Tibet Journals II: The Road Out

...We leave Lhasa in the falling snow.  The bright blue curtain above is gone, replaced with a ceiling so low I'm afraid I'll bump my head.  It is a day best described as listless.  Lhasa is equally so this early in the morning.   Luckily the clouds lift eventually, through the rain lingers.  We stop for fuel in a little town of tree-lined streets.  It is pretty in a way, but it could be the weather, like how Japan looks best in shadow.  LYL and I buy more road snacks, giggling at some of the weirder items, like dried chicken feet.  The further we get from Lhasa the more the sky clears.  This leaves us the views as we wend up toward the 4700m Kamba-la Pass.  Hugged by the hairpins, ruined monasteries stand sentinel in the valleys below.  Here and there are overlooks, where industrious men have turned their animal husbandry toward the free market.  For a few yuan you can take a photo with a horse, a yak, a mastiff.  The latter are simply immense and furry like lions.  I've read of these dogs, and how they can be vicious when protecting the homestead. They prove far bigger than I'd expected but appear to be passive when off duty.  From the pass we look down on the Yamdrok-tso, Tibet's most scared lake.  It's waters are reputed to be turquoise, but not under darkening skies like above. The lake takes a week to walk around, and the drive feels nearly as long, since there are no bridges that feed it.  We zig and zag along the inlets, as if tracing the shape of an amoeba.  People take advantage of the water source, their horses pulling plows between the irrigation channels. Cow pats decorated the walls of their farm compounds.  With the remaining handprints, they are little round catcher's mitts.  

The skies darken again, and the snow comes and goes, comes and goes. We move beneath a jawline of jagged hills, the second row onward snow-capped.  On the other side of these is Bhutan.  There are goats at the next pass, and a snarl of flags. A road appears to be going in across the valley, leading perhaps to the dam further on, one controversial as it bleeds water from holy Yamdrok-tso.  Another pass, higher this time, beneath the Karola Glacier.  It is an idyllic spot, with a few farm houses clustered beneath, obviously taking advantage of the ever-present fresh water.  We can feel the 5045m altitude though the locals appear unfazed.  A group of women sit and gossip nearby the stupa marking the landscape as auspicious.  A pair of them approach Lai Yong speaking Singlish, which scores them points for accuracy...

...We lunch in Gyantse, at an Indian place that is tasty, despite the vomit on the stairs leading in.  The old dzong hovers above, which appears repeatedly in the books I've brought on Francis Younghusband, and the 1904 British Invasion.  In hindsight, I'd wished I'd climbed it, to brush my fingers with history.  Instead we go immediately to Pelkor Chöde Monastery.  The street leading in is a mess of construction, the old town now sacrificed for Han tourism. (The following morning, I'd see a similar sacrifice had been made in Shigatse, its once charming old market quarter having already fallen victim.) The walled kora route is visible above but few of the original buildings that it once fed remain.  The central temple is a massive red monolith, no doubt difficult to destroy.  It is an atmospheric place, dusty and open and mythic due to the walls above.  There are no other visitors here.  The adjacent Gyantse Kumbum is next, the name reminding me of the Scorsese film. This stupa is a simple pyramidal structure pocked with chambers that contain a different deity, 108 of them over four floors.  Inside one I find Vajrapani, the Tibetan equivalent to Fudō-myō, solving a personal mystery I'd discovered in my reading earlier in the van. I am tempted to climb up the top of the stupa, but I can see G is anxious about getting to Shigatse before Tashilumpo closes to visitors. So we go...

 
...Our first stop in Shigatse is a huge military checkpoint.  I follow G inside, as they need visual confirmation.  I always feel tense in places like this.  I sit and wait as a few guides and drivers joke in Chinese with the Chinese staff.  Most seem friendly, but then tense up with the arrival of a trio of obviously higher rank, who are stern and appear to be in a heated discussion. And my heart sank because I knew that all attention to shift to them (it did) and we wouldn't get to the monastery on time.  At that point an odd character walked in, a heavy-set Australian clad in flip-flops, sweatpants cut-off at the knee, and a baggy shirt open to the chest, bangled with jewelry.  The moment flesh touched the seat I'm lurched into a series of questions about myself and my travels.   It was an odd, disjunct exchange, where each subsequent sentence barely connected the one before.  He was traveling with his wife and teenage daughter and obviously starved for alternative companionship, clutching at conversational topics as desperately as a shipwrecked man lunges for floating debris. Yet he kept missing, and when he tired of asking questions, he'd simply make a statement about travel, leaping from decade to decade, continent to continent. I tried to hold up my end of the volley to these lobs, but he told me that I was the first foreigner in Tibet who actually returned his conversation, I found I had nothing to say...

...We made it to Tashilumpo Monastery after all.  It was laid out like a medieval village, all narrow twisting alleys with high walls broken on occasion by tall doors.  We ducked in and out of these, tying to dodge a Chinese tour group who would spread out to completely fill any space they penetrated.  A young monk hurried to get to the large assembly hall for the late-afternoon chanting.  The rest were all seated in rows, their robes filthy and terribly tattered. Visitors aren't allowed to photograph inside the halls, but through the open doorway seemed fair game. As I raised my camera to shoot, two men attempted to step past into my shot. Assuming they were with the pushy tourist group, I extended my arm to block them.  When I later saw them wrapping a large Buddha statue as a donation, I felt petty and small.  The other group now gone, we continued to wander, And this sacred space began to operate upon me, as I sank into the quiet, and the chanting, and the peaceful vibe.  Our hotel at the center of the new town was garish and pretty ching-chong.  There were a few other foreigners here, including one Dutch couple who were having a hard time getting through to the apathetic staff, their volume rising in tandem with their desperate need for mayonnaise.  Armed with Mandarin, LYL stepped into the fray...

 ... Onward to the west.  Towns falling away now, but until this point they'd acted little more than caravanserai anyway, places built around the fortress monasteries for travelers to sleep and eat.  Little has changed today.  Nomad camps are now the biggest feature on the landscape, just a tent or two, beside which is parked a small truck and the ubiquitous motorcycle.  Sheep herding is done with a higher RPM these days. The few permanent structures are adobe type, protected by dappled walls and deities or scorpions painted onto the houses themselves.  There are a few figures on the landscape:  a boy playing with a toy shovel;  a row of women hoeing in rhythm; a lone walker talking on a smart phone in the middle of nowhere.  Yaks are more prevalent, some with hair shaved to look like hats, other affixed with prayer flags. More numerous still are the sheep, one herd bizarrely the same color as the earth itself.  A tribute I suppose to the landscape, which is stupendous and monumental.  The peaks and hills almost look liquid, as if they are flowing, a tribute perhaps to the volumes of water than once covered them back when all this was seabed.  As attractive as it all is, the landscape is inhospitable, dehumanizing. As such, the nomads enthral me, living a lifestyle as fluid as the land itself.  I imagine that the job of shepherd must attract the same type of character as nightwatchman...

 ... Another reason for the rush of the previous day is to make time for a detour I wanted to do to Sakya.  The road is under construction, and the snows of yesterday have made it thick with mud. Farmers here are collective in their work, undergoing major projects before the earth softens enough for planting whatever it is that can survive out here.  Tourist vehicles are shunted through a checkpoint, unmanned as it turns out, but the road is cut by all the construction and literally goes nowhere.  G and I get out to look around, but he ultimately decides to backtrack and take the other road, which finally gets us to town.  Sakya Monastery is a simple temple surrounded by row house dormitories.  A high wall surrounds all, which we walk after visiting the temple proper.  From here we can see the ruined temple buildings on the hills across the river, as well as into the town below.  A long-time feature of this area is its striped walls of gray and red, but the more recent constructions within the Chinese town ignore this.  Below us, young monks throw snowballs at each other, and from above, more continues to fall...     

...We stop for lunch in Tingri, once the major staging area for the earliest attempts at Chomolungma, or Everest as those men chose to call it, after a former Surveyor General of India who not only objected, but pronounced his name with a long "E."  This late in the day, the only other customers are a group of foreigners at an adjacent table.  From this scrum comes an American accent saying, "There are peanuts in this."  I dismiss her as a difficult tourist until I'm later told that they are a team making an attempt at the mountain.  then I'm intrigued. 

On the drive out of town I notice a new Chinese temple built within the ruins of an old monastery.  (Numerous were the ruins I'd see during the three-day drive, looking forgotten and forlorn, in places deemed too inhospitable to warrant reconstruction.) We leave the Friendship  Highway which we've been following since Lhasa, though we prove to be latecomers as it had already travelled 4670 kilometers since its origin in Shanghai. The road west toward Saga is in even worse condition than the one into Sakya, so we bump and grind along, then leaving it entirely to run parallel awhile through the desert.  The two passes we cross are luckily open, and we drop down to detour enormously over the sole river crossing...

...Saga doesn't quite live up to its name, but it is an ordeal.  A military outpost, the town itself is hideous, and our room overlooks a sprawling bruise of industry which throbs into the night.  There is no heat, hot water is temperamental, and electricity shuts off from 2:00 to 7:00 am.  The staff shuts off for much longer, spending far more time on their smartphones or chatting loudly threw doorways marked, "Staff Only."  (If only they acted like staff.)  This is symptomatic of most hotels in China and India, where the number of 'workers' exceeds the amount of work and leads inevitably to boredom. It reminds me of the manager of a restaurant I used to work at, and his "Got time to lean, got time to clean..." 

... Today we have 600km to cover, so leave just after the power comes back on.  One annoyance in Tibet is that it is on Beijing time, so this time of year doesn't get fully light until almost 8 am.  Coupled with the lack of power, showering and packing up were done by torchlight.  No hotel breakfast either, so we eat at a local place the guides like, run by a Tibetan babushka type with broad face and rolypoly body girded in sheepskin robes. It is a simple by satisfying meal, of thin but gingery rice porridge, and what the New Mexican in me would call Navajo fry bread for dipping. We leave Saga in the same caravan with which we bumped into town yesterday.  In the dawn light, the drive is stunning, beneath low mountains reflected in ice.  As ever, the landscape betrays a previously undersea geography, of long, sloping hills rising toward jagged ridgetops, many pockmarked by sheep.   Now and again a town would appear, the usual unattractive Chinese type of functional two-story concrete blocks flanking the road between.  We stop at one for lunch in a Muslim restaurant.  Needing to pee, I'm directed to the yard outside, piled high with wrecked vehicles and a veritable minefield of human and animal feces.  Still, the cook serves the best food I had in Tibet.  We'll later stop to fill up with petrol, the shop inside selling nothing but Red Bull and beer.  Later we'll come to a new town, obvious by now to my eyes as there is nothing authentically Tibetan about it.  Many are heavy with military, and checkpoints come more frequently now.  Just outside one of these towns is an army burial ground.  And the mountains to the south all rise in India. Atop one pass is a billboard with a photograph of Xi Jinping, telling us all that "Heaven will not provide bread and biscuits.  Anything worthwhile comes from your own efforts."  

 And effort it takes to do roadside prostrations at the last high pass along our westward route.  Lake Mansarovar is to our left, and before us, the reason I've joined G and D in touching my forehead to cold bitumen, is the looming peak of Mount Kailash, the immovable object that brought about ten days of forward movement...


On the turntable: Jerry Garcia and David Grisman, "1991-02-02 The Warfield, San Francisco"

Tibet Journals : Onto Lhasa

...Flying from Kathmandu to Lhasa, you'll want to sit on the left side of the plane.  I don't believe I ever opened my book, as the Himalaya slid beneath me.  I played the 'Name that peak' game, more from assumed geography than any familiarity with shape.  Everest was unmistakable this time, and remained with us for a good half an hour, its apex streaming with blowing snow.   Once over the hump, the land fell away and turned brown, eventually to be cut deep with rivers.  The plane did a wide U-turn over one of these, them cruised in to land in the middle of nowhere. 

Immigration was quick, but baggage took ages to appear, as we huddled in a cold airport.  The bags were scanned, but somehow they didn't notice the guide books.  I'd been warned that they'd be confiscated if found, a loss I was willing to risk.  I had photographed the maps and pages I thought crucial.  But luckily it was a moot point. 

We were met in the car park by our guide G and driver D.  They presented scarves as expected, and we returned the favor.  The Tibetan scarves were longer then I'd seen, even draped over our necks they hung to mid-thigh.  The van we'd have for the trip was big and comfortable.  My eyes immediately found the surveillance cameras, one affixed to the dash, another hanging from the roof like a turret.  As if on cue, we were immediately warned not to discuss politics, a vow I kept, though it would prove difficult at times.  Despite this, the dashboard was covered with statues and draped with beads, which surprised...

...It was an hour to Lhasa, across a dry lunar landscape.  The mountains were like those of Arizona, spiny and rocky, the colors drab against the bright blue of sky.  There was little else here, but for the odd view of the rail line cutting northeast.  Lhasa began as a typical modern Chinese city, of tall apartment towers and hotels, with shops and restaurants on the ground floor.  Beyond this the Potala, marking the old town.  Kyichu Hotel was near the old town's center,  a collection of rooms horseshoed around a quiet garden.  We climbed to the roof to look over the old town, as cats dozed in the grass below...

...We start the day at Drepung Monastery, the drive up winding through forests where yaks graze.  It is a long trudge up the hilly steps to the temple, in the company of locals following suit, or undergoing the kora up along the hillside.  Kata scarves flow white like a waterfall from the base of Buddha statue above.  A few older priests flick their beads as they walk, clad in maroon which covers their thick bodies.  We all move in the same direction through hills and courtyards stacked atop one another up the hillside. The wind is ever blowing, the yellow drapes in the large windows in constant motion. Each room is tainted with that sour smell of butter lamps.  Monks of all ages within, though quiet this Sunday morning.  A few of the older monks stand watching the rooms, though most are distracted by their iPhones.  (One monk talks on his phone on the roof, probably the place with best reception.) I catch one chanting a sutra read off that exact device.  Bills of small denomination are everywhere, stacked and falling off small plates, or from glass cases.  (I'll later change money in the carpark, to be doled out as offerings for the rest of the trip.)  It takes a good hour or more to wander this ancient fortress, reduced by the 40 percent destroyed in the 1950s...

...We drive across town to Sera Monastery, looping around the back of the Potala.  One car we pass has Che Guevara painted on the doors.  I have my first yak steak and fries (which will become my go to meal when tired of the ever-present noodles), then we wander up through the halls. These are bisected by broad lanes and shaded by trees like a small suburban town, its gate welcoming as you step through to a large courtyard. Sera is known for its book-making, so we buy a couple of sutras wrapped in silk. After Drepung earlier, and a week already in the Himalayas, the statuary within begins to take on a certain familiarity, which allows the mind to stop grasping at facts, and the eye to focus then of the magnificence of aesthetics.   One Maitreya sits solidity upon a three story high thanka.  The courtyards here are more yellow than white, and far above, a hermitage glows almost a brilliant gold upon the rocky hillside.  Sera gets its name from the roses that bloom here, and besides these, the cherry trees were just filling in with pink.  Three hundred monks now study here, down from a pre-1959 figure of 5000...

 
...the Norbulingka Summer Palace is today a park, occupied by young Tibetan couples or families, as well as tourists obviously from mainland China.  It is a pleasant stroll beneath the varied fruit trees and around the ponds.  Temples exist here instead of pavilions, their courtyards decorated with fountains and flowers.  I am surprised to find many references to the 13th Dalai Lama, including one temple that serves as a transport museum of sorts, filled with turn of the century bicycles and buggies.  One clever palanquin is built with rails at a 30 degree angle, to use when climbing the long flights of steps up to the Potala.  Not far away is the palace to the 14th DL, though nowhere is that stated.  It looks like it probably did when he left, though I can't imagine that to be possible, especially after the rampages of the Red Guards.  But it fun to dream so, of the boy sitting beneath the large paintings, listening to 78s on the record player.  I remind myself that he fled from here in 1959, as hundreds of Tibetans were being gunned down in the streets beyond the walls... 

 ...the Winter Palace is better known as the Potala, familiar to anyone whose ever seen a photo of Tibet. It appears much smaller than it appears on film, (yet in finally climbing the steps, its size reasserts itself).  The Potala is an inspiring structure, even better than expected, in a way like I found with the Taj Mahal.   Rising majestically from the center of Lhasa, it can be seen from just about everywhere.  You'll find yourself looking for it as you walk the city, in a way that you look for Fuji when you hike the mountains of central Japan. We visit at an early hour, to beat the crowds.  There are already hundreds walking the kora around it.  One man chants as he does full-length prostrations.  He has two small girls with him, attached to ropes at his hips.  As he lays himself out, they run forward a few steps in order to keep from getting pulled off their feet.  The girls bring him a fair amount of attention, and it is they who receive the donations.  Flanking the main walkway is a pair of snow lions, nearly invisible beneath all the kata scarves.  We queue just in front of the massive doors, colorful tassels tied to their impressive knockers.  A few Chinese men smoke as they wait, which annoys as ever, though perhaps a bit more at this high altitude. I am intrigued by a trio of nomads in front of us, quite intricate in their dress and reminiscent of South American gauchos.  The doors open and we find ourselves at the head of the queue, leaving behind others to huff and puff up the steep steps.  Above, below, and around, all is a bright white.  To enter the covered passages that turn the steps back upon themselves is to temporarily blinded.  Finally we come to a large courtyard, and all becomes red.  The sky above bright and flawless, the mountaintops beneath busted with white flour.  An old woman is helped up a flight of steps so steep it is almost a ladder.  She, and many others like her, carries thermoses filled with butter, in a way like Americans clutch their take-away coffee cups as they move around public space. The butter will be used to fill the lamps.  (One poor fellow broke his at the entrance, the floor made slick and dangerous.) The stupa here is a work of art.  A boy monk plays with a cat just inside.  As we wend around, it is refreshing not to jostle with the crowds.  In the main hall, a senior monk meets with uniformed government officials. I recognize the room from the sets of "Seven Years in Tibet" and "Kundun." I find myself most impressed by the 14th DL's anonymous chambers. The thanka and statuary are as incredible as you would expect. There is a a small cave within, housing many of these great works of art  Most are probably original, and we have Zhou Enlai to thank for this, as he personally intervened to protect it.  That said, countless treasures have been looted over the years...        

 ... A cyclo wheels us over to the last of Lhasa's three UNESCO sites, the Jokhang.  There had been a fire at this 1400 year old temple two months ago, but incredibly there was no apparent damage.  This temple serves as the heart of the Tibetan religion, a fact supported by incredible queues.  G waited while I went off to a nearby shop to buy a Tibetan cowboy hat. Once inside we as foreigners had to circumambulate around the outer ring while the locals ducked in and out of the tiny chambers housing relics. It has almost reverse effect of the Potala, this large temple somehow compact within. The neat rows of cushions are topped with a triangle of red robes, like a sailing fleet.  The central image, of Shakyamuni, was the scene of a recent fire, and again, miraculously all was intact.  (An interesting metaphor for the Tibetan spirit.)   We exited out onto the second-story courtyard, filled with pushy Chinese tourists jostling for selfies.  (Over two weeks, I never encountered a pushy Tibetan.  Who's civilizing whom here?)   The courtyard had dozens of people prostrating, while armed soldiers patrolled the wider spaces and rooftops above, as they have since the 2008 protests... 

 ... These wider spaces define the Barkhor that serves as the central market.  It is mainly composed of a ring around the Jokhang, with smaller lanes radiating outward.  After lunch, I returned alone to wander the shops, and the stalls in the market, selling beads, statues, clothing.  There are a few temples around the outskirts, some art schools, and a tiny Muslim quarter which has monopolized the butcher trade in this land of Buddhistic carnivores. (Great band name!)  Passing a barber reading a newspaper, I pop in to give him some business.  Later I stuff my backpack with snacks for the upcoming drives.  Mainly I return to the central Barkhor and people watch, as a carnival of exotic characters and tropes spin round and round and round...
  

On the turntable:  John Coltrane:  Miles Davis and John Coltrane, "The Complete Columbia Recordings"
On the nighttable:  F.M. Bailey, "Mission to Tashkent"

(untitled)

Drifting through doldrums before the rains,
Leigh Fermor and Coltrane
Along for the ride.

On the turntable: Grateful Dead, "Dick's Picks Vol. 10"
  

A Stroll Along Teramachi: Kyoto’s “Temple Street”

The third installment of the Kyoto Streets series, at Deep Kyoto.

http://www.deepkyoto.com/a-stroll-along-teramachi-kyotos-temple-street/ 


On the turntable: James Brown, "There it Is" 

Imbibing Bibliophile #59

 

Walking the Woods and the Water by Nick Hunt

Yona Yona Ale, Yo-Ho Brewing 

On the turntable: The Handsome Family,  "Milk and Scissors"

 

Sunday Papers: Patrick Leigh Fermor

"A bookish attempt to coerce life into a closer resemblance to literature was abetted – it can only be – by a hangover from early anarchy: translating ideas as fast as I could into deeds overrode every thought of danger." 


On the turntable:  Hayseed Dixie, "Weapons of Grass Destruction"

Imbibing Bibliophile #58

The Broken Road by Patrick Leigh Fermor

Asahi Super Dry, Asahi Breweries 

On the turntable:  Ice Cube: "The Predator"

A Strange Bewildering Time...

The flight traced the Himalayan skyline, along the row of peaks sacred to local and mountaineer alike.  I misidentified Everest as Lhotse at first, then was quickly corrected when I saw the former's familiar shape. It's been said that the peak isn't even particularly beautiful, but I disagree, as its grandeur lends itself to beauty. 

Kathmandu itself was barely visible in the haze of early spring.  The farmers were busy with their burning to prepare the soil for the planting.  And since the quake, masons were frenetic with their baking of bricks, which further muddies an already murky sky.  My first impression wasn't the best, of a city sprawling out of control, Asia continuing to eat itself. 

The mind of the traveler is fickle.  No matter where you go, someone will have gotten there first, and never fails to tell you how much better the place was back when.  Yet your own experience is valid in that it is your own.  But for the second time in my life I was feeling that I'd arrived too late. (The previous was with Cambodia.)  I'd thought about going to Nepal about 15 years ago, but friends had suggested I wait out the Maoist insurrection.  Not that my security would have been at stake, but because one of the true beauties of Nepal was the character of its people, and the Nepalese had been under extreme duress at that time.  And as the years passed during my waiting, refugees from the volatile countryside flooded the city, which grew and sprawled and lost a lot of the charm it had had.  Then of course, came the quake...

The effects of this were immediate as we strolled Patan, and it seemed as if every third building had collapsed into piles of brick, and every other remaining building was propped up with timber.  The already narrow lanes became narrower for this, and progress was ever impeded by a motor bike racing through.  The Durber Square was more or less off-limits, the museums and palaces still closed three years on.  This scene would be repeated over the next few days, as we moved through the city, all the monuments in critical condition.  

I was amazed that nothing had been rebuilt, until I was told that this was due to its World Heritage status, which handicapped them into rebuilding exactly according to the original materials and design.  And UNESCO doesn't provide money for the upkeep, it simple adds the name to the list.  The optimist in me wants to believe that the government had put their resources into rebuilding the lives of the people first, which is of course the proper course of action.  So we sat atop a balcony restaurant and pondered this, as below us a pair of temples took form as mere piles of brick.    

The more important temples were in better shape.  The Ashoka stupa courtyard was bright and open and ringed with prayer wheels, under the watch of multi-story apartment blocks.  The Banglamukhi Temple was undergoing repairs, but kids still frolicked in the plaza outside, and local women drew water from the step wells.  The Hiranya Varna Mahabihar was the true gem, and was hosting a festival where shorn young boys were celebrating a rite of age.  Bells rang, priests chanted, and mothers fawned with their selfies.  I immediately got a sense that the religion of the Newar people was different than the Hinduism of India, diffused as the former was with elements of Himalayan Buddhism.  (A topic for further study.)  There were also a few training temples, now seemingly abandoned.  They reminded me somewhat of the madrassa of Central Asia, though with much less adornment.  These open courtyards were now being used by local men and sleeping dogs.  

A festival of another sort was underway at Shree Chandeshwori Mai, its narrow grounds filled with musicians and men chanting.  A few minutes before we'd been passed by a handful of young men dragging a headless goat carcass back to their hotel.  The temple was the scene of the sacrifice, a stone before the altar stained a bright red.  I've never seen a red so red. 

  
The following day we expanded our circle to outer Kathmandu, beginning with the perpetual circles around Bodhnath.  The ring of cafes and shops was almost Roman, and I intend a return here, to spend an afternoon on one of the balconies to watch the wheel of dharma take human form.  I underwent my own circuit, distracted most non-buddhistically by all the bells and whistles. 

Nearby Pushupatinath was much more open, more serene somehow, but that is befitting this place of burial ghats.  We moved quickly past the ruined temples to the river, and spent a few quiet moments watching the journey of others.  A trio of saddhu were sitting on one bank, bodies whitened with ashes.  A couple of other saddhu looked more polished, these being retired sannyasi, renunciate householders moving quietly through a bifocaled later life.  

A short drive took us part way up Swoyambhunath Stupa,  its lower grounds filled with young couples, its upper deck the playground of monkeys.  The central round stupa was off-set by the ziggurat of winding lanes leading up from all directions.  More young people enjoyed the views of the city through the haze, while the older generation revolved and spun and muttered prayers. 

Our driver dropped us off at the renowned Yak and Yeti Hotel, where we had a mediocre lunch served by a numerous and therefore non-attentive staff.  I wanted to see the famed casino here but it was under heavy restoration.  So we ambled over to Durber Marg and looked through the windows at what Kathmandu's leisure class might be buying. (I also learned two new verbs: 'shirting' and 'suiting.')   Hanging a left at the Narayanhiti Palace (post-abdication, now a museum) and over toward Thamel.  The way was lined with outdoor shops aimed at trekkers, many selling knock-off brands, which presents certain dangers.  Finding a proper North Face shop, we bought a few last minute items for our upcoming Kailash kora.   

The length of Thamel was a cavernous tunnel of low-hanging prayer flags.  Legendary and infamous in the way of Bangkok's Khaosan Road.  It was busy with backpackers and punters shouting about goods and services. ( I'd have loved to have based myself here ten or twenty years ago, but sadly I am getting a little soft and pampered.)  We detoured a street over to Vajra books, on Tshering's suggestion.  He'd emailed ahead, so the owner was waiting for us.  Luckily I wasn't in a buying mood, as I could have spent a whole afternoon here, both perusing books and taking with the owner.  Yet another reason for a return.     

We found a locals only counterpoint to Thamel in Asan Tole, a spiderweb of lanes running into a market buzzing with dinnertime shoppers and motorbike commuters.  We braved all this, moving down Indra Chauk to Durbar Square.  Here too was a ruin, with couples and families sitting happily amidst the wreckage.  We paid our admission despite just passing through toward the opposite side.  It was humbling to face so much destruction, and reminded me of my visits to a shattered Kobe in the early months of 1995. 

UNESCO is doing absolutely nothing here.  The US and the Chinese offer the most assistance, the latter of course to counter the balance of long-term patron India (whose own influence is on the wane, mainly due to their embargo of petrol to Nepal not long after the quake, which paralyzed an already devastated economy.)  The Chinese influence can be seen as responsible for subtleties like more governmental pressure on Tibetan refugee communities, and may take form in the tangibilities of a railway that is expected to cross over from Tibet and perhaps eventually reach as far south as Delhi.  The government of Nepal seems to be doing what it needs to do, making some sensible choices, despite a lack of perspective, and lousy sense of timing.  Every decision made seems to alienate someone.      

Beyond the Square was the legendary Freak Street, still pretty grotty but today punctuated with internet cafes.  We ducked into the Snowman Cafe, closing a circle that began at Istanbul's Pudding Shop one year ago.  These two places were the internet of their time, providing travelers with relevant information before they embarked on a journey along the hippie trail.  Today, most in attendance were young Nepali hipster types, but the bearded old fellow serving up lassi looked like he'd been behind the counter since the 60s.  And he probably had been. My lassi tasted slightly narcotic, but I rode out the rest of the night without feeling any effects. 

LYL took the following day off as I broadened the circle outward to the perimeters of the Kathmandu Valley.  Roads muddied from the previous night's rain led us beneath newly sprouting deciduous trees toward Namobuddha.  This old monastery was clean and tidy compared to those of Bhutan, hinting at a funding by the Westerners who come to study with the renowned Rimpoche.  There were a few French here who appeared to be on retreat, quiet, glassy-eyed, and wrapped in pashmina.  A nearby sign read "Keep silence," heeded not at all by the monks gossiping about me.  Another young monk sucked a lollipop, and another talked loudly on his mobile, moving with a definite swagger.     

Despite their efforts, it certainly was a quiet place, high above the surrounding villages that stretched themselves along the hilltops. There were apparently also a lot of rhododendron, unseen by my color blind eyes.  I wandered along the high ridge between the stupa and sub-temples, then dropped down a long flight of stone stairs shaded by prayer flags, buzzed over by cicada whose song I'd never heard.  Midway down, an old woman was chastising a young couple who'd overtaken her.  At the base was another stupa and a small temple, along with a small set of buildings that served as cafes serving cold drinks.  As people circumambulated they stirred dust that swirled into the into the air.  All very wild west, as set in an Italian village. 

Over a drink in a cafe on the square, I talked frankly with my guide about the political situation in Nepal.  I knew that the King had abdicated, but was considered that upon his death, there might be a power grab by his son, a known wild-card who'd been close friends with his cousin who had massacred the royal family in 2001, an event in which he too was injured.  But the guide assured me that the son was a drug addict and didn't have the clout. 

We backtracked to Bhaktapur, where we had lunch on a balcony overlooking the quiet Tachipul Tole, the light music coming from somewhere adding a fair amount to the atmosphere. Taumahi Tole was bit busier, on the day following a battle between neighboring shrine floats.   Foreigners had staked out all the tables of Nyatapole Cafe, so I climbed up Nyatapole temple itself to sit awhile and get into their photos.  We meandered down a narrow lane where I bought a kukri, then continued over to Potter's Square where most of the work was being done outdoors, many kilns and shops having fallen in the earthquake.  Durbar Square suffered the most, with only a few people sitting before the now shuttered museum. 

Our final stop was up the hill at Changu Narayan, a World Heritage site that hardly looked like one, and thus was mercifully spared the crowds.  The temple approach was through a hilltop village that would have been at home in Tuscany.  The temple seemed to have undergone no renovation at all despite its great age, the buildings looking simple dignified.  The grounds were a veritable museum of Vishnu statues, represented all of the gods many incarnations, as well as one stone dating back to 464.  There were only a few people around, namely two girls playing badminton sans (Indra's) net, and a curious trio of Chinese who appeared to be Hindu, diligently going through their rites. 

 The drive back took us past the airport.  People were lined up and looking through the fence, little surprising as people do that throughout the world, watching the flights come and go.  It was only at my hotel that I read that a plane had slid off the runway onto the grass in a non-fatal accident.  This would take on greater significance the following day as we checked in for our flight to Lhasa, to find that all the passengers from flights cancelled the day before were flying out today.  Long queues extended every which way, but hey, at least there were queues.  I thought upon arrival a few days before that certain countries seem to impede their own advancement and modernization as their top-heavy bureaucracies create policies that seem to do little but create havoc.  How many security and bag checks do we actually need?  

And there was one more journey on the other end, after we crossed the border on our return from Tibet two weeks later.  We'd been warned about the road down to Kathmandu, one barely deserving the name. Leaving Tibet was easier than entering Nepal, and the passage between was over a pile of rubble that was once a bridge.  We banged and bumped over stone and brick, moving at a pace only slightly faster than the walking farmers and their livestock.  This area had been seriously hit during the earthquake in 2015, and it's miraculous that the road was open, though only just, as nothing at all crossed the border before October last year.  Nearby villages looked far better than the city of Kathmandu, though there were a still the odd collapsed house.  

We meandered along a track clinging to the hillside, many offering incredible views when one was brave enough to look down.  The hill towns looked as extensions of terrace fields; those in the valleys stretched laterally along rivers.  The scenes along the way were a wonderful encapsulation of rural Nepal.  Road crews were busy in pushing dirt around.  They were often paired off, one shoveling, and other pulling a string attached to it, for some reason.  There were also people planting rice, mainly women, bent at 90 degrees, moving steadily.  Old men sat in front of shops and smoked or dozed, women squatted in colorful skirts and played with babies.   

There were also the checkpoints.  At each one we'd have to unload and open our bags, as the police searched for smuggled gold or pieces of snow leopard or red panda.  The cops proved to be as bored with this as we were, so a few times we would leave a bag or two in the back of our 4x4.  We were told that there would be as many as fourteen checks, but after four or so they merely gave us a quick glance and let us through. Our driver laughed and told us that they would only search those with Chinese faces from here on.    

The 130 km journey took us nine hours.  Each of those hours brought adventure, mainly in the form of a stuck vehicle, or a crash.  Most fun was the muddy hill that sent vehicles skidding and motorcyclists sprawling, all watched over by the townsfolk on the hill above.  And again and again we sit and wait, never certain about how long. 

Which brought its own joy.  The journey was the sole event of the day, and it never failed in being colorful.  And there was peace in all this uncertainty, which reminded me of how I used to travel:  never quite sure when I'd arrive somewhere, but sure I'd eventually will.  This alleviated any pressure around time or expectation.  That lack of expectation was the most profound Buddhist experience of the entire Himalayan journey.  

After the jarring journey sleep was easy.  Just before leaving the hotel the next morning, I noticed a tidy structure nearly hidden in the corner of the grounds.  It was a shrine, but it wasn't even real, just a conglomeration of images and icons cobbled together.  But still, standing beneath its clean lines of brick and polished wood, something strongly resonated in me.  I need a return to this culture, to these people.  After a few more years, and a bit more time to rebuild, I know I'll come back.


On the turntable:  John Coltrane: "Live in Japan"
On the nighttable:  Patrick Leigh Fermor, "The Broken Road"
   

Back to Bhutan

The trip in seems a repeat of the previous entry, with an overnight in Bangkok, and an in-flight conversation with a Western aid-worker.  I didn't know it at the time, but this man acts as a Greek chorus of sorts, and many of the things he mentions returned to me while I was in country.

There are no yaks off my wingtips on approach this time, but it is equally exhilarating, bumping from cloud to cloud, the wings waving as if greeting the houses that dotted the hillsides.  (I remember the quip of one Himalayan pilot, "Our clouds have rocks in them.")

Our guide Pema meets us in the usual fashion, by draping scarves over our necks.  Much like with Pacific Island leis, it is always awkward to receive them, as the visitor is never sure when exactly to remove them.  Luckily the brevity of the first drive dictates this for us, and emerging shortly afterward at Jangtsa Dumtseg Lhakhang we are thus unencumbered. The temple presents the Bhutan I remember, a squat stone structure rising upward in a thick tower, with prayer wheels running along all four sides, and the usual group of traditionally-clad worshippers endlessly circling the grounds like film extras.  The hillside above is topped with prayer flags, and the hill itself is nearly covered by tiny white chortens, which I find out later are made of clay mixed with the ground down bones of the departed. After going one round, I climb the ladders inside the temple to view the paintings within, as the scent of butter lamps hangs thickly in the air.

The drive to Thimphu is also as I remember, along a road that clinging firmly to the riverbank.  The trio of chorten are exactly where I recalled, protecting the confluence of rivers, rooting out the bad mojo that tends to accumulate there. A grisled old cowboy sits before a general store.   India-style road signs lead us in, each with a quip whose level of wit must surely amuse the average 10 year old.  The wind too pushes us onward, as it whips through the narrow valley. 

Arriving in the capital, I am amazed at all the building that has gone on since 2003.  New buildings are of a number that could rival only that of the ones currently going up.  Traffic too, pedestrian and otherwise, seems heavier than before, and while Thimphu can hardly be called a city, it has certainly become a town a-bustle.  I don't recall this many cars moving along the main thoroughfare; my memory tends toward dogs sleeping on the irregular sidewalks.  We move along these, to buy books, and a series of traditional outfits to wear during our week in country.  The curiosity in the eyes of the people we pass, many of the younger types offer greetings.  Like elsewhere in Asia people seem to be just hanging around.  The monks are the only ones who look like they have someplace to be.

At dusk, we visit the dzong, which I'd been prevented from entering in 2003 as the King had been visiting that day.  Today, there are a number of tourists about, taking selfies beneath wooden ladders and white stone. Fifteen years ago, I'd only seen one other tourist group during my 12-day stay.  No surprise really as at that time, only 7000 tourists or so were allowed in.  Today that number has grown to 180,000.  Another change is that the locals no longer need wear their native dress.  Many still choose to do so, but there are as many people walking around in jeans and T-shirts.  Thankfully baseball caps aren't all that popular yet.

Our friends and hosts live nearby, and we enjoy a lovely dinner as the shadows of the dzong lengthened under the arc lights.  Tshering works for the royal family, and as such, he is a fount of information about a country quite curious to the outside world.  Providing an astounding amount of facts and insider knowledge about the kingdom, he is in many ways the man behind the curtain.  And his wit and conversation help shorten the long car rides in the days to follow.

Body on Japan time, I awake early, so walk over to the Memorial Choten.  A few dozen worshipers precede me, and are already undergoing their circumambulations.  A small structure has been set aside for the lighting of lamps, a practical decision in a region that often loses temples to fire.  Beside this I notice a small bit of paper decorating a rock, which reminds me of a little of Shinto.  I attempt to take a photo but am quickly scolded by a guard.  So I join in on circling the chorten, doing a series of rounds before sitting off the one side to meditate awhile.  I'm finding this difficult of late, as the passage of feet in motion tends to present a metaphor for my own life at the moment, movement dictating the current tempo.

That movement is far less physical though than the trio clad in maroon undergoing full-length prostrations.  This facet of Vajrayana continues to puzzle me.  So different than the dignified quiet of shikantaza in Japanese zen, "just sitting."  Is the idea here to use the body in order to deny the body?  And if so, isn't it a little bit absurd, like someone who spends far too much on a fine automobile, then has no money left over to actually go anywhere.  

But we at least have places to go.  We begin with a quick trip up to the Tango Buddhist college and its marvellous paintings.  The walk up at high elevation proves good training for Tibet later, as a parade of monks descends toward town, and at the top, a group of workmen continue their restorations beneath the snow-capped Himalayan foothills.

I'd heard that Thimphu's beloved Swiss bakery had closed, but Ambient Cafe proves a fair substitute.  Here is best exemplified what I most love about Bhutan: the random encounter.  During the course of a single lunch we meet a renowned explorer, a Welsh lama, and Tshewang Dendup, the lead actor in the film, Travellers and Magicians.  On Tshering's mischievous prompting, I ask the latter two my question about Detachment vs. Compassion.  Dendup is in the midst of answering when he stops and says, "Actually that's a pretty stupid question."  And I agree with him.  Getting too caught up in dogmas is a distraction from reality itself.

We arrive in the Phobjikha Valley just past dark, and immediately light a fire to warm our cabin.  Morning dawns brighter and warmer, so we set off on a long hike along the hilltops that define the valley's eastern edge.  It is refreshing to pass through a healthy forest, the path laden with pine needles.  In one village, a trio of men is moving timber into place for a new roof.  A black dog adopts us and tags along.  When we stop, he plonks himself down to sleep. You might not be so tired if you and your friends hadn't been up barking all night, you bastard.  He follows us for an hour or so until reaching a bridge.  There he suddenly turns back, having reached some sort of invisible internal barrier of his territory.

A spur of land provides an overlook.  Some benches provide a perch from which to muse.  The valley spreads out below, and its silence fills us.  We humans all share the same ability to recognize beauty in features.  There is a commonality in what we find beautiful about an anomaly in the landscape, in a passage of music, in art, or even what we consider the perfection of the human face. Where does that come from?

This valley of course is renowned for its beauty, and even more so for what it represents, as the winter migration grounds for Siberian black-necked cranes.  The birds appear to recognize beauty themselves, as they partner up for life.  How much sadder then the fate of Karma, a crane living alone at the nearby Visitor Center after having one wing permanently disabled by dogs.  And how miraculous to see another crane feeding alone out in the nearby marshes, as if staying behind to accompany its mate?                  

We retrace our drive back to Wangdue.  Unlike Japan, only a few farmhouses we pass look abandoned, no matter how remote or impossible the terrain.  Our digs for the night is another cabin, this time at the Eco Lounge that overlooks the ruined dzong, destroyed by fire in 2012. Ironically, I now find myself on the opposite side of the view that I had enjoyed on my first morning here in 2003, when the dzong had been intact.  Large turbines spin on the hill above us, as Bhutan experiments with its first wind power generation.  It is pleasant to sit in the sun on the balcony and watch the temples in the peaks above disappear with the light.  Go to sleep to the stars, awake to the Himalaya.

We break the drive to Paro with lunch in Thimphu at Hotel Druk.  There we meet Karma Wangmo, who'd guided us in 2003.  As we await the meals, Tshering and I dash out to buy books around the corner.  We'll stop again later to cross the iron bridge at Tachog Lhakhang.  The temple itself is privately owned and in a corresponding state of disarray.  I appreciate most the run-down nature of these nondescript places, one unlikely to continue as such due to a cafe being constructed in a side valley just below.

In Paro again, we climb the hairpins to the end of the dirt road where Tshering's own temple is. The views of the valley below are incredible, on a bare promontory wrapped in forest.  The runway of the airport stretches seemingly to our feet.  I doze in the room offered us, then am awakened to be told that we'll be returning to the valley since there is a problem with the water system.  Our replacement digs are equally nice, in a refurbished farm house that has a bath warmed piping hot by heated stones. 

The following day, our last, we take slow.  The original idea had been to climb up to Tiger's Nest, which I'd visited during reconstruction (and our guide Pema had been a workman there at the time.  This former yak-herder had some interesting stories, the funniest being about trading cordyceps with irate Tibetans).   But as that is an A-list destination, it would keep for next time. Tshering instead suggests a hike up to Dzongdrakha Monastery nearby.   It is a pleasant stroll under spring sunshine.  The temple is known as Little Tiger's Nest, as it has a similar imposing cliff-face location, yet this one is privately owned and the lack of UNESCO funding adds to its rustic charm.  Snoozing dogs can't be bothered to greet us, but a few little kids are up and about, helping their parents with chores.  I smile when I see that one has an inflatable REI pillow.  

The walk builds up a thirst, so it is fitting that our next stop is a new craft beer brewery run by Tshering's cousin.  A notorious partier in college, he is now channeling that experience into a marketable skill, namely in the production of the world's first beer brewed with red rice. The affiliated taproom is a few weeks from opening, but his cook does us up some food, which match the beers amazingly well.  I am in my element, gazing down at the quiet airport runway, all flights finished for the day.

As we eat, Tshering mentions a property he thinks might be for sale, so we have a look in the sake of interest.  Nestled not far from the foot of Tiger's Nest, this former farmhouse has been haphazardly opened as a folk museum, a handful of exhibits strewn within the crumbling facade.  It is a beautiful location, set off the road amidst a small orchard and within two hours hike to one of the best loved temples in Asia.  Though the structure needs a lot of work, LYL seems serious about buying the place, and we again wander the rooms, discussing what we can do with them.    

At such moments my mind kicks into the 'what if' game, and I begin to imagine time spent there.  Meals at a large table out in the garden, within the security of the high wall.  Slowly building a library of books on the Himalayas and Vajrayana Buddhism.  Leading friends up the steep trails to Tiger's Nest.  The joy of having one's own temple, a base for resuscitating my own Buddhist practice.  Bicycling down to Paro and becoming one of the recognizable features in town.  Most of all, I feel it was destined somehow, as the beams of light I that had noted during my meditations just up the road at Kyichu Lhakhang in 2003 seemed to fall on this very spot.   Of course, there are also the cold winters to consider, plus the anxious and dark walks from the car, worrying about cobras and tigers.   (We cling to this vision for a couple of weeks, until the impracticality of it all awakens in us.) 

After a quick change back at our inn, we climb the bumpy road up to Eutok Samdrup Chholing Monastic College.  At our wedding party a few weeks before, we had asked guests to offer a donation in lieu of gifts, so as to donate to this temple.  The monks are either orphans or from broken homes, and unlike boys on loan from families for the purpose of becoming monks as a means of acquiring merit, these boys have few other chances in life.  The money donated will go to a water heating system for the temple, as the cold water tends to reek havoc on health and hygiene.  The head priest is of course delighted to receive us, and the feeling is immediately reciprocated, the man radiating such a calm yet solid presence.  (At the height of my Bhutan resident fantasies I imagine studying under him.) He leads the young monks in a blessing for LYL and I, the boys rocking back in forth as they chant, thigh-bone trumpets blaring up the line.  A Thai monk visiting from Bangkok  (who bears a strong resemblance to Benicio del Toro) keeps up a similar strong presence at the other end of the hall.  When it is finished, we are shown the paintings and treasures on the upper floors, among which is an empty room used for English lessons.  Then we are asked to take one of the snack offerings on the main altar, the goddess of compassion beaming down upon us. 

After another bumpy ride back down the mountain, I find Dorjee Wangchuk waiting for us back at the inn.  It is brief visit, but a joyous one, the young man who'd guided me in 2003 now a full grown man with a more filled-in life.  I suppose we can all make the same claim, as can Bhutan itself, having moved from a small country on the periphery of the modern world to one taking cautious steps on a path of its own making.


On the turntable:  Israel Kamakawiwoʻole, "Facing Future"
On the nighttable:  Aisin-Gioro Pu Yi, "From Emperor to Citizen"

Sunday Papers: Robert Louis Stevenson

"Natural talk, like ploughing, should turn up a large surface of life, rather than dig mines into geological strata. Masses of experience, anecdote, incident, cross-lights, quotation, historical instances, the whole flotsam and jetsam of two minds forced in and in upon the matter in hand from every point of the compass, and from every degree of mental elevation and abasement--these are the material with which talk is fortified, the food on which the talkers thrive."

On the turntable:  Huun-Huur-Tu, "The Orphan's Lament"
On the nighttable:  Mizuki Shigeru, "Kitaro"

Imbibing Bibliophile #57

Things Japanese by Basil Hall Chamberlain
Four beer taster set, Ise Kadoya Brewery

On the turntable: Iron and Wine, "The Creek Drank the Cradle"

(untitled)

Riprap steps
Bring out laughter in knees while
Ridgetops above catch clouds

On the turntable:  The Handsome Family, "Honey Moon"

Seven Hours in Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit

Back in the pre-internet days in the 'Nog, I had little access to 'outside' culture (which had its own kind of charm.)  When traveling in Asia, I'd try to break up flights with long lay-overs in in Bangkok, so as to head down to the backpacker ghetto of Khao San Road to buy cheap clothes, stock up on books, and watch a film or two at a sidewalk cafe.  Over the years it was a bit sad to watch the place gradually lose its charm, as more and more foreign chain stores drove up the rents.  Upon my last visit in 2009, I hardly recognized the place.  

The following details a half-day spent during my return from Bhutan in 2003.  

Bangkok!  What a different rush.  Got a ride into the city with the craziest cabbie in Thailand.  He talked as fast as he drove, a wild mixed mumble, as he cut into traffic using all the lanes twice within a single half mile.  (I tipped him well, then regretted it.  If he thinks driving like a madman will make him rich, then he's sure to kill some farang or himself.)  The only sign I saw welcoming me to Thailand had a Ronald McDonald on it (a Thai in whiteface).   A Thai model on a billboard looked like my wife.  On to Wat Po.

Went immediately to the massage area, greeted by a sexy girl in a clingy white dress, but massaged by her granny. (A transparent M.O.) But I appreciated the latter's experience.  She seemed to intuit where I had tension, though after two weeks away I had little.  It was about an hour but felt much longer, laying there clad only in surgical-type shorts on a yellow bed under lazy ceiling fans. 

Wandered the wat awhile.  Dogs lay asleep in the shade.  I entered a courtyard where I remembered from a previous visit a group of old women, but today it was only Buddhas and playful cats.  The Buddhas all had individual expressions, some were black and others had streaks of gold on their hands and foreheads.  I entered a building with a towering Buddha, stretched into a pagoda-shape and covered with jewels.  In another room was a tall Buddha whose escorts seemed to be in need of a touch up, their gold flake fluttering in spots due to the spinning fans.  I walked amidst the jewel encrusted towers and smiled as a fat monk who passed by.  I followed him to a fountain where many old people sat and chatted, in a place made cooler by sitting near water.  On into the pavilion with reclining Buddha, once again vast and incredible.  A group of monks were taking photos of his feet. rounding his heels, I hear a strange sound, which turned out to be old women dropping coins in what in Japan would be altar bells.     

Coming back out, I watched a security guard hassle some Western women about their attire. Rounding the corner of the palace, a friendly man greeted me and offered his advice on what to see in Bangkok.  I appreciated it but really wanted to head over to Khao-san Road quickly.  He wanted nothing from me, no stinger was attached, but he got kind of pushy, pulling over a tuk-tuk and fixing a price.  I got in and rode off, a hot noisy ride through the city.  At the lights, it was like a drag race, all revving engines.  One chubby boy threw water as we passed (Songkran?), but he only got my legs.  

I was let out at a Thai plantation/wat.  I watched a group of monks chanting.  When they finished, they paired off and seemed to bless one another.  In other rooms around the wat, younger monks were being given a lecture by a monk at the blackboard.  I walked into the main building, black and imposing against the sky.  Forgetting to take off my shoes, I was scolded.  Embarrassed, I quickly moved to the center of this building, part southern plantation, part Roman temple.  It was built on five levels, each being pillared with long even rows with Buddhas sitting at the end.  A few cats slept on the cool tile floors.  I climbed the central spiral staircase (on legs quaking from the recent massage) to the roof for great views of the city.  Dark clouds were moving in.  

Outside, the oncoming storms seemed to be led by a glowing corona.  I've never seen anything like it, real end of the world stuff. I walked toward Khao San Rd. for a couple of blocks, passing a few homeless people sleeping on benches, and dozens of young women selling what looked like lottery tickets.  On K.S. Rd I ducked into a cafe for a couple of juices to beat the 34 degree heat, and watched the world pass by.  Many farang walked slowly past, eyes straight ahead in an effort to look cool, to impress.  As I sat, the skies finally broke open, and the street vendors burst into action, covering their wares within seconds.  I wandered the street for a couple of hours.  Things had changed a lot since my first visit in 1997.  There were fewer cafes and many more shops. Vendors had increased too, their stalls facing both directions now.  The street itself seemed to have been closed to vehicle traffic, people walking freely down the middle despite the rain.  One section had been rebuilt into a mini-mall type of upscale chain shops. There again was Ronald, hands in a wai, the bastard. The backpackers themselves looked young, and I felt more out of place than last time.  When entering shops, the keepers greeted me in Thai.  Did they think I was an older expat, adapted into life here?

I bought a few things and settled in at a cafe to watch the street traffic.  A big Irishman in a cowboy hat sat at the next table and harangued me with his adventures, detailing especially the fights and the drugs.  I can't say I was very interested.  Another lonely guy on the road. 

As he chatted, one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen sat at the table below me.  And what followed was one of the most aggressive flirtations I've had in years.  Married as I was, I'd never act on this, but I did enjoy the attention.  Yet through it all, I was never sure if she was a pro.  Today, like last time, I noticed many young Thai girls with older Western men.  Though not surprised, I wonder at the extent of their relationships.  Did this woman like me, or see me as a mark?  Upon paying, either she noticed my wedding band, or noticed me bum a few bhat from the Irishman.  The eye contact stopped immediately.  It was time to go the airport.  


On the turntable:  The Hold Steady, "Boys and Girls in America"
On the nighttable:  W. Somerset Maugham, "On a Chinese Screen"

Sunday Papers: Robert Byron

“A spiritual necessity…travel must rank with the more serious forms of endeavor. Admittedly there are other ways of making the world’s acquaintance. But the traveler is a slave to his senses; his grasp of a fact can only be complete when reinforced by sensory evidence; he can know the world, in fact, only when he sees, hears, and smells it.”

– First Russia, then Tibet (1933)


On the turntable:  Harry Connick Jr., "Easy to Love"

Imbibing Bibliophile #56

The Tibet Guide by Stephen Batchelor
Illy Cappucino

On the turntable:  Iron and Wine, "Our Endless Numbered Days"

Imbibing Bibliophile #55

 

Treasures of the Thunder Dragon, by Ashi Dorji Wangmo Wangchuck
Bhutan Glory, Ser Bhum Brewery

On the turntable:  Hank Williams, "The Unreleased Recordings"