Lhamos in Ladakh

Computer Room in Leh, Ladakh, June 28th, 5:00PM

Well, we are back from Nubra Valley where we were camping. This is our second day in Leh and then tomorrow we head out to Lamayuru for five nights to participate in watching the festival of the lama dances and, I suppose, just hanging out.

The most exciting thing that happened recently I suppose was going to a local oracle. I don't really know where to start with this. Basically, lay women who are otherwise ordinary perform a ritual to allow themselves to be possessed every so often (sometimes every day) by local spirits who are then able to access powers of divination and healing that is otherwise not possible. The various range of problems and difficulties that a Ladakhi may face is met with a just as various means to fix these problems. There is the Ladakhi Amchi (Tibetan trained physician) excellent for chronic ailments and basic health. For accidents and serious issues, a western doctor may be consulted. And for "other," there are the lhamos (lha, meaning "spirit," and mo, indicating the sex--a lhapa is a male oracle). Sometimes the choice of consulting a Lhamo is based upon finances. While it costs a western doctor much to remove a bit of barbed wire that a small child has swallowed, for the few rupees that it costs to buy a kata one can go an oracle and have the piece of metal sucked out of the child by the lhamo.

Of course, the lhamo is met with some skepticism, being seen as "superstituion" by westerners and locals alike. Some believe that only some lhamos are authentic. Some will "neither confirm nor deny." Nonetheless, the large crowds that attend these possessions about Leh daily show their fascination and draw, if not the efficacy that they have in the mind of the public.

So we got there early, the sixteen of us cramming into a shed smaller than the landscaping shed at Warren Wilson College. We got there, apparently, "on time," but we waited all by ourselves there for a while and I think someone looked out the window and said, "she's milking her cow," and so we had to wait until she was done milking. The life of a Lhamo is very schitzophrenic in this sense. They don't remember anything from the possession; they only know what people tell them afterwards that the Lhamo, through them, had told them to do this and so on. Neither do these lhamos seem to be in it for the money. Not much money is made and the money that is isn't the cleanest money you would want. After all the money is an offering to the spirit. Not knowing exactly what to do with it, the lhamos often give large portions of it to the monasteries.

The lady was done milking and proceeded to clean her ritual table; other ladakhis arrived, wandered at us and the pictures of the blue ridge parkway that we showed them ("they're the oldest mountains in the world," we told them, "and the himalayas the youngest!") but weren't bothered. The possession begins (as it did this day) outside in the hallway when the lhamo washes her hands. In fact, there was another woman, an apprentice, who was learning to control her diety who also was being possessed that day. Dieties, as well as the possession itself, have various degrees of wrathfulness. As is sometimes common, the training process is somewhat difficult and as is not unnheard of the apprentice had difficultly controling her diety. While the elder woman's possession was somewhat smooth (both begin the possession by throwing themselves in front of the shrine and beginn reciting prayers in high, unearthly voices). The younger woman was hiccoping violently, on her knees, hands clasped together in front of the shrine.

Unlike regular shrines, there are no buddhist images here. Perhaps an indication of how old the ritual is, dating back before buddhism arrived. Nevertheless, they use the buddhist implements and the older lhamo wore a typical five-edged crown, and wore a specific robe. As I mentioned earlier, the younger Lhamo was having a more difficult time, pounding her back with her fist and shaking all over, producing sounds that did not sound human. They begin chanting quickly, shaking a bell and flipping a damaru, a small two sided drum. When the possession was over, the oracles resume a more relaxed nature. Some oracles are mean and will hit people but our Lhamo was fairly gentle (yet nonetheless intense). Many in our group used the Lhamo as a type of fortune teller (should I take this job? are there obstacles for me if I chose to do this) which is within the power of a Lhamo. When this is done, however, the healing begins. She took off her ritual clothing and produced a small tube--an "arrow". Many oracles do this. They place the tube to the skin of the patient (where it hurts so to say) and they suck out globs of mucus from their skin and spit it out into a special bowl. Sometimes they spit it into their hands and show it to the audience. Some oracles draw forth a black globby stuff, some blood, others something purple. Ours sucked out a mucus from the skin (see photo). Sometimes, when the pain was located in the stomach or the back, the wand was not sufficient, and the oracle would lean over and suck out the stuff with her mouth.

There is a certain logic to the format of the ritual. Questions can no longer be answered once she has dirtied her mouth and so once the ritual clothing comes off and the lhamo begins sucking upon the patients, no more questions will be answered.

Last note: I just finished Treasure Island, which was a treat and also a completely original work, I thought. There is nothing better than when Long John Silver Shouts, "Them that die'll be the lucky ones!" It's really good. I've begun now The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole, one of the first novels to initiate the Gothic movement in eighteenth century England. In fact, in the British Museum, just several weeks ago, I saw an Aztec obsidian mirror that he owed at one point, keeping it as a curiosity as it was a ritual object of that people.

Precious Baby

Also lifted from my journal:

Nubra Valley, June 24th

After visiting a monastery on the other side of the Shayok River in Nubra Valley, we went to see the child reincarnation of Bakula Rinpoche. Bakula Rinpoche is a reincarnation from the time of the Buddha, depicted in many of the monasteries that we’ve visited as one of the sixteen arhats. He holds a mongoose in his lap and from its mouth it spits precious jewels when it is squeezed. The symbology in this depiction is based off of the mongoose’s natural ability to kill and eat snakes. The mongoose then is seen to transform the poison of these snakes into precious jewels which it will spit out when squeezed. Otherwise, I’m not sure why this arhat holds the mongoose in particular. I only know that this depiction is common among many of the images found in the monasteries of Ladakh.

Rinpoche’s previous incarnation was a very important lama. He was “Ladakh’s lama.” He was chosen as the Indian Ambassador to Mongolia. The airport in Leh, actually, is named after him. These honors, I think, should be seen in the light not so much as his skill as a public servant. More importantly, they should reflect how much Ladakh respected him as their representation.

We went to a general store in town to buy kata (silk scarves) to present to the young Rinpoche (we were told he was about five or six, but, really, he must have been three or younger). On our way we actually passed the child on a monk’s shoulders marching swiftly into town, but I didn’t make much of this because he looked so much smaller than I had expected. Though he did not wear the robes yet, he was dressed in the monastic colors. He wore a gold vest and a red beach hat to keep off the sun.

At the one room general store, a monk brought in Rinpoche, cleared a space on the counter, and sat him there. He was so small, and he looked bewildered on that counter and legs barely hung over the edge. So, not having expected this at all, we presented him kata one by one and he in turn placed it over our heads with difficulty for his reach and enthusiasm was somewhat limited. Sometimes he placed it over the head very snugly and assuredly, already possessing that distinction so common in Tulkus. He was silent and scowled through much of the procedure, a bit annoyed or sleepy as a small child gets. His wavy hair, once his hat was taken off, we saw was pulled back and tied into a small tuft. I presented him with a Jacob’s ladder along with the kata and I placed the toy by his side. He was patient and polite enough to let it sit there. Eventually, he began to play with it, folding it in different ways on his lap but not quite able to perform the toy’s trick. All the while, he had to give his attention back to placing the scarves over our heads.

When he is enthroned, he will take the throne of the main Gelukpa monastery in Ladakh (Gelukpa is the sect of Tibetan Buddhism that H.H. the Dalai Lama is the head of), which is Spituk, near Phiyang. He is clearly the pride of the village; it isn’t necessarily often that such a small town produces such an important lama

A Long Walk

Similarly lifted from journal:

SITTING IN THE YELLOW DINING TENT IN NUBRA VALLEY AFTER A LONG WALK 6:30 PM MONDAY 22nd

I took a walk at 5:00 o’clock. The sun had already set on the valley and as I write this it is still not obvious as it is so light in the sky. There does not seem to be a “center of town” for Hundar or at least I haven’t found it. I went walking with Hun down the rocky paths where streams run alongside it, sometimes crossing the way and sometimes slipping under the stone walls that are covered with clippings of sea buckthorn, the bluish prickly shrub, to serve as a barbwire to keep animals out of the gardens that the small streams feed. Other times, the small channels would be dry where at one point it had healthily flowed but has been diverted to the other gardens. It was curious how silent the place was as if no one lived there at all except an occasional bird call, the freshly cut ends of willow (the branches are cultivated and cropped for fuel and construction), fresh sea buckthorn on the walls, or other various signs that indicate human presence.

Of course, everything speaks of the careful human endeavor—the streams, the houses and gardens, the mani walls (large extensive rock walls wherein each rock is carved with the mantra om mani padme hum), and so on. However, we saw no one but children as if a race of children owed the place. More than children—and more eerily—cows walked down the paths, obviously going some where. They were strikingly red, clean, and walked with a certain dignity that was only undercut by the flies that congregated upon their noses and eyes. Like once good subjects of the English Queen, most of this bovine race passed us on the right. Others, either obstinant or American, would pass upon my left. With this fanciful wandering, I suddenly felt what Jonathan Swift must have experienced when he first felt a horse’s face with his hands, understanding immediately its intelligence and dignity and, simultaneously, if indeed the horse was human, how inappropriate most of our actions directed to this beast become—and so birthed in his mind the Hwynym (sp?) of Gulliver’s Travels, horses with a fierce dignity and intellect in constant contradiction to their beast-like form. And so I was struck by these beautiful cows who wandered idly or purposefully by as if they owned the place. And indeed, when they mooed the sound was so thick with expression that it seemed one only needed to speed the noise up to hear them speaking perfect Queen's English.

In fact, I was vividly reminded of the country side of Greece. Both Tibet/Ladakh and Greece are sophisticated civilizations reaching apexes in understanding (one in art and philosophy and one in religion), yet they are mostly comprised of small, industrious but rugged farms. Ladakh does not have the fineness of cuisine that comes from associating with the Mediterranean climate, yet here they grow apricots, seemingly magically to me, in a four month growing season. Both cultures rely upon herding as much as agriculture, and the land is fairly barren, only coaxing forth only what the people work to produce. Hundar even looks like Greece. The twisted willows, cut back for their sturdy, fast growing branches, look something like the ubiquitous olive tree, and the tall white poplar trees here have something of the distinctive look of cyprus trees.

Approaching Nubra Valley

Leh, Ladakh June 28th


The following is lifted from my journal:


NUBRA VALLEY, OUTSIDE HUNDAR, CAMPING BESIDE A CHAPEL OF SORTS, 10,000 FEET ELEVATION, SOMETIME IN THE LATE AFTERNOON, JUNE 23rd 2008


Today we headed north from Leh to Nubra Valley. You can’t go much further as a tourist. In fact, we are forbidden to walk across the bridge higher up in the valley with prayer flags upon it. We aren’t even allowed to take a picture of it for that matter or even take a picture aimed in that direction (national security go figure). The reason that we are not allowed to go across is because of the military presence in Nubra, which is even greater than in Leh, for as one goes north, one gets closer to the land disputed with Pakistan.


Much of our six hour drive consisted of shear mountain passes and spectacular views, something like the Blue Ridge Parkway but thousands of feet higher. There is nothing to it but that you drive upon the side of a mountain so either to the left or to the right there is always a fantastic drop. And it doesn’t matter if you have six inches to spare or three feet, if you are passing someone on the outside or the inside--boulders to one side, space on the other--a twitch of the wheel is the only distinction between a pleasant scenic drive and oblivion. That is to say—it gets to you after a while. Maybe not while you are on the road, but afterwards, the implications fall upon you, like so many bad thoughts, and you think, sitting at camp, well, I guess we can make it out of here, right?

Our journey climbed higher and higher until we came to the pass at 18,000 feet making it the highest motor road in the world. Snow began to flank the mountains as we arrived, and at the pass itself, except for the muddy brown road, there was snow everywhere. For comparison, Mt. Everset scraps the sky at an enormous 26,000 feet. Where I live in Pennsylvania, that little hill I live on, is a humble 530-something feet above sea level.

At the pass, of course, we got out and ran around a bit deflated upon the scarcity of oxygen; we cranked opened our water bottles to hear them hiss and so on. We even dug up hunks of the icy snow and flung them at people--whether we knew them or not. I guess our judgement was slightly impaired. We lit a cleansing smoke fire with a lighter which took a long time (also because of the lack of oxygen) and we had to use pages of an article on Ladakhi oracles that I was half finished with, using the pages I had already read of course. We observed proper ritual and also fumigated some prayer flags which we hung and that flap now at 18,000-some feet.

Coming down on the other side of the pass, the landscape began transforming, first with riverlets from snowmelt. Then the mountains, bare mostly, were flushed the lightest green by the faint growth of various vegetation, adding color to the already colorful brown, pinks, and what-the-hell-is-that purple streaks that manifest on the open rock.


You follow the gyre of the road about one mountain and Nubra valley opens up directly below you like a peaceful kitchen floor at 10,000 feet. If one were to throw a rock, it simply disappears into the air, making one dizzy by the implications it has made of the space before oneself. Nothing so much illustrates the expanse of space as a rock thrown or, as I learned in St. Pauls, a bird flying about. Something that appeared flat and inconsequential suddenly reveals itself as profound and with depth beyond imagining.

The Shayok river, from the glacier of the same name (I think), melts into the flat valley, a chalky gray, indicative of its glacier source and also aesthetically pleasing to the colors of sand that compose the valley floor and the soft blue growth of sea buckthron (a prickly blue bush that gives a red berry Ladakhis make into a sourish juice that tastes something like apricot). What is cultivated is green, but as you follow the stream and valley down, it is sand and sand dunes that dominate. There is nothing growing here but the thorn bush and a high altitude sage that blooms purple. Camels live here, actually, once imported by traders, and patridge are always lingering about the roads. There is also some hoopoo birds and lots of marmots (which is actually an animal, a more attractive light tan cousin of the groundhog, slightly more like a weasel). The dark brown mountains loom up about you and disappear into the mist of the distance of the valley.


At this point, while sitting in the back of the car, I told our driver to turn the music up that was so softly being played on the radio. I had only half been listening but what I thought it was had been correct, the tinkling of piano, the shimmering of strings, and, of course, the lone trumpet filled the car and, for us, filled the landscape with the timeless sound of cowboy music. The voice on the recording spoke low—so low that we could not find out if it was English or Ladakhi. The melancholy, expressiveness of the sound betrayed the true sense of our surroundings, perfectly fitting this distant frontier.

Schooling His Eyes

Outside of Guest House Kidar Watching the Mountains and Avoiding the Sun, Friday June 20th

Last night the dogs again were barking begining at nine and going until one. The dogs one sees during the day are collapsed upon piles of dirt indiscriminately about the citiy, remarkably similar to the poorest of those people whose skin is so brown, mostly their feet but also entire babies, so completely blended with dirt that it is difficult to discern where one ends. The boy in our hotel is fourteen but he looks like an old ten year old and not any taller than someone who is eight. This is due to general diet, I suppose, even to children, like the one in our guest house, who are comparatively well off. The features of the Ladakhis are somewhat darker than the face of Tibetans. They have lost, for the most part, that remarkable red cheek. But in exchange, their features have come somewhat smoother and slightly more complex. Historically, Leh has been a trading center between India, China, the middle east, and the rest of Asia. Dispite the long winters and its comparative inexcessibility, Ladakh was able to acheive a distinctly affluence and rich culture. And so the ethnicity is complicated too, incorperating the identities of its economic neighbors.
The day is bright by four o'clock. I know that the dogs bark at one and the sky is bright at four because I could not sleep last night, dreaming dreams of incalculable sums and frustrations.

Today our group traveled to Hemis monastery of the Drupa Kagyus. The are famous for their lama dances in late June, early July, depending on when the tenth day of the fifth lunar month falls. Hemis lies crouched in the upmost corner of a valley, hidden by its distance from the Indus river and on the opposite side from the road to Leh. When Muslims came and raided the whole of Ladakh, they missed Hemis not considering it possible that such a large monastery could exist in that corner. Once out of the valley cut through by the Indus, one descends up tiny fields of barley fields, intricately built through a system of irrigation. There are large rose bushes with simple large flowers, and, as one climbs higher, one begins to see the large mani wall, three to four meters thick and chest height tall that climbs verticle up the valley to the monastery. Every stone that composes this wall has the prayer om mani padme hum carved into its surface, an endeavor acheived by the local Ladakhis. Large white stupas populate the slope now and then, at the very top of the valley where it looks as if one could go no further, Hemis stands. Yet even further, if one is to travel up the stone slops, there are meditation caves and retreat huts.

When man grows staid and wise,
Getting a house and home, where he may move
Within the circle of his breath,
Schooling his eyes’
That dumbe inclosure maketh love
Unto the coffin, that attends his death.

Lift Not the ...

Downtown Leh, Ladakh, June 19th

Upon that first morning (I arrived yesterday as the Ladakh sun was rising), around seven or eight at the hotel, sitting, tiredly, in front of the ubicquitous English tea and toast that is served in Guest Houses everywhere, and still acclimating to the altitude of Leh (some 12 or 13 thousand feet above sea level) I thought, "God, I've not come here for long enough! I already dread leaving it."

Leh is especially more picturesque than Lhasa, Tibet. It is quite a bit smaller and it sits upon a hillside (rather than on a plain). All the mountains are the color of sand or dirt except for the green swathes of vegetation in the valleys, irrigated and cultivated for barley, vegetables for local use, and apricots that they export. The juxtaposition is fantastic and dramatic like much else here. For example, outside is the sky, the sun, the mountains, bright. It is bright long before the sun rises which is later than I expect it would be, places of habitation being in the valleys (and shadows) of the mountains that surround them. Yet you walk into a monastery and it is close, dark, perfumgated. Almost every monastery has a protector shrine. They are usually a bit smaller than the main shrine. On our first day we visited a monastery outside of Leh called Phiyang where the throne holder of the Drigungpas keeps one of his seats. The throne holder uses the room that is at the top of the monastery, where the wind will whip about the prayer flags and knock at the windows. Below there is the main shrine where rituals are performed. Similarly contrasted with the outside landscape, the main shrine is hung all about with weighted fabric canopies and circular cloth chandeliers that obstruct any view of the whole place at once. In fact, one needs walk about the hall, behind the throne to see everything, including the wall paintings and large statues of the order.

Last, there is the protector shrine with, like the main shrine, images painted across the walls and statues, yet here the figures' faces are covered in cloth, a compassionate move to mediate the forceful energy of the protector dieties. It brings to mind Shelley's verse titled, "lift not the painted veil." Instead of cloth hangings, there are war implements, sheilds, masks, and furs of different animals.

And who transverses between these two worlds is harder to say. They are condifent and strong and happy, people who seem to really belong to this place in the world, who, indirectly, makes the traveler reflect upon his or her position as a traveler, what he or she is doing there, what he or she wishes to leave with. In this way, I think it is slightly overwhelming. These questions are big considerations. We'll see where it leads.

Most of the group has arrived by now (we are only missing now two who we expect to come several days later). Our company is good. Yesterday we went to see the monastery mentioned above. Today we have simply wandered through Leh and had lunch and now free time! I think I might wander to where I saw cricket being played.

Here is Shelley's verse by the way. The movie off the Somerset book The Painted Veil with Edward Norton lifts its title from here.

Lift not the painted veil which those who live
Call Life: though unreal shapes be pictured there,
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spread,—behind, lurk Fear
And Hope, twin Destinies; who ever weave
Their shadows, o’er the chasm, sightless and drear.
I knew one who had lifted it—he sought,
For his lost heart was tender, things to love,
But found them not, alas! nor was there aught
The world contains, the which he could approve.
Through the unheeding many he did move,
A splendour among shadows, a bright blot
Upon this gloomy scene, a Spirit that strove
For truth, and like the Preacher found it not.

The Island of Dr. Moreau

East Croydon, London, June 15th

Over the times I have traveled I have developed a certain taste of literature. Some of the works that I have picked up in my travels have been my most enjoyable reading experiences. Many of the novels I remember vividly and many were the first of that author, many of whom I have come to greatly enjoy later on, including Hemmingway, Graham Green, Dostoyevski, Sherwood Anderson, and Daniel Defoe. The last author falls into a furthermore specific genre of novels that I like to read while traveling: island narratives. When I traveled to Greece I read Yann Martel’s The Life of Pi and then Gerald Durrel’s account of his family moving to Corfu, the Greek island, in My Family and Other Animals. Two years ago, traveling in Tibet and Thailand, I read both Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe and William Goldsmith?'s Lord of the Flies. Now I find myself in London reading H.G. Wells’ The Island of Dr. Moreau, which has nothing intrinsically to do with my surroundings here. I suppose England is an island, and I also suppose that H.G. Wells is an English writer, but here the similarities stop.
Dr. Moreau as I expected is quite entertaining, in fact, quite a bit more so than I thought The War of the Worlds was, perhaps because the former is an island narrative. The novel begins, “I do not propose to add anything to what has already been written concerning the loss of the Lady Vain [this refers to a collision between two ships and the aftermath of finding the surviving men]…I have now, however, to add to the published story of the Lady Vain another as horrible, and certainly far stranger. It has hitherto been supposed that the four men who were in the dingy perished, but this is incorrect. I have the best evidence for this assertion—I am one of the four men.” And so his story begins.

Wells’ story can be easily plotted through the various “suddenlys” and moments of horrific realization that is characteristic of the adventure genre. In this way, there are no surprises to the experienced and savvy reader anticipates what occurs by twenty pages or so. Prendick, the antagonist, actually comes across as a bit stupid in this way figuring things out long after the reader has. He is a man only distinguished by his exceptional series of misfortune, first abandoned to die on a boat, forced to battle with his shipmates to survive. Once on the island he is chased by the strange beast-men who live there. He lives in perpetual disgust and moral aversion to the two other men that live on the island, Moreau and Montegomery; he breaks his arm; he has no chance to rest in the entire story.

As an H.G. Wells’ novel, this story offers an overarching fantasy that can be interpreted allegorically, rather like much of what George Orwell writes. What Wells presents is an investigation of a godless state fraught with suffering and meaninglessness.
More provocatively, he seems to map this vision through concepts derived from mythology. For example, once Dr. Moreau is finished operating upon his animals, grafting them into human-like creatures, they go about for a while as passable humans, even speaking. But eventually the animal instincts weigh upon them and they return to walking on all fours and so on. The dynamic is suggestive of the Christian duality of spirit and matter, the progression of Adam and Eve to Able and Cain (the last of course eventually is banished with “the mark of the beast”).
Ultimately, H.G. Well’s adventure is one without God. He writes, “A blind fate, a vast pitiless mechanism, seemed to cut and shape the fabric of existence and I(Prendick), Moreau, by his passion for research, Montgomery by his passion for drink, the Beast People, with their instincts and mental restrictions, were torn and crushed, ruthlessly, inevitably, amid the infinite complexity of its incessant wheels.

In describing Dr. Moreau, H.G. Wells also is able to advance a concern and doubt toward the creator figure himself. As Prendick, Wells writes, "Had Moreau had any intelligible object I could have sympathised at least a little with him. I could have forgiven him a little even had his motive been hate. But he was so irresponsible, so utterly careless. His curiosity, his mad, aimless investigations, drove him on, and the things were thrown out to live a year or so, to struggle and blunder and suffer; a last to die painfully. They were wretched in themselves, the old animal hate moved them to trouble one another, the Law held them back from a brief hot struggle and a decisive end of their natural animosities."
In Prendick’s view, God repeatedly messes up his experiments of creation and throws them aside unworthy of his further endorsement.

H.G. Wells’ motivation to have readers create the parallels between the lives of these beast men with normal human beings is made clear in the last pages of the novel. “I could not persuade myself that the men and women I met were not also other, still passably human, Beast People, animals half-wrought into the outward image of human souls; and that they would presently begin to revert, to show first this bestial mark and then that.” Here, he also seems to make an allusion toward Cain with the phrase “bestial mark.”

In his own elegance, H.G. Wells tries to further persuade the reader having Prendick write, “I would go into the streets and prowling women would mew after me, furtive craving men glance jealously at me, weary pale workers go coughing by me, with tired eyes and eager paces like wounded deer dripping blood, old people, bent and dull, pass murmuring to themselves, and all unheeding a ragged tail of gibing children.” Interestingly enough, Prendick finishes his story by writing, “I hope, or I could not live. And so, in hope and solitude, my story ends.” The solution for Wells it seems in this Godless universe fraught with pain is hope, which seems silly. However, Prendick doesn’t hold any sophisticated views and this is the way that he finishes.

Roll of Honor

East Croydon, 13^th of June 2008

I’ve collected a number of artifacts from London that the curious reader may appreciate. I will apply myself in the manner of those men who founded what in this day we reverentially call “Science” who began by storing the world away in miniature in cabinets of curios, and who found an excitation in the appreciation of the addition of strangeness to beauty; they kept talismans from other cultures, flora and fauna collections from exotic countries, anthropological artifacts of interest, as well as fossils, scientific instruments, and anything that described to them in smallness the ways of God and man.

In a sense, travel writing should elicit something of the excitement that those cabinets draw. These early scientists were drawn to astrology and astronomy both. They saw the strangeness and inconsistencies of man and his workings, and at once they tried to justify, categorize, and explain what they saw. The position that some hold in their provincial day to day existence is that nothing is new or strange.

For instance, in the British Museum, in a special tribute to these men of the Enlightenment Age (the age in which the Museum was founded, 1753 I believe), they showed several of the objects that one finds in these collections. At one point I noticed a small pin knife with its tip a discolored gold sitting on a black rock; next to it was a small gold bullet. I read that it was an object connected to the great search of the philosopher’s stone and the mythical elixir it creates that produces immortality in the drinker and transforms ordinary metals into gold. Sloane wrote, “A penknife the end of which is dipped in gold pretended to be made so by dipping of it so far into the great elixir.” Strange though that such an obvious fake made it into his collection, but it held its place alongside a penis pouch, an obsidian mirror used in Aztec Mexico to call forth the dead, toadstones, and other talismans. The suggestion to me is that from the point I left this “cabinet of curios” where scientific categorization whole-heartedly embraced superstition and unfounded scientific mythology, the entire museum I went on to view was also like this. When I walked out of the British Museum—why, I walked into the greater cabinet of curiosities found down the streets, in and out of shops, the inconsistent and sometimes surprising marvels of this world we have created. The world is a curiosity; so what is it?

There were the Lapiths and centaurs battling and frozen into stone that once faced the north side of the Parthenon from Greece stolen—or salvaged—from that damaged country and put into the British Museum. I had eagerly anticipated a trip to the British Museum for four years having been to Athens and the Parthenon and seen the many statues, but mostly the arms and legs, kept in their own museums with many excuses that the rest of the statuary was in London. So I was able to finally see the Lapiths and centaurs battling, the centaurs pulling off the Lapith maidens at some unfortunate god’s wedding. The statuary was great, but rarely did they have heads. And usually there was a sign affixed that said, to the effect, “heads are in Greece.” Ah, well!

In Chinatown, there is a window through which is a cake with a Barbie doll stuck in the middle and the icing curled so elegantly that it seamlessly assumes the place of her dress. I took this picture. My first picture of England!

I visited St. Paul’s today with my friend Tessa Currie who met Hun, Jo Ann, and me in Covent Gardens. St. Paul’s was quite impressive, and I wish I remember more from my literature classes what we discussed about its architectural interests (yes, we even talk about architecture in literature classes). I was surprised to hear a choir singing Down to the River to Pray, a good American old-time religion song, but we learned that the choir was from the United States so I guess that is okay. But boy I was jealous of those singers—putting their voice into that space, you must have felt like you had wings, flying to the top of that beautiful dome. It is possible to take stairs that one may walk around the inner rim of the dome. In this inner dome, you may do several things. If you whisper along the wall, you can send messages to people around the entire room! Your voice, secret, runs about the place like a stone skipped over water. But this is not enough; you want to fill the space with your voice, the only way to really fly through the space, which is what you wanted to do. A pigeon that was fluttering about landed in a windowsill high above everything and created a puff of dust where no one had ever cleaned. Then he flew down passed me, close enough that I was seized by a tinge of vertigo or the sensation one has driving at times, the powerful sensation that grips you when another car passes from the other direction—so close! You want to fill your space with your voice but one is not so brave in front of God I think. What has one to say anyway?

One surprising fact about St. Paul’s was that all the dedications and entombments in the church were for generals, war heroes, and civil servants. As a result, the only females were classical-style, bare-breasted women placing crowns of laurels upon the dead man’s carved face. The only female that our group saw represented was Florence Nightengale, that wonderfully intelligent and progressive woman; but alas, we found her not upstairs but in the basement.

Hun and I surmise that the reason for this outrage (it isn’t exactly an outrage) is because St. Peters in Rome similarly has such statues all over the place but not of generals of course; it’s catholic—they have saints (and probably more women to that effect, too, but only slightly more). St. Pauls, being the front piece of the Church of England, gave these positions to its civil servants.

The east chapel was dedicated to American soldiers who had fought in England. The east chapel could be said to be the most important part of the church architecturally. The church being in the shape of a cross, the east chapel is at the very head. It was the end that was partially destroyed in WWII. 23 August 1946 Eisenhower wrote for the Roll of Honor these words:

EACH name inscribed in this book is a story of personal tragedy and a grieving family, a story repeated endlessly in white crosses girdling the globe. The Americans whose names here appear, were part of the price that free men have been forced a second time to pay in this country to defend human liberty and rights. Fittingly, this ROLL OF HONOR has been enshrined by the Mother Country of all English-speaking democracies in this special chapel of St. Pauls, once a target of barbaric attack. Here, we and all who shall hereafter live in freedom will be reminded that to these men and their comrades of all the Allies we owe a debt to be paid with grateful remembrance of their sacrifice and with the high resolve that the cause for which they died shall live ETERNALLY.

The rhetoric of a particular patriotism, whether we find it in a Shakespearian play or in the mouth of a ruler, we must remember has the power to send armies willingly off to their deaths. What does the modern citizen of the world do with this particular attitude toward an appropriate militarism? How do we speak of honor and eternity in the context of war? How have we changed! Or have we not? How much awfulness British imperialism once produced; but now one looks around and it doesn’t look so bad. Are these men Saints or Devils? What is the role of history? What kind of legacy does America leave in its wake? For, like everything, America must pass, too—gracefully or tragically only time will tell.

I think that’s it for now. More later. I'm displeased I haven't been able to write sooner, but there is no convenient or reliable internet where I'm staying. In fact, right now, I am in an internet place. How odd!

Cucumber Magnolia

Felton, Pennsylvania

Dear A--,

And now my blog has degenerated into pure banality. Do you know why? I really have nothing to say at all except that I took a run today. It was hot. I had done nothing all day and a run is a good way to feel like you've accomplished something. It's also a good way to experience things. People run all over the world to see beautiful things but the secret of traveling and seeing beautiful things is to simply look around you carefully as if you've never seen it before. Act like a traveler in your own village. That's what taking a run does to me. You begin out feeling like there are loose tape players in your brain, chest, and stomach. Everything in your body is telling you that running is such a stupid idea. But anything awkward you just run until it's gone. If something is really strained--you didn't stretch out properly, whatever--it comes back to you when you're walking back up your dirt road and the pains in your knee are saying, "I told you so."

So I took a run, which turned into a long walk--long in the since of time: walking took a lot longer than running. I've attached a photo of a Cucumber Magnolia that I found growing in the woods to the side of the road. Now how is it that I've lived in this area for twenty two years and have never seen this beautiful, native flowering tree? I certainly recognize the pungent smell, which is a heavy-ish scent of rain and you can smell it from a mile away. The photo I've attached, unfortunately, cannot replicate this aspect of the experience. However, I thought, as my first travel-logue, I would include it.

Leaving

Felton, Pennsylvania

Dear A—,

Today my sister left with her friend to go riding (in Montana?) I still don’t know where. They will be traveling with their truck (Big Mama), their blue heeler Breeze, 50 gallon barrel of biodiesel, ten bails of hay, and also a blue trailer with three horses. My friends who were helping my dad and myself shingle our roof are leaving as well to return to North Carolina, but, the more I was thinking about it, it occurred to me that I too was leaving today.

Last night L— and I had a nice long talk after everyone had went to bed and it wasn’t so much a conversation as it was a series of studied interruptions of silence and not so much the content of our words as it was the process of making offerings to each other. He gave me a book and a shirt, Blood Meridian the book, and a T-shirt that says I (heart) NY, both of which are tokens that I will be essential to my survival “out there.” In the coming weeks, I will be spending time gathering other such impractical but necessary items. I am going to Asia to live not merely survive, and so my suitcase is being packed by books, sheet music, and dress shirts.

I stood outside last night and I felt how the damp had lifted from the rainy day. The rain had lifted earlier that day enough that we were able to throw a baseball until it got lost in the woods. I went to look for it but only saw the owl launching itself from the wet ground majestically, seeming to not care at all if I looked. Now the night was cool and only the pale horizon I could glimpse through the black, heavy trees and it was flickering like a light bulb adjusting intensity due to the agitated and confused nature of the rainy heat that had moved on. The silence was filled with the breath of leaves, the scratchings of certain things, the hootings of other things—as is the silence customarily filled with noises here in Pennsylvania and filled not so much with calls but with the myriad responses that penetrate into and then create their own pathos of a complex and complete and utterly calm reality. I think this is what German, French, and English philosophers and poets have anxiously ascribed as “nature” for the last several centuries. The only patch of sky I could see was the big dipper like seven diamonds floating in the sky.

A— today I am leaving as well. Although I will live in this house for ten more days, they are numbered and my hours will be filled with the tedious and important task of anticipating my travels and as there are no longer the days working in the sun and no longer the house full of friends to distract me or share these left over beers with I will spend these days in Taiwan and Ladakh. I will see you there, A—.