Sydney Australia
January 1992
Dear All,
Why would a Scottish accountant have been signing autographs at a Pioneer School in Omsk, Siberia, last May? There is a fairly easy explanation to that and as you may have been wondering what I’ve been up to and where in 1991 this letter should answer all your questions.
Like the letter I sent when I was in Saudi nine years ago this one does need a wee bit of an introduction and explanation. It is being sent to quite a few people (family, relations, god-children and friends old and new from many sources) so you may not understand all the references, but this is a lot easier for me than to write different letters to you all. Bear in mind that I am writing for my entertainment too. I did keep a journal and these are the edited highlights. I’ve had great fun writing it and re-reading my journals, it has brought back some tremendous memories.
I have had a very interesting eighteen months – it seems to be true, life does begin at forty! The changes I’ve made in my life may be because I am at a difficult age or because I spent five weeks at a “Self Development” type course called Insight IV (in California of course), or because I couldn’t stand the idea of being an accountant any longer. Or something else.
On my fortieth birthday I resigned my job in protest at being an accountant but only shortly before the company went into receivership anyway. I wasn’t clear what I was going to do next but I hoped that it would be something that involved being creative. And I don’t mean creative accounting. At around this time I got a letter from a friend I’d met on the course in California. He was in the process of putting together a book which involved traveling around the world. I wrote back to say how much I admired what he was doing and wished him good luck. Somewhere in that letter I seem to have accidentally slipped in “Can I come and assist you?” and sort of forgot about it. Nearly.
Christmas in Romania
I shall only mention in passing that I was persuaded, fairly easily but at only four hours notice, to help drive 15,000 light bulbs across Europe, literally to ‘light up for Christmas’ a town in Romania called Jimbolia, not far from Timusuara. I actually spent Christmas Day racing down a motorway through Yugoslavia to the Belgrade office of Associated Press to get Sam Westmacott’s “Copy” back to the Daily Mail for Boxing Day. Christmas dinner was not at the McDonalds there as my leader said that hamburgers made her sick. Instead we went to a restaurant next door and fared worse. It was a fascinating trip. On the way over on the Channel Ferry we put out an announcement asking for people to donate sweets, cuddly toys or anything. Going past the ships shop I bumped into a former accounts assistant of mine, Gill Oakley, off on a skiing holiday, buying some stuff for us. It was a delightful surprise. ‘Are you buying stuff for those Romania people too?’ she asked. ‘Er , no, I’m driving.’ We had a television crew with us recording the fun. One of the more interesting and varied Christmas’s of my life.
The First School – Tunbridge Wells
The author arrived in London in February. I accompanied him to a school near Sevenoaks, south of London and we seemed to be able to work together. I had a fantastic time taking photographs. I got a marvelous buzz out of photographing and working with the children. Some of the slides I took turned out far better than I could have hoped for. I was decidedly ‘hooked.’ However the budget couldn’t cope with my expenses so I would need to meet these myself initially. But at least it was agreed to let me go on the trip. So all I would need to do was sell my house to finance myself. Simple. It was something I had actually already resolved to do when I had resigned my job.
Background to the Project
Let me explain a little bit about the author and the book. Lannis Temple, 38 year old recovering Texan Attorney, was backpacking around the world when he was inspired by a tremendous idea for a book. Basically it was to collect the letters and drawings from children aged eight to twelve from lots of different countries. These would be their message to the world about nature and the environment. He has visited nearly forty countries. (The actual number can change unexpectedly if the school in Omsk, Siberia, and Kiev, Ukraine, are suddenly in different countries.) I consider myself very blessed to have been able to accompany him and be involved in the project in some small way for about for about ten of those. A real privilege. And not the sort of opportunity that comes knocking on the average Chartered Accountant’s door too often. I know that the book will be inspiring and spiritual, whatever that might mean to you. To find out more you will need to buy it. It will probably be called “Where Would We Sleep?” and it should be published first in Australia in about October 1992.
But please be clear. This letter is definitely not about the book. It is just about my experiences while traveling. My part in the project was very small. All I did was keep receipts, helped in some ways with admin. and travel (carrying equipment), took some of the photographs and for some schools later on in the trip I gave a small part of the presentation which set the children up to do drawings.
Back to it. Lannis went off on the African leg of his trip (Soweto near Nelson Mandella’s home; Israel during the war; Addis Ababa with rebels only 40 miles away; Timbuktu before the revolution – buy the book and find out for yourself) and I set about pacifying my bank manager and selling my house.
Because we had so many friends (from the Californian course) in the South of France I flew down to help on the Monaco assignment when Lannis started on Europe in the middle of April. That weekend was not too arduous. We were looked after very well by our friends and they assisted with translations at the school.
When Lannis had finished Europe I went with him to USSR in the middle of May. I had exchanged contracts on the house and thinking that it would complete while I was in USSR I had a fairly hectic time getting all my effects packed away. Several very late nights before we left. In view of events later last year the trip was well timed. And fascinating. I did not really believe the people we met in Omsk who said that Gorby would not last the year.
Omsk Siberia
Omsk, Siberia, where we went first, had been a “closed” city up till December 1990. However the people we were dealing with had already set up an International Marathon the year before and since our visit they have even organised an Insight I Seminar there. They are the most amazing passionate and lovely people. They seemed to shower us with gifts at every opportunity. They even got Lannis an interview on TV and a couple of write ups in the local papers.
I will remember many many things. Like, for instance, going to the Cathedral and hearing a Russian Orthodox service being sung and thinking the God must be delighted to hear that marvelous, mystical sound again. Or the young teacher and his girl-friend who come up to me as we were leaving a school we’d worked at and said, in a really open and touching way, that they loved me. I never quite worked out what it was I did but I hope that I can keep on doing it. Or the dinner with our translator, Eugine, and our host, Dimitri, just before we left. We had hit the “Champanski” (yes it is spelt that way) fairly hard and we discussed where they had done their national service and where and when we had faced them, Lannis in the US forces in Alaska and myself doing NATO exercises in Germany. I explained how I had seen my brigadier’s plan for me and my platoon of TA(Reservist) soldiers – I think there would have been twelve of us if they had all bothered to turn up – to defend an airfield somewhere in Germany from hordes of Soviet Tanks. Or how my sergeant had always warned me about the ‘Hairy-Backed Russians with snow on their boots.’ To start with it was about 32 Centigrade outside and after we’d sat in the town sauna it was agreed that I’d had the hairiest back there. I think we laughed till we cried. How long ago it all seems now. I felt concerned for them during the “Revolution” in August as they were the sort of people who were already well out of line in Soviet terms.
Other things that struck me were the way that tourists had access to goods not available to Soviet nationals, simple things too like cans of Pepsi, or that there was a special and far nicer facilities for tourists at the airports. It was as if Soviet people were regarded as second class citizens in their own country. On Aeroflot flights, when we weren’t boarded first, other people were made to give up their seats for us. The flights were memorable, not just for the carpets with holes in, runkled up in the aisle, nor that dogs, hens and pigeons that were loaded with us in the cabin but mainly because the in-flight entertainment was a tombola (raffle) – tickets costing one rouble – I can’t remember what I won – probably a plastic doll. And the Samantha Fox (Page 3) poster on the Airport Bus in Omsk.
Our translator there spoke excellent English but had only ever spoken to half a dozen native English speakers before. He admitted that his experience made it easy for him to translate words such as “Super Fluidity” but he had to look up the word for “Starlings”. He told us that there was a shortage of many things in the USSR, sugar, butter, etc., but the greatest shortage of all was common sense. The national past-time was “Mutual Humiliation” i.e. whenever possible try to humiliate whoever you are dealing with in shops and queues. He envied us our freedom to roam from country to country and deal with the world’s problems; he used his freedom, he said, to solve the problem of finding enough food and clothing for his family. I wonder how all that has changed now, for better or worse.
Kiev – Ukraine
Kiev presented us with a special challenge because – how should I express this. – we got the distinct impression that the powers that be (or should that now be “the powers that were”?) seemed to be concerned about what subversive eight-year-olds from the Chernobyl area would say in their letters about their fears for the future. We had not even been able to get a visa for the Ukraine before we London but our hosts in Omsk, amazing people that they were, had “fixed” that for us somehow. Fortunately we were able to overcome all of the other difficulties too.
There were some precious and positive memories too; the Ukrainian Folk Dance Ensemble made up of children from the Chernobyl area who put on the most beautiful and moving concert just for just Lannis and me, completely captivating and enchanting; we also attended an end of year kindergarten “Graduation” concert – again Chernobyl Children, aged up to about six or seven – a lot of fun and very special. I shall long remember the grin on the face of the six year old boy awarded the ‘Naughtiest Boy in the Class’ prize.
We visited various committees that had been set up to coordinate relief work and projects. In fact it seemed as if we weren’t going to do anything else but visit well intentioned committees whose charters, which were shown to us, gave them the power to coordinate with lots of other committees (which we also visited) and as far as we could see did very little else. Lots of them had their headquarters in a part of a building which the Communist Party had generously given up etc. etc. This was not, of course, getting us anywhere near school children who could do letters and drawings for us.
Fortunately we met another remarkable and courageous couple who invited us to dinner. They were teachers and when we had explained the problem they set about phoning up friends and by 9 pm on Saturday evening they had arranged for about twenty pupils to meet us at school at 10 am the next morning, the first weekend of their summer holidays. Unbelievable. By this time, when we wanted to communicate in our room, Lannis and I were reduced to writing messages. To get to the school we slipped out of the house, or rather, ran to avoid being met by our helpful guide and translator (spelt K – G – B) and were doing all the right stuff about changing trains at the last moment in Kiev Underground system. We got some excellent work and that afternoon we were able to get the Folk Ensemble to do letters and drawings for us as well. The next day we flew back to London. Exciting, incredible and wonderful people and experience.
The couple who did all that work for us had got a scholarship to study in London and we spent some time when we got back trying to clarify details of it for them. I hope that they both got there in the end. His specialised subject was the ‘Killing Fields’ of the Ukraine during Stalin’s time. Not a particularly popular subject less than a year ago. Her 12 year old daughter was quite a character too. Her mother had started to become ill recently – probably Chernobyl – and so she had started to do the cooking – she prepared an excellent meal for us. ‘Poor Cinderella – working away in the kitchen’ I said. After dinner she showed us her pet rat. ‘All you need now is a pumpkin and you could have a coach!’ ‘No way! You can keep your coach – I want a white Mercedes!’ Obviously she had got her priorities sorted out. We also met a youngish teacher friend of theirs who’s parents had been in a labour camp at the time of her birth, so she too remained there for a large part of her early life. She had recently been to see the cell where she was born. It seems so unbelievable.
Language in Kiev presented some interesting challenges for me. We where there on a ‘Home-stay’ program but our hostess could only talk to me in Russian or French. I have barely used French in the 25 years since I failed my O level. I’d even resigned myself to getting no-where with it while we were in Monaco. However it is a lot better than my Russian. By the end of the four days there I was surprised and encouraged by my fluency. And then there was the beautiful 14 year old singer, dancer and harp player from the Troupe who had learnt Spanish in Cuba. I last spoke Spanish regularly in 1978 but she was definitely worth remembering it all again for. So there I was in the Ukraine improving my foreign languages… It was a strange trip in many ways.
Getting to Katmandu
The rest of May was spent getting visas, seeing what we could find out about our Kiev friend’s scholarship and handing over my old accounting clients. The sale of my house still hadn’t completed but my solicitor assured me that it would by the end of the month. We spent something like five hours at the travel agent working out how much time we needed for each place we wanted to visit and all the connections for about ten countries in two and a half months. Incredibly, it was only when we had weather problems in Papua New Guinea, my final country, that we had to change our original timetable.
The next leg was going to start with Katmandu and we would be flying out at 7 pm on Friday 31st May. The night before I could barely sleep. I lay in bed checking out my body to see I all of me really wanted to go. As far as I could make out every part from the top of my head to the tips of my toe were lined up and raring to go.
By 9 am that morning I had got away all the luggage that had somehow crept back into my old home again. My solicitor, David Lloyd-Evans, who had been incredibly helpful through-out, phoned me at 11 am to tell me that the sales proceeds had hit my bank. I went into St. James’s and drawn a large chunk of that out by 2 pm got back to Jane Douglas’s house – where I’d been camping and using her computer – by about 4 pm. She too had been tremendously kind, helpful and tolerant. On the floor of the post office I finished parceling up material for the book that was to be posted to Australia ahead of us and ran to the station where I got the train out to Gatwick Airport. I was sitting in the departure lounge only a little time before the flight for Katmandu was called. The day was taken on the run and a little bit fraught but I think that I completed everything. It was only when we got into the air that I could relax and really believe that I was off.
Katmandu
In Katmandu I had my first experience of something that by now Lannis was very used to; fighting off taxi drivers, would be porters, hoteliers and a variety of other people who were keen to take money off us. With about six heavy bags of clothes, writing and drawing supplies and photographic equipment it was quite an art to hold on to it all before some ‘helpful’ person whipped it into what was probably his brother’s taxi. We got a bus to the “famous” Katmandu Guest House and once we had settled in I went for a walk. The streets are narrow and wonderfully crowded with taxis, motor and pedal rickshaws bicycles and people in colourful clothes. The roads were also full of holes, dirty and smelly. In other words, it was all magical. I felt elated. The first leg of a wonderful adventure and what a place to start.
By way of a contrast, breakfast the next morning consisted of porridge, croissants and Handel’s Water Music. The school was organised for our first full day, Sunday, which is not the weekend in Nepal. Throughout the project schools were found by a variety of methods. This one relied on the brother (who happened to be headmaster) of an aide to the brother (who happened to be working in Nepal) of a university girlfriend of Lannis. Quite a tenuous connection but it worked. The school was in a village and the children were from a mixture of backgrounds, races and castes. It was noticeable that in this culture the boys and girls did not really mix at school. While in the younger classes their numbers were about even, as the classes got older so there were fewer and fewer girls. Presumably they were required to help at home and education was not considered important for them.
Language presented some interesting points. It is normally impolite to use the word for ‘Thank you’ in Nepali. Mind you, that probably wouldn’t trouble some people I know. Thanks is conveyed in other parts of speech, by suffixes and the degree of condescension used by the speaker. And then of course there is the wonderful greeting ‘Namaste’ which is normally translated as something like ‘I worship the place in you where we are all one.’ Beautiful, isn’t it. Makes saying ‘How do you do,’ or, now that I’m in Oz, ‘G’day Mate’ seem a bit tame.
Getting to Lahsa
The next morning Lannis came bounding into my room at about 10.30.- I was suffering slightly from jet lag, exhaustion from working at the school and the excitement of leaving London – ‘You wanted to go to Tibet, didn’t you..?’ True, I’d mentioned that it might be nice while we were in China to take in Lhasa… So before I could say ‘What about some breakfast?’ Lannis had bundled me into a taxi and was introducing me to a Chinese lady from New York who wanted to get up a party so that she could get permission to go there. We were to be her party. “Tibet would be a great addition to the book”.
Two days later, Wednesday, we were at the airport waiting for the flight to Lhasa. Unfortunately the plane didn’t turn up because of bad weather on route. As we had already checked in for the flight, we were taken off to the world famous “Yak and Yeti” hotel for the night. Nice to think that it is being paid for by China Airways and The Peoples Republic. The next day the flight arrived from Lhasa but couldn’t go back because of storms. This gave us a problem as we were originally only due to be there for four days , now down to one, and delaying any longer would have meant problems with timing for the school in India – and re-scheduling our whole trip for the next half dozen countries. We could both go for just the one day ($1,600), but that left no margin for error, sickness, schools being closed (which days are weekends in Tibet?) etc. So how did I feel about doing it on my own.
That was a very interesting question and it started an interesting process for me. I had about three minutes to decide before we would need to re-book, get refunds etc. while we were still out at the airport. The internal panic dialogue ran something like this:-
Lannis doesn’t think I’m ready to present to the children yet….
We’re doing book now, that’s not important here…
Er.. Hamish would be quite pleased if I went….
We’re doing book now, that’s not important here…
Er.. How would we meet up again ?
We’re doing book now, that’s not important here…
Er .. All on my own…..?
We’re doing book now, that’s not important here…
Er .. We would need to split up the pens, paper etc. and we wouldn’t have enough..
We’re doing book now, that’s not important here…
Er .. all sorts of junk, both for and against and each time I got the answer:
We’re doing book now, that’s not important here…
Until, beneath all that dialogue, I heard in my heart “Go”.
I managed to ignore it a bit longer, until I said to Lannis in a very small voice “I’m sorry but I think I’m meant to go…” I was aware that this was not the most practical answer but if we were doing ‘practical’ Lannis would still be in Texas and I would be in London. Lannis was wonderfully supportive of me and my process. It was an amazing sort of spiritual experience of dropping ego and all sorts of considerations that didn’t really matter and listening to my heart. I was quite moved. I wish I had that sort of clarity and experience more often. It may give you a clue as to how important I think the book is. It also explains how I had the amazing experience, privilege … words really do fail me .. of contributing Tibet to the book.
Lhasa – Tibet
So after one more night in the old ‘Yak and Yeti’ the plane decide to give it a go the next day. At the airport there was only slight confusion with our guide as to where Lannis was and why MR S S D Maclaren had become MRS S D Maclaren. The ‘party’, who were Ya-Shi, the Chinese girl from New York, and myself, accompanied by our guide, Jimi, set off with our driver to the Holiday Inn (no wonder the whole thing was so expensive) in Lhasa about two hours away. I had my first experience of what many seasoned travelers have described to me before in these sorts of places: instant people: – The Japanese 4WD developed a problem and we needed to stop along the way. There had not been a sign of anyone for miles and miles along the road, not a village or anything. But no sooner had we stopped than children appeared out of no-where to point and giggle. There was no-where for them to have been except perhaps behind a blade of grass. Interesting phenomena.
I suppose that the Chinese think that Buddhism and the Dali Lama get enough mentions elsewhere so at the hotel they play up probably the only other famous person to have a book written about them and Tibet: Yes – I’m sure you guessed – Tintin.
Lannis had advised me not to get the guide or the authorities involved in setting up a school as they might create difficulties and probably take too much time. From a contact in Katmandu Ya-Shi had got a sketch map of the centre of Lhasa with some primary schools marked. I told our guide I was not feeling well, quite believable and normal at 13,500ft, and went to my room to lie down for a while. A little later I felt ‘better’ and set off walking in the direction of the Putola Palace which I could see looming above everything. I assumed that it would be near the centre where I could use the sketch map. It was a lot further than I thought. I didn’t want to kill myself through lack of oxygen (40% of sea level at this altitude) so I gasped at a passing cycle rickshaw, and somehow, with the aid of the sketch map (which they can’t all read there) managed to explain where I wanted go.
I found the first school marked on the map and hunted around to find someone who could speak English and help. It was now after school hours and it took some time before I found one class still in session. After saying “English?” and “English teacher?” several times a girl of about eight and group of her friends indicated that I should follow them. They led me anti-clockwise around the Bahkor pilgrimage route (the guide-book had said something about making sure that all local customs were observed and being particular to go clockwise with the pilgrims…) through a gate into the centre, up stairs, along passages, and eventually arrived at a door where my young guide pressed the doorbell. A few moments after the completely incongruous “Ding Dong” door chimes I met the English Teacher, Lhabsang Randam. After I had explained the project to him he was delighted to help and knew just the right school. It was arranged that I would meet him here tomorrow with Ya-Shi, who was going to be doing the translations, at 9 am and he would take us there..
On my way out I was invited to help an English conversation class somewhere in the ‘warren’ of rooms. That was fascinating. It was only later that I realised that I had been exposing them to more Western culture than I had realised; my flies were undone. Actually it was probably the reminder I needed not to get caught up in ME doing the project and not getting to big for my boots. Getting back to the hotel I walked the correct way around the Bahkor , something I did almost every day after that. Except for Ya-Shi when she came with me there were never any Chinese there. She was clearly a tourist but there was something about it being ‘too dangerous’ for others. There was the most amazing kaleidoscope of market stalls, monks, beggars, prostrators, pilgrims, old ladies and goodness knows what else. I even saw one member of what the guide book referred to as the ‘Olympic Prostration Team’, stripped to the waist, going hell for leather, standing up and throwing himself forward in the dust again around the pilgrimage track.
I learnt one of the most important Tibetan phrases; “Photos?” This roughly translates as ‘Do you happen to have on you any Photographs of his Holiness the Dali Lama which you would care to give me?’ Our guide had warned us, even before we had got to the hotel, that to have any such subversive material on us could get him and us into serious trouble and we were to hand over the inflammatory items right away. Of course neither Ya-Shi nor I would ever have had about 10 such photos each on us and certainly would never have done anything as disruptive as hand them out to people who approached us and led us down ally-ways, away from spying eyes around the Bahkor. That would have been unthinkable. A strange attitude when there were so many photographs of the Dali Lama pinned to statues in the monasteries and in the palace. I even saw people wearing ‘photo’ lapel badges quite openly around the Bahkor.
That night I could barely sleep. I rehearsed the presentation several times but the altitude, anxiety about getting everything right and mainly a pain in my lower back which I had never had before (and which my chiropractor in Sydney later told me was my Sacroiliac joint (something like that) and could sometimes be put down to taking big steps in life, stepping into ones own power, etc.). I really don’t think that I slept more than about one hour. We had to leave the hotel early for our appointment and, more importantly, to avoid meeting our guide.
I thought that getting a cycle rickshaw within 20 meters of the hotel was pretty good but I considered finding the house again to be a major achievement. Owing to a misunderstanding (probably when I was doing up my flies) the school had not been organised. In fact Lhabsang was still in bed when we arrived. A little time later, up and dressed, he was leading us through some more back streets to a school where he took us to see the headmistress. She thought that the project was excellent and was delighted to help and start right away. In no time she had organised the right number of pupils from a variety of classes into one room. It may also have helped that two of her sisters live in New York not far from Ya-Shi. The children were a mix of Chinese and Tibetan and could write in either language. Quite amazing. After some anxious moments we got some brilliant letters. Ya-Shi found that she got a bit stuck at times so Lhabsang stayed to help out. His English was good but not quite up to doing the whole presentation. He could also translate for the Tibetan children who didn’t understand enough Chinese. The first time I had presented on the trip and I was using two translators. It did, however, go far better than it had any right to. Ya-Shi was quite a star at the school and throughout the trip.
We found out later that Jimi had been ‘Criticised by his leader’ for loosing us. So for the next four days we tagged along with him and did all the tourist sights. I loved the Putola Palace and felt surprisingly peaceful there. We also did a couple of monasteries but one highlight was the Great Yak Hunt. Everything, it seemed, was made with yak butter; cement, candles, tea and goodness knows what else. But we had not seen a yak. So we set off to find and photograph a yak with Jimi and our driver. I’m sure they thought we were mad and was fairly certain that that is what they told the Chinese army road-block who waived us on down the road with gales of laughter. Yaks were not as easy to find in Tibet as you might have thought. Apparently most of them were up in the hills at this time of year. Several villages and many bemused Tibetans later we tracked one down in a farmyard and persuaded some children to feed it hay while I photographed them.
Tibet is not the cleanest of countries and I had started to feel a wee bit ill by the time I left and was living on a diet of bananas and oranges from sellers outside the gate of the hotel. This quote from The Lonely Planet Travel Guide to Tibet may explain some of the conditions more eloquently than I can:-
“The trek to the toilet is an arduous one and you’d best come well equipped for the ordeal. First, do not try to look at the floor. Some of the toilets look like they have been backed up since the first century. Since the sanitation system is non-existent the stuff just lies there in the fly infested pit below. A clothes peg and a set of horse halters would be a good idea. A swig of whisky before the assault is recommended and some are known to pat a dab of tiger balm or Channel No 5 on the upper lip to minimise the overpowering smells. You’ll need a torch to make sure you don’t fall into the back-up at night.”
I read this to a German who was in the process of writing a Tibetan guidebook himself. He studied the far distance thoughtfully. ‘Yes’ he said, ‘They’ve been to Tibet.’ I regret to say that I was glad to leave the country.
The tension between the Chinese and the Tibetans was always in the air. When we were going around the sights our Chinese guide would sometimes pretend to be American like Ya-Shi . It made things easier he said. Almost every evening we were warned not to go to the Bahkor because of ‘problems.’ Almost every evening we went to sort out some details about the school but saw nothing. Apart from the two Chinese policeman armed with machine guns on the roof of the police station. I met an American doing research in Lhasa who lived right beside the square who informed me one night that some nuns had been arrested for throwing rocks. It was not long after the 40th anniversary of China taking over – I don’t think that was how it was officially described – so tension was up. In the English language daily paper in Beijing where I was later there was an article every single day about Tibet, ‘proving’ how much a part of China Tibet is and always was. There was also a ‘Gift’ to the Emperor in the Forbidden City, I’ve forgotten what it was, which ‘proved’ that Tibet was part of China in some way. Methinks they dost protest too much.
Now if you think that I did well overcoming all that on my own, bear in mind that that is just one country. Lannis has done nearly forty. And some of them were a lot more dodgy than my minor hassles. But this is my story. Buy the book and find out what he got up to.
One of the best thing about the trip was flying over Sugamata (Mt. Everest) on the way back to Katmandu. It had been too cloudy to see on the way in. It was really very very special. I used about two rolls of film. There was a cloud base of about 20,000 ft and the three peaks of the Everest Range, as well as about two other groups of ranges stood out clearly above the clouds like icebergs on a frozen sea. Very dramatic and exciting. One day I will go to the base camp. I was very surprised at my over enthusiastic reaction to it all. It was also the final bit of inspiration to write a poem that I hope I remember to include at the end of this letter. Much to my delight Lannis was waiting for me at Bangkok airport where I flew direct from Katmandu. Our plans to meet up had been rather hurried and sketchy and I was a little concerned about ever meeting up with him again. He had had a very interesting time at Varanasi, but that, too, is his story.
Bangkok
Setting up the Bangkok school was a bit tame after that. Lannis already had a contact name and, with comparatively little effort, we got an excellent experimental school attached to the University. They already had an environmental project of their own and their work was first class. Our contact, Dr. Pretit, looked after us so well, taking us for meals, to the royal palace and the snake farm and helping with translations of course. She was phenomenally kind.
The royal palace is incredibly beautiful. The temple and several other buildings are covered in what I can only describe as millions of bits of coloured mirrors. I reckon that whoever built it was ‘taking something’ at the time. The traffic pollution is appalling and the girls very beautiful.
Viet Nam
Viet Nam was interesting. In London I had arranged a four day ‘tour’ from Bangkok, complete with trips to orphanages which Lannis wanted to visit there. Again we were met by a guide at the airport but he was a lot more helpful and cluefull than Jimi. Ho Chi Minh City or Saigon was fascinating. It felt strange to walk along the Mekong River. Names potent with memories of the sixties and seventies. My initial reaction was to wonder what all the Boat People are playing at, risking death to leave, as the stalls in the main square are brimming with western goods – not that I can remember seeing anyone buying anything. But then I didn’t experience the underlying political system. Someone told us that the south, where they never really lost the taste for western style capitalism, was substantially better than the north.
Visiting the orphanages was very moving. The first one we visited was for the handicapped and I started out by being angry with God for the poor deformed things lying in their cots. Then I took the ‘re-incarnation line’. What if these poor brave souls had chosen to come back in those twisted bodies at this time. From there it was far easier to move to respect and love. And one that let it be easy to work with the children. A lot of the children at the other orphanages we went to were also handicapped but not so severely. That was probably why they had been abandoned to the orphanage. At one place, while I was working, a Catholic nun even asked me if I was a minister. I couldn’t think what to say but I was quite flattered.
It seems to be every orphanages’ aim to get children adopted in the West and I got the impression that part of the reason we were taken on full conducted tours of the three we visited was a ‘marketing ploy’. If we had had time I wanted to go back for a morning and help out at the first one we had visited but unfortunately our schedule was too tight. In many ways it was one of the most touching visits I made.
On our last evening we met up with an American who invited us to go with him to a quaint restaurant. There, at our invitation, he chose the menu for us; snake, eel, trout and venison. Very interesting. We had originally met him by the river where a crowd of street children were perched behind him on the railings like twittering sparrows. He spoke Vietnamese and had promised to buy them some bread. He gave the money to the oldest with instructions to buy a loaf for each boy and bring back the change. To my amazement he did just as he was told. There was a crippled lad who had been robbed of the takings of the lottery tickets that he had sold by bigger boys. His margins were small at the best of times and his family would have been in trouble financially for a long time sorting it out so our friend reimbursed the boy himself. We asked him if he thought the wee chap might be having him on. He pointed at the miserable tear stained face. When he was given the money you have never seen such a miraculous change. It was lovely to watch. The boys’ mother later came running up to thank our friend. It was a lesson to me in many ways. He didn’t take any nonsense but in his own quiet and totally unpretentious way he did a bit of good at not a lot of cost. It gave him a lot of pleasure too he said.
Hong Kong
Our next destination was Beijing but we had to go the long way round, i.e. back to Bangkok for one night then to Hong Kong for the weekend before getting an early morning flight into China. Hong Kong was absolutely fascinating. I have heard so much about it but had never really understood the place or its geography. Having been there for 36 hours it now all fits into place in my mind a lot better. I stayed one night with Bruce Walker, an old friend from Edinburgh who I hadn’t seen for about ten years. As I suspect is the normal for Bruce, his social schedule was really tight so I waited up till about 2 am at his house to see him. He was very hospitable and made me extremely welcome. He had been to a black tie dinner and was of course wearing the kilt . He had just got engaged the week before – he got married in September I think – and was in excellent form. Nikki is a very lovely girl and Bruce is a lucky lad.
The next day Bruce lent me his car to get into the yacht club on the main waterfront. He had to sail his Hobby Cat (small Catamaran) round there for repairs and Nikki, who hadn’t sailed before, went as crew. She was sick. I spent the day touring around then joined them and a few friends at the club for an excellent celebratory dinner – I think they were having quite a few of those. In amongst all the strangers I’d met and adventures that I had been having it was exceptionally nice to meet up with an old friend and experience some home hospitality. It was, in a different way from all the other things that happened, a very pleasant wee highlight.
Beijing
Getting into China was interesting. After my experiences in Tibet I was not really looking forward to it. What I hadn’t realised was that the Visa that I had so carefully picked up in London before I had left had been equally carefully stamped ‘canceled’ (in Chinese so that I had no idea..) when I had got another one for Tibet. This posed certain challenges but I thought of Terry Tilman and was not going to let a simple thing like a visa stand in my way. Lannis had by this time cleared customs ahead of me and so had no idea what was happening to me. I had a lot of supplies and equipment in my cases that he would need if he was to go on alone. Although at one point they were leading me back to the plane for the return trip to Hong Kong I managed to slow things down and got to work.
It appeared that I needed to be invited by a Chinese national resident in China and then I could be granted a visa. Fortunately I had met an English chap in London before I’d left and he’d given me some contact names and phone numbers, including those of his In-laws and a travel agent/fixer. The in-laws didn’t speak enough English for me to be able to explain my problem with enough charm for them to help me, but eventually I managed to track down the travel agent. Providing I left my passport there and the travel agent brought a letter out the next day I could have my visa. It only took about two hours to sort out. I felt quite pleased with myself. TT would have been proud of me. I won’t bother you with the complications of checking into an hotel without a passport but that was simple after the airport.
Getting a school here posed a problem as Lannis’s publisher had told him that the Chinese authorities had turned down his official request for help. But between brain-storming and another of the names from my London contact we began to make progress. All the schools that we went to on the trip seemed to be perfect in some way or other. Our contact took us to talk to the headmistress of one school and we had sat down to explain what we did and our requirements with her. At that moment two of her teachers walked in and asked what they should do with their classes the next day as they had finished their exams. We had an idea. The children were of course just the right age and so a lot of problems were resolved at once. In the end we did two schools and they both went very well. One was on a Saturday afternoon (the weekend in Beijing) where the children had stayed on specially after school to work with us. Very flattering really .
I found time to hire a bicycle and toured around Tianamen Sq. and the Forbidden City. I thought of the massacre in the square about two years before… In the Imperial Palace I was given a taped audio guide and had Peter Ustinov give me an informed tour. Very interesting indeed. I suppose that I will now have to see ‘The Last Emperor’. I also took a trip out to the Great Wall which is only about 60k north of Beijing. Fascinating. Very glad I went there. The authorities are beginning to get some ideas about Capitalism and have rows of stalls set up for people to sell things from. However each of the hundreds of tiny stalls seemed to be selling identical products. The stall holders reminded me of battery hens screaming at the top of their voices to extol the virtues of their particular ‘eggs’. I don’t think that they’ve got it quite right yet. Another memorable sight was in the Forbidden City. One of the stalls was selling various masks, presumably Chinese theater type and, of course, Ninja Turtle masks (heaven help us all).
Japan
Our next stop at the beginning of July was Japan. Lannis wanted to get the thoughts of children form the Hiroshima district and from a beautiful country area. The first part gave us a problem and in spite of a number of faxes and letters couriered from London we found that we were getting no-where with either the school or with accommodation. So Lannis dropped all reference to Hiroshima and the bomb and we started to get results. We organised a home stay and ended up with a charming Japanese family who almost embarrassed us with their kindness and hospitality. We were only meant to stay there for three night but they insisted we stay longer. They helped set up school and translators and a lot of other useful contacts. They could not have been more helpful, kind and considerate. They even organised a party for us before we left. At about twelve thirty a young friend of theirs turned up. She often dropped in at that hour and just happened to be passing. She was nineteen and her name, Sukuro, meant Cherry Blossom. She was delighted to have someone to practice her English on and set about asking me questions – but straight from the phrase book that she produced; ‘What is your name? How old are you? Where do you live? Etc.’ Our hosts were delighted and roared with laughter as she pressed on earnestly. When she had finished her gentle interrogation she needed to give me a present. She delved into her large bag for some time till she found something. She was a trainee dental technician and proudly handed over a plaster mold of someone’s teeth, presumably hers. Our hosts were beside themselves with laughter but she carried on completely straight-faced. I accepted with as much grace as I could muster but when I went to bed a short time later I left them discretely behind. She was having none of that and knocked on the screen to the dining-room where Lannis and I were sleeping and insisted that I pack them. So now I have a set of Japanese plaster teeth beside me. I wouldn’t dare to leave them behind again. She was a remarkable young lady. Very direct and determined, not the slightest bit bashful. Most unusual in Japan. Very refreshing.
We found a delightful youth hostel to stay in on the Island of Shokoku. The ‘Young Monk’ (his daughter told us that the guidebook had been written fifteen years ago) who was warden and looked after the temple there as well was just as helpful as the other people we had stayed with. He set up two schools and his 18 year old daughter, whose high school English was excellent, worked as our translator. He also organised some newspaper reporters and a local television news team to cover our visit. How the children managed to work with that carnival going on around them was one of the minor blessings of the trip, but it went well. It was an interesting experience, sitting in the Monks kitchen that night with his wife and daughter, a couple of beers, watching ourselves on TV. We were on between two bout of Sumo wrestling. The next night his wife did the Tea Ceremony especially for us, having already spent the whole day driving us around the neighbouring countryside on a sort of conducted tour . Incredibly kind and generous people.
Another thing that sticks in my mind was the conjuring tricks that the Monk did for us over those beers. Do you know that the angst of a teenager saying (and here I am guessing the tanslation) “No Dad – please – not the conjuring tricks – stop embarresing me……” sounds just the same in Japenese as it does in English?
I spent some time at the Hiroshima Memorial and Museum. Very moving. Some school girls asked me to complete a questionnaire for them. The first lot of questions were quite straight forward, name, what do you think of Nuclear weapons etc. type. The final question threw me slightly:
“5) Please read the next two sentences first. We have been studying the history of Showa until now. In the subject we have some important facts that we want everyone to know.
1. The WWII should have been finished by October 1945 without using the atomic bombs. Because japan had already been on the verge of annihilation.
2. In spite of American Government’s executives had known the pearl harbour attack, they dared not tell their nations that to increase their fighting will.
Q: Have you known these fact. Yes No
If no, how do you think about these?” (sic)
Very interesting. What were they trying to prove?
The Japanese television system is good and we were able to get English translations to a lot of programmes. I even watched bits of Wimbledon live with the BBC commentators at midnight. A very strange feeling in the middle of Japan. And there was the Baseball live from US with a Japenese commentry. Our hosts kindly swithched to the American commentators, particularly for Lannis who I think was into sport and Baseball. It was at that point that the American commentators said something about the fact that the was being broadcast live to Japan and wouldn’t it be interesting to listen to the Japanese commentary? At that point I was strugging to remember where I was and which language I should be speaking.
We traveled most places by the Bullet Train which is as good as everyone says. On our way back north for our flight to Sydney we spent one night in the ancient capital of Kyoto. There was a festival in progress and a large number of women and young girls were looking fantastic in Kimonos.
Australia
We arrived in Sydney on a Tuesday morning and by lunch time I had arranged to assist on an Insight I training that started the next day. We were due to fly up to Darwin early the next week and I didn’t have anything else to do. An interesting way to arrive in a country and get to know lots of people.
In Darwin Lannis wanted to get Aboriginal children as their culture is very close to nature and quite special. Between schools we took a safari trip along crocodile infested rivers in fairly small boats with outboard motors. Our guide had us eating ants and all sorts of ‘Bush Tucker’. It was nice to have a break. Lannis took along cameras so it will be Tax deductible. We spent quite a lot of time in the Kakadu National Park and needed special permission to enter some areas to get to remote schools. At one point we needed to cross a ford which wasn’t particularly a problem except that on the way back I noticed that there were quite a few cars pulled up around it and I thought that perhaps the water level had risen a bit. In fact we only just got through without stalling. Later we found that that spot was famous for flash floods and sweeping cars away. The people who had been pulled up around it were waiting to photograph crocodiles. Lannis was convinced that that was the closest call he has had on his whole trip around the world.
Somehow I had never really associated crocodiles with Australia – in spite of Crocodile Dundee. I suppose I thought that all the animal life had to be completely different here, like kangaroos and koalas. And as there were crocodiles elsewhere in the world then Australia wouldn’t bother to have them. In fact they are quite a tourist attraction and feature of life in the north.
Aboriginals don’t have words for please or thank you either. They work on the perfectly reasonable assumption that if you do something or give something to somebody it is because you want to. It would be interesting to try that concept out elsewhere. Their spirituality is fascinating. The three ‘drives’ in their life are 1) To seek nutrition and survive 2) to procreate and 3) to achieve and advance. Each person has a ‘purpose’ in their life. They are meant to seek out and incorporate all advances and knowledge that they can. How very different and refreshing to religions of Western culture suppressing knowledge and discouraging research. In setting up the schools to visit the teachers were always concerned that the aboriginal children were behind the Europeans because they spent so much time in the out back, particularly during certain times of the year, at ‘Ceremony’, learning their ancient rituals. But, as everywhere else in the world they were wonderful to work with and loved the idea of being in a book.
Papua New Guinea
Then we went to Papua New Guinea. Now that was quite an experience. This is where I started to write six pages a day in my journal. There are about 700 languages in PNG – some 40% of all the languages in the world. I was sitting beside a PNG national on a flight somewhere and I asked him about this. He explained that his family came from a fairly small island with three villages on it – one at each corner – and each had a very distinct dialect. This was because they were always at war with each other and there wasn’t much time to talk. If someone had strayed too far from their own village they would probably have been killed. And eaten. In the old days you understand (as I shifted uneasily in my seat). Not that he had ever eaten anybody, you understand…(Well of course not, he was just returning from delivering a paper on oil exploration….) and he didn’t think that his father had eaten anyone (well why should he….?) but perhaps his grandfather… He kindly gave me his card and invited me to look him up in Port Moresby.
There is a fantastic video called ‘First Contact’ about the first meeting the people in the interior of PNG had with whites in the 1930’s – the people who were there at the time and remembered it. It was a native belief that when somebody died they turned white and went off to the east, while their remains – their bones – were put in the rivers. So along come these ‘White’ people, out of the East, and they’re searching the river for their bones, i.e. panning for gold. Several members of the expedition were recognised as recently departed relatives. Well, you can imagine the confusion. Especially when the locals wanted to show the ‘returning spirits’ where they had placed their bones in the river. They only resolved the matter by digging up the latrines from the camps when they had moved on.. ‘Its all right – their shit smells just like ours.’
They didn’t really understand the white men’s clothes either. Or were they a skin. Perhaps it was to hide their giant penises that they had to tie around their waists. Again this related to old legends. No more confusion really than if Martians had landed in Hyde Park.
Until they were discovered in the 1930’s they had thought that they were the only people in the world and the world was just the territory that they could see – well you will remember that travel wasn’t exactly encouraged. Then in the 1940’s they were fighting the Japanese in a World War. Quite a concept.
When gold was discovered the prospectors would encourage people of different tribes to come and work for them, some from a distance away. Because they were working for the prospectors they were automatically given a safe passage, or else the prospectors would go and sort out the offending village. I remember being told at school that in the Roman Empire people were guaranteed to travel safely on Roman Roads and I could never really understand how that system worked until I thought about it in terms of PNG. The prospectors maintained a sort of Pax Romana over their neighbourhood and their workers. Fascinating. Mind you I don’t think that the Romans had rifles to help them settle things ‘peacefully’.
In one place we stayed a local was discussing foreign aid that PNG had received. I can’t verify the facts of the case but his emotion and feelings about it all were conveyed quite nicely:-
PNG had been given a Development Bank Loan to help set up some agricultural infrastructure. US$ 30 Million was mentioned. International consultants were called in to decide what to do with it. 14 Belgians paid lots of International Consultants Fees. Remitted to Belgium. They came up with a recommendation of Buffalo ranching. Buffalo were imported from Australia for which Australia received funds. But PNG has no culture of herding and animal husbandry. So Australians were brought in to manage the herds. On expat. packages (accommodation, children’s schools, generous leave and flights home, gratuities) And they remitted their expat. salaries to. Australia. But in Australia they use helicopters to round up buffalo. So.. You can guess. Next the buffalo got tuberculosis and had to be destroyed. A new lot were imported but they didn’t last either, and by that time all the loan was used up. And of course there was nothing with which to pay back either the capital or the interest. The World Bank became concerned about non-payment of debt and sent in advisers. Ex-pats on Ex-pat perks and salaries, mostly saved and remitted overseas. You get the picture. This of course all has to be paid for somehow. You can spend money on the police the defense forces (which means a small amount on manpower, because that is local and cheap, but the rest goes on expensive imported equipment like radios etc.) because the World Bank likes a stable government (and they may be needed to deal with unpopular domestic economies soon), which virtually only leaves health, education and social services to carry the can. At least until the Oil and copper exploration comes on stream.
There are other things I won’t forget. Like the New Cavendish Scottish Country Dance Band tape being played as a background filler during the news on the local radio in a remote town. Or the tribal war that was going on in one town we went through. There were about 3,000 people involved (no worse than football hooligans really). One family painted their faces in traditional white and the other red. Honour would be satisfied when about five people had been killed on one side or another. They didn’t use guns, just bows and arrows as it was easier to keep track of the body count that way. We could go and watch – take photographs if we wanted – we’d be quite safe as we were clearly tourists … Er.. Thanks .. But…
We had got as far as Mount Hagen in the centre and were trying to get a flight down to a remote lake in the south and the only way seemed to be by using the Missionary Air Fellowship, MAF. Because of bad weather they only managed to get us as far as Mindi, about halfway there but there were not even any roads to where we wanted to go. The forecast looked bleak but we hung around for a day hoping for the best. The Archbishop of Canterbury was in the country at this time and the best pilot, who might have been able to fly us in, was called away for more important clients. We were beginning to get very concerned about time. The weather might have closed down for days – I think that they have some 200 inches of rain per year. In the end, after much negotiation, we chartered a helicopter which could fly under the clouds and weather. It was expensive but the fantastic half hour flight down ravines, gorges along rivers and over remote villages was spectacular and worth it. We had picked up a German and his Japanese wife who had agreed to come with us and contribute the standard air fare which helped our costs.
I always loved flying there and normally managed to sit beside the pilot (except in the helicopter where Lannis and I tossed for it and he won). A lot of them were local people. I thought that that was fairly amazing really. Their grandfathers had probably never seen a plane or been in one. But then I’m not sure if either of my grandfathers went in a plane either. Probably not. There was one Indian (like Delhi) pilot we flew with who was called Matthew Llewellan. Curious.
There is a plan to build a road there but their major problem is compensation to villages and land they go through. Easy, you plan the road away from villages in that remote area. That’s the theory. But by the morning after the survey a village would appear in the middle of the marked out track demanding compensation or ‘payback’ for the disruption.
The place we got to was Lake Kotubu. Beautiful and remote. But with oil exploration going on at one end and an appalling level of air activity (no roads – everything is flown in). Big C130’s and enormous Russian helicopters.
We arrived at a beautiful lodge overlooking the lake. The food too was fantastic. Beautiful English style roasts. The cook had been taught by the missionary who had now moved on, not, I presumed, eaten. We arranged to go to the village about a mile away and were taken there by a large dugout canoe with an outboard motor. The school was delighted to help.
Next morning we got there early to watch the children come across the lake in their own dugouts. I experimented with a dugout of the size that they were using. A little more stability than a log. I was OK, sort of, sitting but standing I had no hope. There were up to five boys standing in each of these canoes. Amazing. The children were fantastic to work with. They worked solidly for us, with no break for about six hours. They worked in English which is their third language after their own local one and pidgin. And Friday should have been their half day. Some had turned up in their traditional dress. One boy had not been able to get to school when he was younger, perhaps it was too far away, so he sat in a class of children about four years younger than he was. Quite impressive for a fifteen year old. When they finished a lot of them paddle off back across the lake chanting a song. One of the most memorable images of the trip for me. They had spears with them and ‘picked up’ fish for their supper on the way home. Really fantastic. The next day we did a tour of the lake and some of the neighbouring villages. Wonderful wildlife, birds, trees and flowers.
On the other side of the dress scale one girl was wearing a ‘Poon Catering’ T-shirt – a company that I had worked as a consultant for in Saudi Arabia and who were doing the catering at the oil terminal.
Getting away from there posed some problems. There were two young Belgian bird watchers who had been stuck there for a week. And it wasn’t cheap staying there either. They were getting desperate. On the other hand their talents came in quite handy in that beautiful area. We tried to get hold of a helicopter to come and pick us up but the radio was on the blink. We thought of trying to sneak into the oil exploration terminal and sit on the end of the runway with our thumbs out. In the end, with what was now a party of six, we took a one and a half hour trip in the dugout followed by a wonderful five hour trek through the jungle on a fairly good track. We waded through one stretch of perhaps a mile where a river had flooded and the track was under three foot of water. Our guide picked up couple of leeches on his bare feet. At another point we saw a snake, or rather our guide did. The first I knew was the shriek he gave out and looked round to see him about four feet in the air as he’d nearly trod on it. But I thought that he was meant to know about such things.
Otherwise it was a very relaxing trip and I felt exhilarated at the end of it. We then had to wait for a break in the weather and hope that the plane could get to the airstrip we had arrived at. About 24 hours later a plane turned up and got us out. We then needed to take a five hour trip in ‘public transport’ i.e. the back of a truck before we were able to get a connection back to Port Moresby. It was a really enjoyable part of the trip. A great adventure.
Australia again
When we got back to Sydney, only stopping in Cairns long enough to recover and for me to get a little diving in, we started to find accommodation and get organised. I helped Lannis get some of the letters translated for about a week before it was decided that we couldn’t work together any longer. That was very interesting for me. It was undoubtedly the right decision from quite a few aspects, so there was nothing for it but to get on with it.
I also spent ten days at a Buddhist retreat centre up in the Blue Mountains. I discovered that I had been sharing a room with a famous and respected pop musician. I’d never heard of him but one of my flatmates screamed when I told her who it was and showed me a pile of his CD’s that she had.
Through an advert in the papers I got into a house on the North Shore of Sydney harbour with two lovely girls, Tina and Sue, and their two dogs, Koko and Elie. Later we all moved down to another house in Greenwich, right by the harbour itself. There was a beautiful view of the harbour and the bridge from a point not far away that I used to run to every day. I often took one of the dogs, Elie, with me round by the shore. The first time I did it I came back and told Sue that I had taken her dog swimming. She was furious and incredulous. ‘What about sharks?’ she screamed. ‘Er .. What about sharks?’ ‘Don’t you know that they come up Sydney harbour to breed?’ Well I didn’t actually. Apparently, while they rarely take people but little hot dogs splashing in the water are considered quite a delicacy -.among sharks that is. I never had that problem walking my father’s dog around Loch Ken.
I managed to run in most places that we visited and almost every day since I arrived in Sydney in August. It’s so nice here, its not a problem at any hour of night or day. I must confess that I didn’t exercise in a few places though:- Katmandu because the roads were too crowded and pot holed and I would have injured myself; Lhasa because I had problem enough just walking – I even had an ‘oxygen pillow’, a big bag of oxygen that I carried around under my arm one day; Bangkok where there is no-way that breathing any more smog there than you need to can be healthy.
I was invited to spend Christmas at the home of one of my flatmates which was very nice and certainly a lot more settling than last year in Romania. For New Year I went back up to Cairns to meet up with a friend from London, Jan Ford, who is taking six months off from her job at British Telecom. She is a very keen diver and it didn’t take much to persuade me to take a diving course up there. It so happened a writer from Readers Digest was on the same diving course so you may see that written up in a couple of months too. After that Jan and I went diving on a wreck, the SS Yongala, which I discovered afterwards is one of the 6 best dive sites in the world. It was completely stuffed with fish of all sorts, including a couple of sharks, barracuda, a giant manta ray and millions upon millions of others. Quite amazing, going down for the first dive of the day in beautifully clear water and seeing a haze of fish all around the wreck. Jan intends to tour round New Zealand and do some diving at various points in the South Pacific. I am not quite sure how much I will join her for yet.
I will remember
So what will I remember of my trip and what have I learnt. Many many wonderful things. For instance:-
Nothing is really impossible to achieve. All it takes to set something up or to get an answer can be as simple as a phone call and that is easy enough to do. Or another call, or another call, whatever is the next step. That’s how I got into China and also how Lannis set up the school there after he’d initially been turned down by the government. It worked in a lot of other countries too to some extent.
The smiles and the love that I experienced in so many schools. Some of my best and most peaceful moments were sitting in the middle of the children in class, with my camera resting on my lap perhaps, just being there with the children and the work that they were doing – ‘holding the energy’ – loving and supporting them. Very special.
The amazing hospitality, generosity and support for Lannis the project and myself that we experienced everywhere. Some people went a very long way out of their way to help.
I loved to watch the enthusiasm for the project catch with head teachers as an interpreter translated Lannis’s explanation of what he was doing.
Walking through a market town in PNG and smiling at a woman behind her fruit stall and watching her returning smile spontaneously match my own as it widened into a heart touching grin. It reminded me of what I think is the Zulu’s greeting ‘I see you.’ Very like ‘Namaste.’ The further away we were from ‘civilising’ influences the more likely that was to happen. I experienced that in quite a few places including walking around the Bahkor in Lhasa. I wouldn’t bother to try it with strangers in London.
Being invited by a monk to the village temple that he served when I met him while I was out jogging on a beach in Thailand
Signing autographs for children in about four different schools and shaking hands with children in Japan – they normally bow – shaking hands is western and funny.
I loved working with the children and taking their photographs. And I like writing this letter. There may be a clue as to what I do next in life.
And much much much more.
Regrets about my choices, abandoning/selling my house, the way things turned out. No. I would have regretted not doing it for the rest of my life. ‘I remember in 1991 I had a chance to travel around the world and take photographs for that book that became a best-seller. Didn’t take it of course. Would have had to sell my house.’ I can barely imagine living with that. Things always work out perfectly, though sometimes its not immediately apparent why. It has been an amazing experience and a tremendous privilege (that doesn’t quite cover it ) to have been involved in the project in some small way and to work with Lannis. I have an enormous respect for him and what he has achieved on his own. I have a great deal of respect for what I achieved helping him too.
My next steps. Well I need to leave Oz as my six month visa is up. I’m off to New Zealand. I may be back here. I would like to spend a bit of time sailing around the South Pacific Islands. I spoke to Greenpeace about doing some photography work for them. I’ll just go with the flow for a while and see what happens.
So write to me. I like to stay in touch. Some people were clever enough to write to my old address and assumed correctly that letters would be forwarded (Thanks Sue P!). You can always write c/o my parents who normally have an idea where I am, or to Tess Smith who is looking after some of my affairs and a lot of my furniture. Her address is below. This letter has gone on far too long. I suspect that no-one will want to read it. But that’s not the whole point. I wanted to write it. There are lots of bits I could add and edit but if I don’t get on and send it out now I never will. I find it difficult to proof read my own writing as I tend to see what I think I’ve written not what is actually on the page.
I miss all the people I love – my parents, family, friends and godchildren – very much. I will return though I’m not sure when at the moment.
The book may be available on Amazon
PS Here is the poem that I completed after flying over Sugamata. Lines had been lying around in my head for a while but it needed completing. It is based on something I actually said to some-one once. It means a great deal to me. I feel that bits of my soul are in it. I wish I could live the words and sentiment more often in the world.
For You
I don’t care where you’ve been or how you got here,
Its just the path that brought you home to me,
The dark clouds of your life are disappearing,
The love that’s in your heart is all I see.
So tell me all the hurts your heart is hiding,
You know how much I love you and I care,
Believe that I was always, always with you,
Its just you couldn’t see me standing there.
I know that you’ve been crying softly crying
For all the pain and heartache you’ve been through;
So hold me, hold me tightly till the morning,
You know I’ve walked along that dark road too.
And I don’t care what you’ve done or how you got here,
Its just the path that brought you home to me,
The dark clouds of your life are disappearing,
The love that’s in your heart is all I see.
Simon Maclaren May 1991
Details about the Book.
The book I was working on “Dear World” is still available on Amazon
And talking of First Contact: A random interview on BBC news with David Attenborourgh while sitting in front of the Papau New Guinea section of his library (First Contact is five books to the above and to right of his right ear):
Also Available from Amazon
Poems from Simon Maclaren 