| On the Wings of a Dragon |
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| Part 10 – In the Land of the Thunder Dragon |
| Monday, September 27, 2010 8:55 AM |
| Dear Friends: |
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The airport in Bangladesh did me in, as airports have throughout
this trip. I arrived at the terminal in Dakha for my flight to Bhutan at
5:00am, so early that the imman was still calling the faithful to
morning prayer over the microphone. I was so sleepy that I staggered
into the men's room with my eyes half shut and failed to see the urinals
against the side wall. What I did see before me was a tub-shaped tile
enclosure about eight feet long with three spigots and a drain, which I
drowsily assumed was a communal urinal, sort of like we had in the Army.
So I did my thing.
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Only as I was zipping up did I realize that it was not a giant
pissoir, but the ablution fountain where devout Muslims performing wudu,
washing their arms, face and feet before they go to pray. Lucky for me
Al Jazeera was not on the scene to record my transgression. With all the
furor roiling the Muslim world that week about the American preacher who
planned to burn the Koran, I think that Podell pissing on a semi-sacred
place would have been highly problematic.And one near-lynching in Dakha
was enough for me.
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The phrase, "On the Wings of the Dragon," which I had chosen for these
installments, is the slogan of the royal airline of Bhutan. During the
course of this long, arduous, and trouble-filled trip I have often
become a bit discouraged and thought of changing the motto -- to conform
to circumstances -- to " On the Dings of the Draggin'," or "In the
Slings of the Dragon" or "On the Flings of the Flaggin'." But I managed
to muddle through and reach Bhutan. 184 countries in the bag!
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The Bhutanese believe that their lovely alpine kingdom is the
original -- and the only remaining -- Shangri-la. Perhaps with good
reason:
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Picture a pristine landscape of thick forests, soaring mountains,
rushing rivers of white water, towering waterfalls, beautiful valleys
dotted with whitewashed farm houses set amid rich green, golden, and red
fields of (respectively) potatoes, barley, and buckwheat, all bordered
by 200 snow-capped peaks of the higher Himalayas, all under a deep blue
sky -- and you have the Land of the Peaceful Thunder Dragon.
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Add a homogeneous population of 800,000 who share a common
background, beliefs, and goals, and a tradition of Tantric Buddhism
which promises them peace, protection, and prosperity; a land that has
never known the heel of a conqueror; a country so isolated from the rest
of the world until recently that it has acquired few of the vices or
shallow values of contemporary civilization; an abundance of
hydro-electric power capacity that is sold to India for foreign
exchange; a per capital income far higher than that of the poorer Asian
countries; all governed by a highly-enlightened, Oxford-educated,
constitutional monarch dedicated to the preservation of that peace,
prosperity, and a healthy environment, and it's as close as you can get
to heaven on earth.
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The people are every bit as polite, kind, and welcoming as those
of Burma, but much happier and far less servile, which I attribute to
their not living under a military dictatorship, but under an benevolent
government, their practice of a more liberal form of Buddhism; and a per
capita income approximately 20 times as high as Burma's.
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I was able to see a large part of the country driving 1200 km along
some exhilarating (i.e. terrifying) mountain roads and passes close to
12,000 feet, and to successful make the six-hour climb up to Tasktsang
Lhafhang, the Tiger's Nest, an amazing Buddhist monastery set near the
top of a powerful waterfall, incredibly carved into a vertical granite
cliff wall above 2,000 feet above the Paro Valley. The construction
required the intercession of the Gods, going back to 747 A.D. when
Padmasambhava, in the wrathful form of Guru Dorji Droloe, flew there on
the back of a tiger to subdue the evil spirits of the region who had
been causing trouble. The vanquished demons were thus transformed into
the protectors of the dharma, and the Bhutanese have lived happily ever
after. (I have promised my aching knees --which are not living so
happily -- that if I ever try this ascent again I will also fly on the
back of a tiger.)
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But the real high point of this trip is that I got to see my old
travel buddy, Steve, who I -- and his doctors -- had given up for dead
last April when he was diagnosed with Stage IV lymphoma. But his sturdy
constitution; the constant attentions of his loving wife, who spent 27
straight days and nights by his bedside; and six rounds of intense
chemo at the VA hospital in San Francisco have blitzed the cancer,
enabling Steve fo fly to Bangkok four days ago and meet me for a
wonderful Thai dinner reminiscing about friends and adventures past.
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I am now in Hanoi for a few days before heading home. Hard for me
to imagine how this town would be any different if the U.S. had won that
war. All the locals are guzzling Pepsi; shopping in Dapper Dan's, Elle
Fashion, and American Apparel; wearing jeans and Western clothes; using
English letters on all signage; and blaring U.S. Top 40 tunes from every
radio. And they are rabid practitioners of free enterprise and
capitalism. Somehow Ho Chi Minh morphed into Donald Trump.
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I hope to see most of you shortly. And I promise to be in touch
again as I aim for the final eleven countries in 2011. I just hope that
Steve will still be around to share that with me, since he is the one
who got me on this road 46 exciting years ago.
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al
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