Where do I park this empty vehicle,
asked a Tibetan monk
burning corpses
after an earthquake killed 2,686 people
in a remote village at 13,000 feet.
A child survivor ate cigarettes,
and paper napkins
drinking his urine to survive.
Life is found in a desperate situation.
Disaster gave the Chinese Party Propaganda
machine a glorious opportunity
to create a new Hero and promote being One People.
Namaste,
Survivors were willing victims of their fear, uncertainty, doubt, adventure and surprise.
Their amygdala, a small almond shaped brain structure validated to be involved in fear and emotional response fired up.
Manipulated by their collective unconscious and the system of socialization control mechanisms and the subtle power of right wing conservative persuasion and media idiots, they either wanted control or approval facing this daily grinding, mind numbing, heart breaking choice.
They struggled, suffered, danced, experiencing gratitude and forgiveness in their heart.
They lived and died.
It’s essential to die at least once while you’re alive and get it out of the way.
An engraved Zippo lighter in a dusty Saigon museum cabinet, buried under service ribbons read, “You only die twice. Once when you’re born and when you face Death.”
Metta.
Namaste,
August may be cruel. She may be kind.
Here in Coma-Land, somewhere below the equatorial zone it is the rainy season. Coming down. Sheets.
What it is. Two seasons. Dry and wet.
Laundry hangs itself. Why does laundry hang itself? Poverty? Lack of initiative? Boredom? For the same reason the juvenile boy facing glass across the street passively performs circular tedious rag motions on a glass door.
His decrepit grannie living upstairs waiting to die a glorious peaceful death will inspect it. If her old tired gray eyes see one dancing smudge she'll begin screaming, Clean it again, Clean it again. He will hang his head.
In shame.
Listening class is permanently cancelled.
Around and around we go. Where we stop no one knows. If he knew the end game he'd cease breathing. He'd hang with laundry. He'd go to school. Too expensive. Yeah, yeah.
Dirt roads are now expansive expensive elaborate esoteric lakes. Welcome to the lake district. Take the long way home. Endless landscape shrines are a luminous green. Eat it with your eyes, said Saigon.
Metta.
Namaste,
Hugo in France recently connected with his thoughts on the Orphan Tourism article. This is what he wrote.
Hugo met Benoît sailing over The Silver Sea to Uruguay.
"It happened Benoit made a trip in a neighboring country named Cambodia.
"And there he saw. He saw the refugee camps on the border. He saw and he realized.
"He began the first Cambodian foundation to help children. The task was huge and often thank less.
"He had to deal with a lot of people, customs and beliefs. Blind or deaf children were considered as useless and cursed beings. You have no sight because you have a bad karma. You have a bad karma because you were evil in your previous life. You have what you deserve, so I must not care. At the time, there wasn't even a Braille system for Khmer language. They had to create it, with help from the Thai Braille language.
"He had to use his trust with great caution. Try to explain long term big projects to people more interested in small time big money.
"And however, here he is. Here they are. Twenty years later, they have their first few bachelors. Those who don't pursue studies do traditional work, earning money for their families, who don't see them as useless anymore. The foundation is recognized by Unicef, and its staff is mostly Cambodian.
"We discussed about humanitarian associations, and he said to me a lot of them are runby either unprincipled or too naive persons. Due to his financial work experience, he was able to give his own association a solid and viable structure.
"But this kind of practice is not so common in such organizations. He also told me about the complete stupidity which is called child sponsoring. Attract western compassion, but create division. I am a sponsored child, you are not. The road to hell is paved with good intentions..."
Cambodia roads are red dust.
Thank you Hugo.
Metta.
I was the only addict in detox taking notes on a yellow legal pad.
I needed raw unfiltered evidence and truth.
I was addicted to writing, photography and traveling.
Heroin, smack, booze, pills and love addicts were wolves crying and howling in their self imposed vast wilderness of pain, hatred, agony. Looking for self love in detox, trying to get their lives together.
Some lived as if they were already dead.
“Before I checked when I was growing tired of it all,” I said.
“I lived with a woman in a disastrous, self destructive relationship. I played the rescuer, a father figure. My victim turned on me. They always do. My writing was empty. I drank to avoid the truth facing the real work. Before coming here, I submitted to therapy.
"If I was going to survive and be healthy, I acknowledged the fact, the hard cold realistic truth that I wasn’t responsible for my mother’s death. I needed to confront this guilt at the heart level, not the head level.
“You have to break down before you break through."
“What happened?” said Tom Vodka.
"I broke down, cried, talking out old fears and self destructive behaviors, old angers and resentments. I realized my integrity, my self-reliance. I accepted more responsibility for my life.”
So it goes.
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