30,000 Feet over Burma - May 5, 1990 - Journal Entry

A taxi ride from the Malaysia Hotel to the Bangkok Airport. I know I want to live in Thailand or at least stay here next winter into the summer. I am done with New York, although that city is not done with me. I spoke with Rick Temerian on the Direct USA Phone> We made plans to meet in Paris at the end of May.

I made another call to Ron Knopmann, who complained, "I haven't had anyone to drink with since you left. New York sucks. The clubs suck. The drug sucks."

"At least here in the Orient there are some lepers. I saw them in every country. Hiding from the sunlight. Stumps of hands and feet. Gnarled faces, but New York has over 50,000 beggars and madman freed from the closed upstate mental hospitals. They have been ravaged by the wars, poverty, greed, and neglect. There is no saving them nor will Buddha save the desperate souls of Bangkok.

I could be anyone of them.

I've been saved from that fate by luck.

"When are you coming back?"

"I'll spend time in Paris and London." I had no reason to be in America. The Knicks had knocked out the Celtics. I had friends in Paris and London. I had worked in both. I could work there again on my fake carte d'sejour. "But I seriously thinking about moving out here. If you want to join me, then start saving your pennies. Departure dart. Jan. 2, 1991. Although I don't know , if I can last that long in the USA. I'd love to leave forever."

Not that anywhere else was as good as America, however I knew its evils too well.

"Good luck in the Himalayas." Ron laughed and the terminal loudspeaker called for all Kathmandu passengers. I grabbed a Bangkok Post and a Singha beer and left Thailand for the first time. I would be coming back soon.

LATER

Ten klicks below are the arid rice fields of Burma, burnt brown and begged for the monsoons. Te rumors of the military's corruption, forced migrations, massacres, and starvation are not rumors. I hd been on the northern Thai-Burma border. Drug lords and Karin rebels fight the junta. no one wins. Too much is at stake to surrender. Neither Thailand nor the USA have cut off ties with Myammar. Heroin was why the French and America fought long wars to control the drug trade. They never stood a chance. These countries are not France or America.

I didn't see one temple in Bangkok.

Just Wat Patpong.

Why did I leave?

I had enough money two weeks or more, but I want to see the Himalayas closer than at 30,000.

LATER

A gold course is next to Kathmandu airport. Soldiers are everywhere. The pro-democracy wave has washed over Asia. Students are calling for the abolishment of the kingdom.

This evening I met Lance. A New York architect. We have hired a trekking team through the hotel. I sit on the roof, watching the sun light up the Himalayas.

Dorge the guide, had arranged trekking permits in less than an hour. He points out the peaks. We have a Nepali cook and Sherpa porters for an early morning departure in two days, which is a good thing, because I can hear gunfire. The army are shooting the students.

"We were stupid, says Todd, another trekker from Hawaii."

"How so?"

"We should have brought two go-go dancers from Pat-Pong."

"So they can ask, "Where Tee-vee?" No thanks."

I am here for the mountains.

The highest in the world.