Deserts, and the five tiṇais

We have explored the three main landforms, but the Earth's surface is very complex, and experts describe a few more. One of them is the desert.

Deserts are large, dry stretches of land with very little precipitation. Their plants and animals are special, like the cactus and the camel. Some deserts are hot, like the Sahara in Africa or the Thar in the northwest of the Indian Subcontinent. Others are cold, like the Gobi in Asia. (Some experts even call Antarctica a desert.) What makes a desert is dryness, not heat, so a cold desert is no contradiction.

Life there is harsh, yet humans have adapted to most deserts. In India, communities who live in the Thar or travel through it have rich traditions, such as folk songs and legends about the desert.

The many ways people have made every landform their home show how adaptable and resilient we are. Resilience means the ability to face challenges and difficulties, adapt to them or overcome them.

The chapter ends with a much older way of sorting the land. The five tiṇais of ancient Tamil Sangam poetry are five landscapes, each linked with certain deities, ways of life, moods or feelings (such as love, longing, separation or quarrel):

• Kuriñji: mountain regions; the main occupation is hunting and gathering.
• Mullai: grasslands and forests; cattle rearing.
• Marudam: fertile farming plains; farming.
• Neydal: coastal regions; fishing and seafaring.
• Pālai: dry, desert-like regions; journeying and fighting.

The tiṇais sort the land differently from mountains, plateaus and plains, but they show a sharp awareness of different regions and what they are like, and of the deep link between people and nature. The Tamil poets sorted the land by how people lived there, and even by what they felt there, not only by its shape.