Arunachal Pradesh

A warming noodle soup with vegetables or meat in a clear broth, everyday food in the cold hills of Tawang and West Kameng.

Hand-pulled flat noodles torn straight into a simmering broth with greens, a homely Monpa soup made from a simple flour dough.

Steamed dumplings of thin wheat dough filled with minced meat or vegetables and cheese, served with a fiery chilli paste.

Thick, soft pancakes of buckwheat flour cooked on a griddle, a Monpa breakfast eaten with butter tea and chilli-cheese relish.

A thick, smooth dough-like porridge of finger-millet flour stirred into boiling water, eaten with vegetables, meat or chilli.

A spicy, creamy dish of fermented yak or cow-milk cheese (chura or churpi) cooked with chillies, onion and tomato.

Salted tea churned with butter into a rich, warming drink, served many times a day and offered to every guest in Monpa homes.

Crisp, twisted fried pastries made in large batches for Losar, the Monpa New Year, and offered at altars and to guests.

A sharp, smoky Apatani pickle of bamboo shoot, pork fat and king chilli, kept for weeks and eaten with rice.

A pungent chutney of fermented soybeans pounded with hot chillies, salt and ginger, eaten in small amounts with rice.

Strips of meat smoke-dried over the hearth and tossed with crushed hot chilli and salt, a long-keeping relish served with rice.

Pork cooked with sour fermented bamboo shoot, ginger and chilli in very little oil, a feast dish across Arunachal Pradesh.

A circle dance of Adi women at the Solung harvest festival, led by a male singer who tells the stories of creation and farming in song.

The dance of Galo women at the Mopin spring festival, performed in white attire to songs that welcome prosperity and good health.

A Monpa masked dance-drama in which performers in bright costumes enact a story with song and dance, staged at Losar and other festivals.

A Monpa pantomime dance in which two men inside a yak costume dance with a rider and masked herders, celebrating the yak that sustains life in the high hills.

Masked ritual dances performed by monks in the courtyard of Tawang Monastery during the Torgya festival to drive away evil and bring well-being.

The agricultural festival of the Apatani people of Ziro valley, held on 5 July, praying for a good harvest and the protection of crops.

The largest Buddhist monastery in India, founded in the 17th century.

The largest Buddhist monastery in India, standing on a ridge above Tawang town at about 3,000 m, a centre of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism.

A high mountain pass on the road to Tawang, at about 4,170 m, with a lake that freezes in winter and snow for much of the year.

A broad, pine-ringed plateau that is home to the Apatani people and their remarkable terraced rice-and-fish fields.

A vast rainforest tiger reserve in the far east of India that rises from low river valleys to snowy peaks, rich in rare animals and plants.

A Hindu pilgrimage site on the Lohit river where thousands take a holy dip on Makar Sankranti.

The remains of a medieval brick fort that gives the State capital, Itanagar, its name.

A forest tiger reserve in the foothills, best known for its hornbills and for the community programme that protects them.