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Niksen: Embracing the Dutch Art of Doing Nothing
by Olga Mecking'Niksen is an increasingly popular Dutch relaxation technique where you relinquish control and just ... stop. At a time when meditative practices can feel like yet another thing to do, niksen is liberatingly simple' the Guardian The Dutch concept of niksen comes at no cost and zero effort. It's literally doing nothing, but consciously so.In this concise and witty book, Olga Mecking will provide tips on how to niksen in the most important areas of your life: work, home and leisure. Talking to experts from around the world, she reveals how doing nothing can make you happier, more productive and creative. In addition, we are given a fun glimpse of Dutch culture to show us why the Dutch are one of the happiest people in the world and why they are so good at doing nothing every once in a while. We all have a concept of what doing nothing means to us, but do our ideas actually correspond with the truth behind niksen? A common hurdle towards embracing idleness, for example, is that we feel the need to be productive, contributing members of society. In fact, even the Dutch tend to say, niksen is niks or, in English, doing nothing is good for nothing. That constant need to work can lead to more stress, decreased mental wellbeing and paradoxically, being less productive. Stress and burnout are on the rise. The antidote: Niksen.
Nine Hills To Nambonkaha: Two Years In The Heart Of An African Village
by Sarah Erdman"When Sarah Erdman, a Peace Corps volunteer, arrived in Nambonkaha, she became the first Caucasian to venture there since the French colonialists. But even though she was thousands of miles away from the United States, completely on her own in this tiny village in the West African nation of Cote d'Ivoire, she did not feel like a stranger for long. As her narrative unfolds, Erdman draws us into the changing world of the village that became her home. Here is a place where electricity is expected but never arrives, where sorcerers still conjure magic, where the tok-tok sound of women grinding corn with pestles rings out in the mornings like church bells. Rare rains provoke bathing in the streets and the most coveted fashion trend is fabric with illustrations of Western cell phones. Yet Nambonkaha is also a place where AIDS threatens and poverty is constant, where women suffer the indignities of patriarchal customs, where children work like adults while still managing to dream"
Nine Hills to Nambonkaha: Two Years in the Heart of an African Village
by Sarah ErdmanA portrait of a resilient African village, ruled until recently by magic and tradition, now facing modern problems and responding, often triumphantly, to changeWhen Sarah Erdman, a Peace Corps volunteer, arrived in Nambonkaha, she became the first Caucasian to venture there since the French colonialists. But even though she was thousands of miles away from the United States, completely on her own in this tiny village in the West African nation of Côte d'Ivoire, she did not feel like a stranger for long. As her vivid narrative unfolds, Erdman draws us into the changing world of the village that became her home. Here is a place where electricity is expected but never arrives, where sorcerers still conjure magic, where the tok-tok sound of women grinding corn with pestles rings out in the mornings like church bells. Rare rains provoke bathing in the streets and the most coveted fashion trend is fabric with illustrations of Western cell phones. Yet Nambonkaha is also a place where AIDS threatens and poverty is constant, where women suffer the indignities of patriarchal customs, where children work like adults while still managing to dream. Lyrical and topical, Erdman's beautiful debut captures the astonishing spirit of an unforgettable community.
Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India (Vintage Departures Ser.)
by William DalrympleThree brothers from a remote village in the Himalayas are driven by poverty to become monks. One becomes a famous masked dancer; the second an accomplished player of the Tibetan temple trumpet; and the third a great Buddhist scholar. A Jain nun tests her powers of detachment as she watches her best friend ritually starve herself to death. A woman leaves her middle class family in Calcutta and her job in a jute factory, only to find unexpected love and fulfillment living as a tantric in a skull-filled hut in remote a cremation ground. A prison warder from Kerala becomes for two months of the year a temple dancer and is worshipped as an incarnate deity; then, at the end of February each year, he returns to prison. An idol maker, the thirty-fifth of a long line of sculptors going back to the legendary Chola bronze makers, regards creating Gods as one of the holiest callings in India, but has to reconcile himself to his son who only wants to study computer engineering. An illiterate goat herd from Rajasthan keeps alive an ancient 200,000-stanza sacred epic that he, virtually alone, still knows by heart. A devadasi - or temple prostitute - initially resists her own initiation into sex work, yet pushes both her daughters into a trade she regards as a sacred calling. Nine people, nine lives. Each one taking a different religious path, each one an unforgettable story. Exquisite and mesmerizing, and told with an almost biblical simplicity, William Dalrymple's first travel book in a decade explores how traditional forms of religious life in South Asia have been transformed in the vortex of the region's rapid change. Nine Lives is a distillation of twenty-five years of exploring India and writing about its religious traditions, taking you deep into worlds that you would never have imagined even existed.
Nine for California
by Sonia LevitinAmanda travels by stagecoach with her four siblings and her mother from Missouri to California to join her father.
Nineteenth-Century British Perspectives on Spanish America: Volume I: Romanticism and Revolutions
by Marisa Palacios KnoxThe sources in this volume focus on Great Britain’s moral, financial, and diplomatic interventions and ambitions in Latin America. It begins during the wars of independence spanning 1810-1825, when Foreign Secretary George Canning prematurely declared, "Spanish America is free; and if we do not mismanage our affairs sadly, she is English." The independence movements of the former Spanish and Portuguese colonies, as well as their ancient past, inspired Romantic writers such as Anna Letitia Barbauld and spurred British military support and political debate, as attested by mercenary Richard Vowell’s Campaigns and Cruises in Venezuela and James Mill's "Emancipation of Spanish America."
Nineteenth-Century British Travelers in the New World
by Christine DevineWith cheaper publishing costs and the explosion of periodical publishing, the influence of New World travel narratives was greater during the nineteenth century than ever before, as they offered an understanding not only of America through British eyes, but also a lens though which nineteenth-century Britain could view itself. Despite the differences in purpose and method, the writers and artists discussed in Nineteenth-Century British Travelers in the New World-from Fanny Wright arriving in America in 1818 to the return of Henry James in 1904, and including Charles Dickens, Frances Trollope, Isabella Bird, Fanny Kemble, Harriet Martineau, and Robert Louis Stevenson among others, as well as artists such as Eyre Crowe-all contributed to the continued building of America as a construct for audiences at home. These travelers' stories and images thus presented an idea of America over which Britons could crow about their own supposed sophistication, and a democratic model through which to posit their own future, all of which suggests the importance of transatlantic travel writing and the ’idea of America’ to nineteenth-century Britain.
Ninety Percent of Everything: Inside Shipping, the Invisible Industry that Puts Clothes on Your Back, Gas in Your Car, and Food on Your Plate
by Rose GeorgeEye-opening and compelling, the overlooked world of freight shipping, revealed as the foundation of our civilization On ship-tracking websites, the waters are black with dots. Each dot is a ship; each ship is laden with boxes; each box is laden with goods. In postindustrial economies, we no longer produce but buy. We buy, so we must ship. Without shipping there would be no clothes, food, paper, or fuel. Without all those dots, the world would not work. Freight shipping has been no less revolutionary than the printing press or the Internet, yet it is all but invisible. Away from public scrutiny, shipping revels in suspect practices, dubious operators, and a shady system of “flags of convenience.” Infesting our waters, poisoning our air, and a prime culprit of acoustic pollution, shipping is environmentally indefensible. And then there are the pirates. Rose George, acclaimed chronicler of what we would rather ignore, sails from Rotterdam to Suez to Singapore on ships the length of football fields and the height of Niagara Falls; she patrols the Indian Ocean with an anti-piracy task force; she joins seafaring chaplains, and investigates the harm that ships inflict on endangered whales. Sharply informative and entertaining, Ninety Percent of Everything reveals the workings and perils of an unseen world that holds the key to our economy, our environment, and our very civilization.
Nineveh and Its Remains: The Gripping Journals of the Man Who Discovered the Buried Assyrian Cities
by Austen Henry LayardIn the middle of the nineteenth century, British archeologist Austen Henry Layard uncovered parts of several ancient Assyrian cities buried beneath the earth, including the capital of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, Nineveh. Nineveh was one of the greatest cities of its time and was an important religious center around 3000 BC. Commerce and religion thrived in the city, which was decorated with ornate stone carvings and reliefs and boasted well-defended walls and an aqueduct. However, the city was sacked in 612 BC, and its citizens were either deported or murdered. From that time forward, the city remained unoccupied, until Layard's excavation in the mid-1800s brought its treasures back into the world. Layard, in this stunningly honest account, describes his journeys around Asia Minor, traveling by caravans to remote places with unfamiliar cultures, religious practices, and customs. He recounts discovering the vast city in the land of Nimrod, and excavating Bas-reliefs, winged lions, tombs, and large stone wall carvings, all of which were a part of the British Museum's excavation and subsequent transfer to London. Inserted throughout descriptions of Layard's encounters with tribes and fascinating historical discoveries is a look at the introduction of Christianity to the region and the culture of the people who once roamed the brick-laid streets of one of the most famous cities in religious and secular history. This new edition of Layard's classic narrative is sure to make a stunning gift for any history or archeology buff.
Ningyo
by Alan Scott PateFamed the world over for their intricate beauty, Japanese dolls (ningyo) have played an important role in that country's culture. This first comprehensive book on antique Japanese dolls published in English focuses on the five main categories of dolls-gosho palace dolls, hina girl's day dolls, musha boy's day dolls, isho costume dolls, and theatrical dolls-made during the Edo period (1615-1868) when ningyo culture was at its peak. Features an extensive glossary and bibliography, plus 250 color photographs.
Ningyo
by Alan Scott PateFamed the world over for their intricate beauty, Japanese dolls (ningyo) have played an important role in that country's culture. This first comprehensive book on antique Japanese dolls published in English focuses on the five main categories of dolls-gosho palace dolls, hina girl's day dolls, musha boy's day dolls, isho costume dolls, and theatrical dolls-made during the Edo period (1615-1868) when ningyo culture was at its peak. Features an extensive glossary and bibliography, plus 250 color photographs.
Ninja: 1,000 Years of the Shadow Warrior: A New History
by John ManThe definitive history of the ninja, based on a wealth of historical texts, local Japanese sources, and John Man's own treks across Asia“An immensely entertaining history, packed with splendidly blood-thirsty tales of derring-do, feats of endurance and self-sacrifice.” —The GuardianOut of the violent chaos of medieval Japan, a remarkable band of peasants rose to become the world's most feared warriors—trained to perfect the art of ninjutsu, the deadly union of martial arts and deception. Today, however, these real life ninjas are overshadowed by legend and pop culture caricatures. Could they fly? Climb walls? Make themselves invisible?Drawing on a wealth of historical texts, local Japanese sources, and his own comprehensive treks across Asia, acclaimed author John Man takes us back to the ninjas' origins in China, through to their heyday in the bloody civil wars that ended with the unification of Japan in 1600. Man also illuminates the twentieth-century reemergence of the Japanese tradition of shadow warfare through the Nakano Spy School—the elite military-intelligence academy that operated as an extensive spy network during World War II—and reveals one former Nakano soldier, Onoda Hiroo, who may be the last surviving ninja.Compelling and absorbing, Ninja reveals at last the fascinating true history behind one of the world's most enduring legends.
Nippenose Valley (Images of America)
by Wayne O. WelshansThe first settlers in Nippenose Valley found the area to be burned over and seemingly inhospitable. They settled high near the springs, but the wet clay soils above caused them to move down to the limestone valley floor. They soon discovered that the soil beneath them was some of the richest in the county. These photographs trace the communities that define Nippenose Valley, from Antes Creek to the villages of Millport, Rauchtown, Jamestown, Oval, Collomsville, and Bastress. Nippenose Valley documents the development of an agricultural community that has evolved slowly over the years while still holding on to its roots.
Niskayuna
by Schenectady County Historical SocietyIn the 17th century, the area now called Niskayuna consisted mostly of cornfields. Niskayuna officially became a town in Schenectady County when the county split off from Albany County in 1809. From its early days as a farming community to its present state as a suburban town, Niskayuna has attracted residents from many areas. Transportation has been crucial to the development of the town, beginning with the Albany-Schenectady Turnpike. After the turnpike came the Erie Canal, proposed in 1808 and completed in 1825, which linked the waters of Lake Erie in the west to the Hudson River. Water transportation was soon joined by the Schenectady Railroad Corporation and the Troy and Schenectady Railroad. Finally, a modern system of roads and highways came into being during the 20th century. As manufacturing grew in the nearby city of Schenectady, Niskayuna emerged as the residential suburb that it is today.
Niños Como Yo
by Lisa AguirreEsta es una historia muy linda y agradable sobre una niña que va con su padre a visitar a su abuela en Haití. Se pregunta cómo serán los niños en Haití. Ella está emocionada de saber que tiene mucho en común con ellos.
No Access Boston: Beantown's Hidden Treasures, Haunts, and Forgotten Places
by Maria OliaNo Access Boston is a collection of the hidden places and little-known facts about the hub of New England. These are the secret gems of the city and many are completely off limits to the public. Through these pages explore tucked away establishments, burial sites, secret tunnels, and so much more. All of these spots evoke a secret historical metropolis that is lost in time and harboring deep mysteries! What a fun way to &“explore&” Boston!
No Access New York City: The City's Hidden Treasures, Haunts, and Forgotten Places
by Jamie McDonaldNo Access New York City is a collection of the hidden places and little-known facts about New York. These are the secret gems of the city and most are completely off limits to the public. Through these pages explore the secret train station below the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, the gold vault at the Federal Reserve, burial sites, tucked away establishments, secret tunnels, and so much more. All of these spots evoke a secret metropolis that is lost in time and harboring deep mysteries! What a fun way to &“explore&” New York!
No Access Washington, DC: The Capital's Hidden Treasures, Haunts, and Forgotten Places
by Beth KanterNo Access Washington, DC tells a story of the nation&’s capital through places in, near, under, over, or around the city—a collection of spaces that most people don&’t see, can&’t see, rarely see, don&’t know how to see, or haven&’t seen. Come journey beneath DC&’s most iconic buildings like the massive undercroft below the Lincoln Memorial and discover hidden-in-plain-sight wonders such as the mini Washington Monument or a neighborhood home that is a thriving habitat for plastic dinosaurs. Journey deep into historic archives, embassies, theaters, and studios. Imagine ringing the bells at the National Cathedral. NoAccess Washington, DC is a tribute to a side of the city not shown on postcards, but that is gaze-worthy all the same. What a fun way to &“explore&” the capital.
No Bad Waves
by Yvon ChouinardMickey Muñoz has been called the "surfer's surfer," and is loved and respected among the cognoscenti for his contributions to surfing and the surfing life for the past 60 years as a surfer, a pioneer of Waimea Bay, a stuntman (stand-in for Gidget), a board shaper and designer, and as a sailor and boatbuilder (America's Cup). Mentored by the Malibu greats of the '40s, and an influence on generations of surfers since, Mickey weaves the story of a California waterman using his own life and that of his friends.
No Baggage: A Minimalist Tale Of Love And Wandering
by Clara BensenOne Dress, Three Weeks, Eight Countries--Zero Baggage Newly recovered from a quarter-life meltdown, Clara Bensen decided to test her comeback by signing up for an online dating account. She never expected to meet Jeff, a wildly energetic university professor with a reputation for bucking convention. They barely know each other’s last names when they agree to set out on a risky travel experiment spanning eight countries and three weeks. The catch? No hotel reservations, no plans, and best of all, no baggage. Clara’s story will resonate with adventurers and homebodies alike--it’s at once a romance, a travelogue, and a bright modern take on the age-old questions: How do you find the courage to explore beyond your comfort zone? Can you love someone without the need for labels and commitment? Is it possible to truly leave your baggage behind?
No Baggage: A Tale of Love and Wandering
by Clara Bensen"No Baggage" is a memoir that will resonate with adventurers and homebodies alike--it's at once a romance, a travelogue, and a bright modern take on the age-old questions: how do you find the courage to explore beyond your comfort zone? And can you love someone without the need for commitment, or any expectations for the future?When Clara Bensen arranged to meet Jeff Wilson on the steps of the Texas State Capitol, after just a few email exchanges on OKCupid, it felt like something big was going to happen. Clara, a sensitive and reclusive personality, is immediately drawn to Jeff's freewheeling, push-the-envelope nature. Within a few days of knowing one another, they embark on a 21-day travel adventure--from Istanbul to London, with zero luggage, zero reservations, and zero plans. They want to test a simple question: what happens when you welcome the unknown instead of attempting to control it?Donning a single green dress and a small purse with her toothbrush and credit card, Clara travels through eight countries in three weeks. Along the way, Clara ruminates on the challenges of traveling unencumbered, while realizing when it comes to falling in love, you can never really leave your baggage behind.
No Barriers: A Blind Man's Journey to Kayak the Grand Canyon
by Erik Weihenmayer Buddy LevyErik Weihenmayer is the first and only blind person to summit Mount Everest, the highest point on Earth. Descending carefully, he and his team picked their way across deep crevasses and through the deadly Khumbu Icefall; when the mountain was finally behind him, Erik knew he was going to live. His expedition leader slapped him on the back and said something that would affect the course of Erik's life: "Don't make Everest the greatest thing you ever do. " No Barriers is Erik's response to that challenge. It is the moving story of his journey since descending Mount Everest: from leading expeditions around the world with blind Tibetan teenagers to helping injured soldiers climb their way home from war, from adopting a son from Nepal to facing the most terrifying reach of his life: to solo kayak the thunderous whitewater of the Grand Canyon. Along the course of Erik's journey, he meets other trailblazers--adventurers, scientists, artists, and activists--who, despite trauma, hardship, and loss, have broken through barriers of their own. These pioneers show Erik surprising ways forward that surpass logic and defy traditional thinking. Like the rapids of the Grand Canyon, created by inexorable forces far beneath the surface, No Barriers is a dive into the heart and mind at the core of the turbulent human experience. It is an exploration of the light that burns in all of us, the obstacles that threaten to extinguish that light, and the treacherous ascent towards growth and rebirth.
No Dogs Allowed!
by Sonia ManzanoFrom the actress/writer best known as Maria on "Sesame Street" comes her picture-book debut that tells of a close-knit Puerto Rican family who heads out for a day at the lake with their family pet, only to find out that dogs are not allowed on the beach.
No End In Sight: My Life as a Blind Iditarod Racer
by Rachael Scdoris Rick SteberRachael Scdoris, the daughter of a sled musher, has a passion for sled dogs and racing. From a young age she dreams of racing the Iditarod. Afflicted with a rare eye disorder, she is legally blind but is determined to overcome obstacles to make her dream come true. The book tells of her childhood, her experiences at school, and her struggle to become independent. Her love of dogs and dogsledding are paramount throughout her young life.
No Fixed Abode: A Journey Through Homelessness from Cornwall to London
by Charlie CarrollCharlie’s teaching contract came to an end and he found himself with no job and no money, but all the time in the world. He decided to travel from Cornwall to London in remarkably cheap way – as a tramp, on foot. With a mix of travel and current affairs writing, No Fixed Abode sheds light on a side of the UK few ever see from within.