Land of Beauty and Grace

Somewhere crowded among the memories are images of cottony clouds swirling among very tall mountains. These would be the Himalayas and I would be looking out the window of a UBA flight between Kathmandu and Rangoon daydreaming. It was evening by the time the plane landed; it had been along day, during the stopover in Calcutta I ran to the duty free shop for the purchase of two highly prized items, Marlboro cigarettes and Johnny walker scotch. Like everything in Burma, trade is strictly controlled, so a huge black market exists for anything foreign. On landing I breezed thru customs and was ignored by the swarm of heavily armed security forces, then mobbed by the black marketers who started a bidding war for my contraband. After selling the cigarettes and whiskey for almost 5 times what I paid, I was offered tempting sums for everything from watch and camera to jeans. It was getting late and I was tired so I shared a taxi with some of my fellow passengers who were also headed to the only decent lodging in town, the infamous YMCA.
Burma, part of the once glorious British Empire has fallen into a crumbling state of disrepair, due to paranoid isolation, shortsighted totalitarianism, and bungling bureaucratic inefficiency. The streets of Rangoon are full of fine examples of grand colonial architecture; few are habitable let alone function as intended. Through all the gloom the people remain optimistic, they are spiritual, mild mannered and education hungry, and their friendliness and hospitality made the Burmese experience one of my favorite. Grace and beauty are everywhere women commonly use thanaka (sandalwood paste) as a facial, smoking cigars is common but women tend to carry an ashtray for some reason.
Due to its literary reputation, Mandalay is one of the most famous cities in Burma yet to me it was one of the least known and most exotic places in Asia and a top priority. At the time Burmese visas were limited to a maximum of 7 days and extensions are not allowed. This is incredible considering how badly they need the money tourism could generate. So after less than 24 hours in Rangoon it was time to leave. The roads are few and poorly maintained, so rails and rivers are the main arteries. I arrived at the train station early in the morning and we left with little fanfare, but soon fell behind schedule and arrived hot tired and 4 hours late. The train was very basic, all one class, with unpadded wood bench seats and no fans, fortunately it wasn’t crowded and everyone was friendly. While there was daylight the tracks seemed to pass thru the middle of a dense jungle.
I arrived at midnight by Tonga at the guesthouse, very tired after 16 hours on a hot train. Stepping inside I was not surprised by the lack of plumbing or electricity but the flimsy construction did concern me a bit. As I walked in the whole structure shook and by lantern light I could see everything was mad of bamboo and palm. A strong wind could lift it off its foundation and a spark could burn it to the ground. Another concern was the numerous frogs and lizards, which were feeding on the thousands of mosquitoes and insects, which were beginning to feed on me. Realizing that I was stuck here for the night I passed thru a partition and made myself comfortable on the springy bamboo flooring and was about to doze off but the innkeeper had another idea. He to tried to sell me everything from jewels to opium then he asked the value of everything I had, and eventually we engaged in a trading session both of us convinced we had out smarted the other and feeling pleased with our new possessions. That night my dreams ranged between contented opium soaked euphoria and an exotic primeval anti malarial nightmare. Waking anxious and excited Mandalay felt vaguely familiar yet extremely exotic. Mandalay Hill is a walled compound surrounded by a moat and guarded by a giant pair of gilded Fu dogs, once reserved for royalty, while in the colonial town roads are laid out in a familiar grid pattern but the numbers are out of sequence a subtle difference that made me realize I was in the Far East now.
Hot and sweaty from the walk back to town I walked into, what I thought was a grocery store and was ushered to a seat at a formally appointed table. I soon realized I had stumbled into a wedding reception looking for ice cream. To make matters worse I was dressed in rags compared to the formal wear of the invited guests and the royal finery of the bride and groom. Still my bumbling entrance was accepted as an omen and I was treated like an honored special guest and I got my ice cream.
Reluctantly I plan to leave Mandaly and travel by boat down the Irawady River to Pagan. The boat is an exciting new experience and all eyes are on me at the landing as we prepare to board. The boat a steam-powered paddle wheeler is reminiscent of Mark Twain. The deck is crowded with women smoking the popular cheroot like cigars and always an ashtray nearby. I spend the night sleeping on the deck and wake the next morning sailing down the river with banks dotted with temples, monuments and villages. The view from the deck is a timeless scene of life on the river, children swimming and playing, women cooking and washing while the men tend the fields. At each village we stop to discharge and accept passengers no matter how small. In the evening we arrive and a Tonga Walla deposits me at another flimsy bamboo guesthouse. In the morning the Tonga is there to take me the short distance to an open plain filled with a spectacular collection of ancient ruins. Laid out before me were dozens of crumbling and a few restored temples and shrines, some adorned with gold. Alone and with complete access I explored the ruins and learned all I could of Burma’s glory days. The most striking memory concerns the flattening of gold bars into paper thin sheets called gold leaf. This was done by monks wielding huge sledge hammers and pounding the gold thinner and thinner. The leaves were then used for decorative objects, spiritual offerings and sometimes for physical healing.
People followed me everywhere, eager to engage they shouted good morning, where you from? Sometimes they offered food or drinks but most just wanted to practice their English. They were mostly friendly and polite, but once I was verbally accosted by a large aggressive man at a train station. He badgered me about travel documents and threatened to arrest me. Maybe he was drunk or the town bully, after awhile I realized he was bluffing and only making himself the center of attention. It was at the same train station that I had an even more troubling experience. Suddenly struck with a familiar but urgent cramping of the bowel I followed the overpowering stench to the public toilet. Upon entering I saw 2 planks crisscrossed a foot or more above the floor when my eyes had adjusted I noticed that the floor was covered with maggots feeding on a massive mound of feces and floating in a sea of urine. One slip and I would be in deep shit.
Finally back in Rangoon on my last day in Burma I met a rickshaw Walla who was so sincerely friendly he had to show me the room he shared with several others and his few prized possessions. One was an address book signed by the many travelers he had befriended along with a few pictures of his family and his village. He was university educated, pious and humble, like most Burmese he could not find work in his field and thus accepted the hard work and low pay of a rickshaw driver to support his family. He worked 7 days a week and ate rice and little else, but he told me his greatest joy was spending a few moments talking with travelers. He really made my heart bleed when he gave me a token gift which I found hard to accept. I thanked him and gave him a large tip, but left with a lump in my throat and a pang of guilt in my heart.

Gurus, Sadhus and Hippies

The Hippy culture was heavily influenced by the music, drugs and philosophy of India. In its heyday many made the pilgrimage, some lost themselves, some found themselves all were changed forever. I bought my bus ticket for Kathmandu from a very persistent hawker in the Nepali border town of Birganj. As a rule border towns are shit holes but Birganj is especially sleazy and the hustlers super aggressive. It was a sleepless night and in the morning I was happy to find that I actually had a seat on a real bus. My mood soon changed and not even the magnificent mountain scenery could lift my spirits. After being thrown around in my seat for 12 hours I came to appreciate the atrocious Indian rail system. Arriving in Kathmandu in January was a mistake, although it rarely snows the cold can be bone chilling and central heating was unheard of. Fortunately I had a down sleeping to keep me warm. Unfortunately it was too cold for trekking and I was stuck in the Kathmandu valley, a hippy Shangri la, more western than eastern, only restaurants fronted for hash shops. With names like Eat at Joes, Hungry Eye, Mellow pie and Eden Hash each with their unique menu including Mexican, Italian and American. My personal favorite the Pleasure Room had a great sound system and played Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, and the Greatful Dead. Peace and serenity was all around, I spent my days at the temples trying to soak in the karma and my nights in the “pie shops” smoking my brains out to my favorite tunes, drowning myself with vulgar sweets. By the second week the hash and pie was getting old, and I got involved buying rice paper prints in quantity, my friend Mark introduced me to Jas who was a printmaker. The prints are beautiful and simply made by inking the carved wood blocks, placing the course handmade paper on the block and rubbing with a clean cloth to transfer the design. At $50 for 500 assorted designs it seemed like a huge bargain and a way to finance my traveling. It was going to take a couple of days to produce the prints and while I waited Jas became a good friend but I realized I was cold and hungry for a change.
The south of India is warm year round so I sketched out a plan to stop at the spiritual city of Varanasi before heading to the beaches of Goa. Strolling along the sacred Ganges among the funeral fires, and bodies in preparation felt like a surreal circus with action everywhere and a cast of characters from high priests to low caste untouchables from oblivious livestock to in your face lepers. It is the duty of every Hindu to bath in the sacred river, many come to die and have their ashes spread in the Ganges. Getting caught up in the spirit I took the plunge one morning but stopped short of drinking the brown water and made a hasty retreat when saw a turd and a dead dog float by. The pilgrimage is most important to the old and the infirm. Many like Baba and his disciple are young sadhus, holy men who shun materialism and wonder homeless living on offerings from the less pious. I met Baba on the burning ghats, where I was warming myself after the chilling plunge, our lack of a common language led to a bowl and as my head swirled Baba quickly convinced me to give him the blanket I wore as a shawl rationalizing that I wouldn’t need it on the hot beaches of Goa.
I left Varanasi and headed to Bombay by train then a boat to Goa where I met lots of people from Kathmandu . In fact it was very similar but more cliquish, from the town of Calingute the beach extends north for miles with villages populated by fisherman, cults and hippies. I kept to myself as much as possible, staying in Baga a small fishing village between the uptight born again Christians and the naked acid freaks. I rented a house from a very poor family. The house had no electric or plumbing, was infested with fleas and rats, the mattress was hard and lumpy but it was on the beach and the price was right. Most Goan’s are strict Catholic’s, having been a colony of Portugal for centuries. The landlord’s teenage daughter was in constant trouble, one night we went to a festival where she turned me on to feni the powerful local hooch made from the cashew palm. Sometimes she would borrow money for liquor then her and her boyfriend would crash on my floor. Each afternoon the fisherman prepared their lines and sailed off in their dhow like boats, returning at sunrise with the catch, mostly shark 8-10 footers not uncommon. They butchered and divided the catch right on the beach in front of my house. Then they would sleep for a few hours and do it again, day after day their stamina amazed me.
Once again feeling restless, it was time for another encounter with the spiritualism India is famous for, the Hindu festival called Kumba Mela takes place every 12 years and attracts millions. I was on my way to Hardwar to witness the largest human gathering on earth, no it wasn’t Woodstock. Looking back I must have logged 5000 miles on Indian trains alone, at an average 20 miles an hour that’s over 10 full days. Needless to say I was doing a lot of traveling and some things stand out in a world wind, one was seeing tens of thousands of naked sadhus, dread locked and smeared with ashes, crushed between millions of upper class Brahmins and common untouchables, moving in a great migration into the confluence of three holy rivers to bath at the specified moment. This sight is forever etched in my memory alongside the scene at the burning ghats of Varanasi. Instead of raising my spirituality it lessened it. Life in India is chaotic, my idea of religion is peace and tranquility. I imagined a yogi in a cave high in the Himalayas deep in meditation with the discipline to find his personal nirvana, rather then expecting a communal bath to wash away the guilt of sin.
I had not forgotten about Nepal and being in Hardwar reminded me that I had unfinished business there. I had also not forgotten the back breaking bus ride, but I was determined to trek into the Himalayas. This time the plan was to take a bus directly to Pokhara which is the second city of Nepal but quite different, quiet laid back with a large lake and a beautiful view of the Annapurna range. Before I had a chance to explore the trekking possibilities I got sick. This was different than the usual jelly belly, this was a painful stomachache. So after several days I decided to go to a hospital, only the nearest one was 5 hours away in Kathmandu. Only a couple of years before it would have taken a week to walk. Upon arrival, the first doctor diagnosed a peptic ulcer, the second said hepatitis a third ordered a blood test which confirmed hepatitis. The doctor ordered 2 weeks bed rest, no fatty oily or fried food and no alcohol for 6 months. My old friend Jas had another idea, he took me to a local shaman who prescribed a home remedy of ground herbs to be taken every evening for 5 days. That week turned out to be a big turning point for me, instead of returning thru Europe I decided I would fly to Bangkok with a stopover in Burma. Then travel down the peninsula thru Malaysia to Singapore, Bali and Australia. So on my last full day in Nepal I was approached by a tall guy with a shaved head and the burgundy robes of a Buddhist monk. Although he said my name I had no idea who he was and I looked at him like a ghost. When he smiled I saw his gold tooth and realized who he was. In April 1972 I met Tec on a bus ride from Istanbul to Herat. During the next 5 days we were baptized and initiated into the third world. Now exactly 2 years later our lives intersected again but this time we were heading in different directions. With little time to catch up Lekshe (his new name) introduced me to one of his teachers, a Rimpoche from Bhutan after I made the traditional kata offering he gave me his blessing and an auspicious new beginning.