My wife, Judy, was born in northern India, grew up there, and graduated from Woodstock High School in the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains. Her home was Lucknow, where her father was missionary for the Kansas Conference of the Methodist Church. They left their mission charge in 1957, coming back to America after Judy, the third daughter, graduated from high school and returned to the States to begin her college career at Baker University in Kansas (where she found me!).

In that turbulent region, more than three centuries before the birth of Christ, Alexander the Great marched his Macedonian army out of Europe, through Persia and the mountains of modern Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, bringing Greek "civilization" to those mountain people. Judy's father was a real adventurer and camper, and he took that little Methodist family up into the mountains where they visited villages of blue-eyed, blond-haired boys and girls wearing still the clothing of Alexander's marauding troops. And may I give you a book to read? Try "The Afghan Campaign" by Steven Pressfield (2006).

This is the land of Michener's "Caravans." Here dwell the tribal societies of Pashtun, Durrani, Ghilzai, Kirghiz, Hazari, Uzbek, Turk, Mongol and smaller groups. Here crosses the Silk Road, Marco Polo's route to China. Through these valleys came Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis.

Islam made its way into northern India, again coming from Persia and over the Khyber Pass, in 712 A.D. That brought a never-ending source of conflict. To those Islamic artisans the world owes one of the most beautiful works of architecture, the Taj Mahal. But also the never-ending conflict between Hindu and Muslim.

Judy's home, Lucknow, was a tinderbox for the famed Mutiny of 1857, the great attempt of Indian sepoys to throw off the British East India Co.'s control of central India. English troops of the Raj, and their families, retreated from hostilities into the British Residency in Lucknow, where they lived under siege for 87 days. The Residency was a great and historic building just down the street from Judy's home in the Methodist parsonage.

In the years before Partition, Judy's family took a vacation in Kashmir, living on a houseboat in regal style. Now, of course, Kashmir is a divided land, a continuing struggle still between Muslim and Hindu, between Pakistani and Indian troops.

Judy lived in India through the years of Gandhi's struggle for independence, his nonviolent campaign to rid his people of the British Raj, his ashrams, his instruction in ahimsa, his work with Jawaharlal Nehru as India gained her independence only to find the greater struggle with the nascent search by Muslims for their own independence, which resulted in creation of a two-part Pakistan, later divided into Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Judy, attending boarding school in the mountains above the Ganges and the great India plains, listened in terror from her Woodstock school as Muslims and Hindus murdered each other in the town below their classrooms. The children listened to the screams, the gunshots, the broken glass in 1947. Those scenes were vividly portrayed in the great film "Gandhi." Later, Judy's father worked with Nehru to bring food to the refugees, Muslims and Hindus who lost their homes in that tragedy. We have a photo of Judy's dad, Dr. Donald F. Ebright, meeting with Nehru to discuss food distribution in the refugee camps.

My wife, Judy, was born in northern India, grew up there, and graduated from Woodstock High School in the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains. Her home was Lucknow, where her father was missionary for the Kansas Conference of the Methodist Church. They left their mission charge in 1957, coming back to America after Judy, the third daughter, graduated from high school and returned to the States to begin her college career at Baker University in Kansas (where she found me!).

In that turbulent region, more than three centuries before the birth of Christ, Alexander the Great marched his Macedonian army out of Europe, through Persia and the mountains of modern Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, bringing Greek "civilization" to those mountain people. Judy's father was a real adventurer and camper, and he took that little Methodist family up into the mountains where they visited villages of blue-eyed, blond-haired boys and girls wearing still the clothing of Alexander's marauding troops. And may I give you a book to read? Try "The Afghan Campaign" by Steven Pressfield (2006).

This is the land of Michener's "Caravans." Here dwell the tribal societies of Pashtun, Durrani, Ghilzai, Kirghiz, Hazari, Uzbek, Turk, Mongol and smaller groups. Here crosses the Silk Road, Marco Polo's route to China. Through these valleys came Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis.

Islam made its way into northern India, again coming from Persia and over the Khyber Pass, in 712 A.D. That brought a never-ending source of conflict. To those Islamic artisans the world owes one of the most beautiful works of architecture, the Taj Mahal. But also the never-ending conflict between Hindu and Muslim.

Judy's home, Lucknow, was a tinderbox for the famed Mutiny of 1857, the great attempt of Indian sepoys to throw off the British East India Co.'s control of central India. English troops of the Raj, and their families, retreated from hostilities into the British Residency in Lucknow, where they lived under siege for 87 days. The Residency was a great and historic building just down the street from Judy's home in the Methodist parsonage.

In the years before Partition, Judy's family took a vacation in Kashmir, living on a houseboat in regal style. Now, of course, Kashmir is a divided land, a continuing struggle still between Muslim and Hindu, between Pakistani and Indian troops.

Judy lived in India through the years of Gandhi's struggle for independence, his nonviolent campaign to rid his people of the British Raj, his ashrams, his instruction in ahimsa, his work with Jawaharlal Nehru as India gained her independence only to find the greater struggle with the nascent search by Muslims for their own independence, which resulted in creation of a two-part Pakistan, later divided into Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Judy, attending boarding school in the mountains above the Ganges and the great India plains, listened in terror from her Woodstock school as Muslims and Hindus murdered each other in the town below their classrooms. The children listened to the screams, the gunshots, the broken glass in 1947. Those scenes were vividly portrayed in the great film "Gandhi." Later, Judy's father worked with Nehru to bring food to the refugees, Muslims and Hindus who lost their homes in that tragedy. We have a photo of Judy's dad, Dr. Donald F. Ebright, meeting with Nehru to discuss food distribution in the refugee camps.

We loved the two great books by M.M. Kaye: "The Far Pavilions" and "Shadow of the Moon." Both are set in the mid-19th century, and the first was made into one of the very great HBO movies. I mention the first book particularly because it portrays the establishment of the British Raj in Kabul, Afghanistan - and the Afghans' complete destruction of the Raj, killing every last British man, woman and child, who had taken for granted their right to rule the people of Afghanistan.

The "white man's burden" was a grisly portrayal in the HBO movie. Judy tells of the big, frightening mountain traders from Kabul, bringing their wares down into the Lucknow bazaar after the spring thaw. So frightening were those "Kabulis" that Indian mothers used to tell misbehaving children to straighten up or the Kabulis would get them!

One of the ironies of the mission to India was the marriage of Judy's best friend to a Muslim Durrani zemindar. The marriage did not last, of course, but was quite a reversal of the intentions of the mission movement. To this day, the two remain the best of friends.

Needless to say, the Soviet Union made one of her greatest mistakes when she tried to establish Soviet rule in Afghanistan in 1978, and was eventually driven out some nine years later, tail between her legs. That invasion only strengthened the hand of the mujahideen, and eventually the Taliban and al-Qaida. And of course, that played a role in the events of Sept. 11, 2001.

I leave you with two last recommendations. Try first Peter Matthiessen's "Snow Leopard." And then a book that I guess more Gazette readers have read than any other in recent years: "Three Cups of Tea" by David Oliver Relin and Greg Mortenson. Set in the chilling mountain villages of Pakistan, it's a story to warm your heart.

Into these mountains, America now finds herself committed, and the end of this story remains very much in doubt.

Warner, professor emeritus at West Virginia Wesleyan College, is a Gazette contributing columnist.