Nancy, and Ellen Hausner . For inspiring me early and explaining things often, my respectful thanks to Gen. Monty Palit and Meryl Dowman. Greta Austin, Sonam Bennett, Suzie Burns, Jeff Cranmer, Gregory Dicum, Mitchell Duneier, Laraba Friedman, Lindsay Friedman, Elyse Genuth, Julie Hemment, Ariel Kaminer, Martin Kaminer, Meena Khandelwal, Carole McGranahan , Peter Moran, Anne Rademacher, Andrew Rosenberg, Melanie Ross, Pam Ross, Jennifer Senior, Punam and the Vajracharya family, and Andy Young have put up with my comings and goings with alacrity. A tale of wandering is bound to be the product of many places. In San Francisco, Mary Boardman provided a haven to write and Richard Olsen continued to provoke new thoughts. In Winchester, I thank Princess Jyoti and Pragya Shah-Singha for their refuge and Rosemary RossSkinner for her kindness. The sacred valley of Kathmandu sustained this work from beginning to end. And in New York City, a sacred center in its own right, thank you to Susan Falk for letting me return to my longest extant home, a loft-bed on Bank Street, to Ricki Fier and Dr. Henry Kaminer, and to the 4B Academic Library for its beloved desk and comfy gray couch, both of which invited me right on in. ...

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