Shangri-La is a fictional place described in the 1933 novel Lost Horizon by British author James Hilton. Hilton describes Shangri-La as a mystical, harmonious valley, gently guided from a lamasery, enclosed in the western end of the Kunlun Mountains. Shangri-La has become synonymous with any earthly paradise, particularly a mythical Himalayan utopia – an enduringly happy land, isolated from the world. In the novel, the people who live at Shangri-La are almost immortal, living hundreds of years beyond the normal lifespan and only very slowly aging in appearance.
In the ancient Tibetan scriptures, the existence of seven such places are mentioned as Nghe-Beyul Khembalung. Khembalung is one of several beyuls (hidden lands similar to Shangri-La) believed to have been created by Padmasambhava in the 9th century as idyllic, sacred places of refuge for Buddhists during times of strife (Reinhard, 1978).An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics. An institute can also be a professional body, or an educational unit imparting vocational training—see Mechanics' Institutes. The word "institute" comes from a Latin word institutum meaning "facility" or "habit"; from instituere meaning "build", "create", "raise" or "educate".
In some countries, institutes can be part of a university or other institutions of higher education, either as a group of departments or an autonomous educational institution without a traditional university status such as a "university Institute" (see Institute of Technology). Also, private schools are sometimes referred to as institutes—rather than schools—in some other countries, such as South Korea and India. In Spain, secondary schools are referred to as institutes.