拥挤的新月 · THE CROWDED CRESCENT
The World's Most Crowded River — India · The Ganges
恒河流域是地球上人口最多的河流流域：五亿多人——约占全人类十五分之一——在这片由喜马拉雅雪水滋养的平原上耕作、祈祷。
雪水与季风雨从喜马拉雅倾泻而下，铺展在一片辽阔而近乎全平的冲积平原上——土层深厚，取水便利，丰年一岁三熟。这份肥沃聚拢了三千年的人烟；而这条河又是印度教最神圣的河，于是平原上稻田与朝圣者一样稠密。
The Ganges basin is the most populous river basin on Earth: more than 500 million people — roughly one in fifteen humans — farm and pray along a single sweep of Himalayan-fed plain.
Snow and monsoon rain pour off the Himalaya and spread across a vast, almost dead-flat alluvial plain — deep soil, easy water, three crops a year where the land is kind. That fertility has gathered people for three thousand years; the same river is the holiest in Hinduism, so the plain is dense with both farms and pilgrims.