On India

In India, every day, extremes of life mix, but retain their essential character. Like a good curry. The secret to a good curry that people don't understand is not the mixture of the tastes, but that each component retains its essence and your taste buds should pick them up individually.

In the video on the left, the moghul emperor Akbar marries a Rajput princess, and the sufi's sing. Colors, fire, tears and Qawali collide and in a stirring finale, the great emperor joins them in the sufi whirl.

I am not a fan of panning panoramic camera shots, but this captures the ethereal role of the Emperor best understood by reading The Miniaturist by Kunal Basu in which a great painter is charged with spending his life making miniature paintings for the grand book of the Emperor Akbar's life, and has never even seen the Emperor.