EDITORIAL

SOLI S. MEHTA

The last three volumes of the Himalayan Journal have been printed in Bombay, with the editor tucked away, firstly up the Hoogly (14 miles from Calcutta) and latterly up the Blue Nile (120 miles from Khartoum)—and terribly romantic but a logistic nightmare, with letters and valuable contributions delayed or lost completely. Someone has to share the brunt of all this with the editor, and uptill now it has been Jagdish Nanavati who has had to deal with the Press—the 8 Pt. Excelsior or the 10 Pt. Baskerville—the galley proofs—the binding—packing and despatch. This is, as all other fellow editors will recgnise, a thankless task which is an unrelived in its boredom as it is critical in its exactitude. From this volume onwards he is assisted by Dr. P. A. Naik and R. E. Hawkins who will add another eye to the proofs and Kekoo Naoroji who has an even more soul destroying task of looking after the advertisements and other general administration of despatch and billing. Sailesh Maha- devia assisted him in obtaining advertisements so necessary for additional revenue. To this small editorial team, then, you owe the H. J. Vol. 34 that you now hold in your hands.

The reading matter-wise, thanks and gratitude go to the authors (most of whom needed no second reminders) and the stalwarts of the mountaineering chronicle—Anders Bolinder, Dr. A. Diemberger, Mike Cheney, Jose Paytubi, Ichiro Yoshi- zawa, Ad Carter and Andrezej Kus all of whom have plied me with a constant stream of contributions and other details (addresses of leaders, corrections of facts, comments on trends). Editors of other Journals and magazines have permitted me to reprint from their issues most freely—I can only repay by offering reciprocal facility.

SOLI S. MEHTA

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