This too shall Pass

Today in Thailand Buddhists celebrate Asalaha Puja (also transliterated as Asalha or Asarnha) which remembers the first sermon of the newly enlightened Siddhārtha Gautama in the Deer Park at Benares, India. The celebration traditionally takes place in July, on the fifteenth day of the waxing moon of the eighth lunar month. According to legend, the Buddha was encouraged by the gods to teach, and gathered together his former associates, the five ascetics (one seems to be missing from this tableau I photographed on the side of the hill above Luang Prabang, Laos), and "set the wheel of Dhamma in motion" with his teaching of the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path.

The first sermon is recorded in the Dhammacakka Sutta. One of the five listeners, Kondannya, received his own enlightenment experience at hearing the Buddha's words and declared: "Whatever is subject to origination is also subject to cessation." I was reminded of the phrase, "This too shall pass," and with a little internet digging I traced it to a Jewish folk tale about King Solomon. Intending to test his most trusted minister, the king ordered him to search for a magic ring, and told him, "If a happy man looks at it, he becomes sad, and if a sad man looks at it, he becomes happy." Solomon knew no such ring existed in the world, but he wished to give his minister a little taste of humility. But the minister found a gold ring and had it engraved with the Hebrew letters for "This too shall pass." Seeing the ring Solomon realized that all his wisdom, wealth and power were but perishable, for one day he would be nothing but dust.

Pandit Bhikku offers another translation of Kondannya's insight: "All that is of the nature to arise, will pass away." And he asks: "Why is it so supreme in Buddhism?" This is a curious question, for this bit of wisdom seems at first so commonplace. Of course nothing lasts, dust to dust and all that. I can also see how it would make a sad man happy and a happy man sad. Pain today will be gone tomorrow, and so will all one's accomplishments. It counsels acceptance of whatever happens. I do not know whether this will give any consolation to the millions of Michael Jackson fans grieving the death of the King of Pop. He died too young! (unlike the actor Karl Malden and the Vietnam war architect Robert McNamara who died this week after long lives). We want what is good to last (certainly if you'd purchased a ticket to Jacko's sold-out concert tour) and the bad to pass, quickly (not a few thought McNamara should have left the scene back in the 1960s).

Wisdom is knowing that nothing lasts. To want it to be otherwise is to suffer. The first sermon in the Dhammacakka Sutta sets out the basic teachings of the Buddha: the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. The First Noble Truth is that life involves dukkha, a Pali word that has been translated as "suffering" but is probably closer to "stress" or "unsatisfactoriness." Dukkha, according to the Second Noble Truth, is caused by tanha, or "craving," also translated as "desire" or "thirst." The Third Noble Truth says that we can eliminate dukkha by what the Fourth Nobel Truth calls the Eightfold Path. The Buddha's enlightenment consisted of this realization, in practice rather than theory.

I'm not particularly keen on turning 70 in a week and a half. But there is little that I can do about it. Aging, according to the Buddha, results in dukkha (as does birth, death, pain, sorrow, etc.). It's natural to age; all that comes to be in this world will eventually fade away. What really causes pain is the desire to stop (or even slow) the process. Workouts at the gym, mega-vitamins, tanning salons, new lovers, all the nips and tucks in the world will not do the job. After birth, it's all downhill. This thirst for eternal life can be abandoned, the Buddha assures us, if we but lead a life of right view, resolve, speech, action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness and concentration (the path to healing the Dhamma Doctor prescribes). It worked for him, he tells us, and we should try it out. His teaching is one of experience rather than theory.

Of course, there is a lot more to Buddhism in Thailand. On Friday, after picking up her cousin at the bus station, Nan and I encountered a couple of monks on the street near her rooming house accepting merit from passers-by. We purchased a couple of dishes full of goodies from a nearby vendor and deposited our gifts in the begging bowl of one. Then we knelt down on the sidewalk and accepted a chanted blessing. Our monk was rather large and I noticed that the back of his robe was soaked with sweat. Then yesterday, we walked back to Wat Ruak Bangbamru behind my building to pay our respects to the monks at the temple before the beginning of Vassa the rains retreat, which starts tomorrow on Wan Kao Pansa, the first day of what has been called the Buddhist Lent. We purchased a transparent orange bucket of donations, including such useful items as rubber sandals, soap and toothpaste, and presented it to a monk seated under a tent in the courtyard. He blessed us with a chant and enough sprinkled water to soak my shirt. Buddhism in Thailand is more a matter of tam boon (making merit) than meditation practice and study. The common belief is that only monks (and certainly not women) can achieve enlightenment, but I'm told that few of the orange-robbed members of the Thai Sangha could be called spiritual seekers or even rigorous adherents of the Eightfold Path.

Certainly I'm not. While I continue to poke and probe the Dhamma as I am able to understand it, looking for ways to incorporate some of the Buddha's teaching into my everyday life, I resist renunciation and full commitment, exploring the cracks to see where wisdom that I recognize can be found. In the Dhammacakka Sutta, the Tathagata (the name Buddha used to refer to himself, meaning "one who has found the truth") advocated the "Middle Way" between the extremes of sensual pleasure and asceticism. This advice does not seem to be followed very carefully by many on the spiritual path who condemn the senses and joyously give up even small pleasures. His words in the first sermon were directed at "the one who has gone forth," renunciants like himself who had less trouble abandoning sensual pleasure than avoiding ascetic austerities. In the India tradition, the Brahmins proposed four stages: the student, householder, forest dweller and ascetic. Siddhartha gave up home and family for the life of a wandering saddhu. Although the life of the householder is far behind me, I'm content to remain a city (and occasionally forest) dweller, doing my best to control the destructive impulses of greed, ignorance and anger while enjoying the abundance of sense pleasures this beautiful world has to offer. I am well aware that both the impulses and the pleasures shall pass.

My weekend was filled with good friends, fine food, and an occasional Dhammic insight. On Friday I met at a small Indian restaurant near Sir Mariammam, the Hindu temple on Silom Road, with a few members of the Little Bang Sangha. In addition to our British leader, Pandit Bhikku, there were several Americans including my pal Dr. Holly, several Thais, Tara from Australia who hopes to become a mae chee in chiang Mai, Rubby from Colombia and Jikusan from Chile who spent ten years in a Japanese zen monastery. David, originally from Dayton, Ohio, but now a long-term resident of Southeast Asia, wore a great tee shirt that read: "CANADA, Living the American Dream without the violence since 1867." Also joining us was Yogi Tevijjo, a bearded American in idiosyncratic robes who follows an obscure Thai tradition. For more about him, click here. I'm always suspicious of those who enter their own stream. I ate a plate of talis which reminded me of my travels in Tamil Nadu.

From Silom I headed to Banglamphu for my weekly discussion of books, films, politics and religion with Colin, Marcus and Ikumi at Ricky's 2 Coffee Shop. Colin and Marcus both left England long ago to teach English in Turkey and Korea, among other places. Ikumi is visiting Marcus from Japan. Last week they bequeathed to me one of their favorite authors, Alain de Botton, whose latest book is The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work. A quarter of the way through, I can see that it contains some of the same understated and ironic humor they use to dissect Thai life and my true verities.

The following evening, after an afternoon of always enjoyable conversation with Jerry at his apartment, I met Marcus near the Ekamai bus terminal on Sukhumvit and we took motorbike taxis to the Korean Hanmaum Seonwon (One-mind Zen Center). It was the first monthly meeting of a Korean zen discussion group in English and our objective was to read and digest Zen Master Daehaeng Kunsunim’s book No River to Cross. The author founded the organization of which the Bangkok center is a branch. In addition to a number of Korean members of the center, including two women priests, attending with us was Joe Shakarchi, a poet from San Francisco who teaches writing at San Jose City College, and Pedro Rivadeneira, an instructor in music composition at Mahidol University. Pedro was born in Ohio, and raised in Argentina. Before coming to Thailand, he taught English in a small Korean village. He encouraged me to come to the World Saxophone Congress at Mahidol this week. I had trouble hearing the soft spoken Koreans and an American bhikkuni and I stupidly refused to buy the book because I thought it too expensive. But the discussion went deep into the author's interpretation of the Mahayana zen path and I'll probably return next month. A number of us met afterward for drinks and snacks.

Yesterday, after making merit in the neighborhood, Nan and I went to Central Pinklao and had lunch at a Japanese fast food sukiyaki restaurant where the ingredients come by on an assembly line. It's an incredibly popular spot with dozens waiting outside for a place at the long counter. The cuisine popular with Thais has little relation to the menus in U.S. Thai restaurants. They particularly love to barbeque and boil their own meals at the table. I dumped different kinds of noodles, pieces of fish, pork, clams, shrimp, tofu, veggies, beef, and various unknown items into my own personal cooking pot. The price was a steep 290 baht for all you could eat and our lunch had a time limit. After ice cream and jello for desert, I took Nan to one of the several skin care outlets in the large mall and treated her to the removal by laser of two moles on her face.

Even though I know that pleasures are fleeting and all will eventually pass, my life here in Thailand is very full.

My Tribe

You must watch this YouTube video of The Zimmers singing The Who's anthem, "My Generation." (This is a new edit of the original video which did not allow embedding, but even this one won't play on Facebook.). The ending is priceless.

The Zimmers are the world's oldest band, 40 British senior citizens with a combined age of over 3,000 years. The group's name comes from the walker which in England is called a Zimmer frame. Their lead singer, Alf, is 90, and the oldest member is 102. If I'm a little late for this phenomenon, I apologize, but it gives me hope that my upcoming 70th birthday will only be the beginning. U2 producer Mike Hedges took the ensemble into famed Abbey Road studios in London to produce "My Generation." Since Roger Daltrey is now 65 and Pete Townshend only a year younger, The Who's two surviving members, they would have fit right in at the recording session. Released in the spring of 2007, the single reached #26 on the British record charts. Nearly 5 million have watched the YouTube video. For a followup, they recorded The Prodigy's "Firestarter," and last year released their debut album which included Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life" and a cover of the Beastie Boys' "Fight for Your Right To Party." The group now has toured the world with their message that life after retirement need not be one long bingo game.

"It's been so exciting, every day has been different," sextagenarian rocker Dolores Murray told the BBC. "One day in the studio, the next on a plane to Germany, then back for a radio show, a trip to a school, off to Downing Street and then onto a photo shoot. I never knew retirement would be so full. People come up to us in the street and thank us for what we are trying to do. It's quite overwhelming at times when people tell us that they feel empowered after meeting us and hearing what we stand for."

Everyone must find their own path through the mine field of aging. Mine at the moment is hedonism. Here I am enjoying the cuisine at a restaurant on a Ko Samed beach last weekend. It was my third trip to the island paradise just a short 5-6 hours away by bus and ferry from Bangkok. Most of the good beaches on the narrow island face east and the sunrise on Saturday and Sunday was gorgeous. Not long after, three monks in their bright orange robes walked on the path past our seaview room on alms round. Heaven was sitting on the beach all day, swimming in the warm clear water and reading in the shade of an umbrella James Crumley's terrific novel, The Last Good Kiss. At night the restaurants turn on their colorful lights and spread mats on the sand for diners to recline, just as the heathens did at Pompey. Some feature fire shows, young men twirling batons soaked in gasoline to tempt the gods. Vendors sold rockets to light up the night sky. The thumping base of a sound system could be heard late into the night. One morning Nan and I walked south over the rocks beyond Ao Pudsa where Molly broke her foot several months ago. I wanted to see Ao Wang Duan, the island's southern outpost. We hiked past the small cove of Ao Nuan where the cheap bungalows were undergoing repair, and over the hill to Ao Cho with its broad beach and long pier. We saw few people, most of them Thais apparently waiting for tourists to arrive. But this is the slow season during a year in which the tourist industry in Thailand has been devasted by political disruptions and a failing economy. We heard one swimmer cry out in pain from an apparent jellyfish sting and watched as her friends pulled her and the baby she was holding to safety. Our destination featured another wide beach with white sand fringed with restaurants and low-priced accomodations. had a number of upscale guest houses and resorts but, as elsewhere, few customers. The setting, however, was breathtaking. We returned to our hotel in a green pickup truck, paying a premium price since there were no other customers for the bumpy ride over a rutted dirt road.

Everywhere I saw dogs, mostly of indiscriminate breed. Most looked healthier than the mangy soi dogs so visible in Bangkok. They sat patiently by your table in the restaurants waiting for a handout, and they curled up in the sand after digging a hole for their bed. Ko Samed is certainly a paradise for dogs as well as people. One evening by our table on the beach at the Samed Villa restaurant, I watched several dogs playing with a crab that had bravely come out of its hole. Although I kept waiting for the crab to find a canine nose, it never happened. Marcus had warned me to watch out for dog poop on the beach. His recent trip here was fraught with calamity. Everywhere he saw poop, trash and pollution. Either I'm blind or the island has cleaned up its act. All around me I saw only beauty. The clarity of the light was breathtaking and the clouds were sculpted to best effect. No doubt the scarcity of people made it easier to observe and appreciate nature. At times the speedboats and jet skis reminded one of the tawdriness of Pattaya. But for the most part Nan and I delighted in our break from the real world. I imagined myself reborn as a beach dog in my next life. That must be a reward for something. Of course, one always has to pay, and my ticket was a nasty sunburn on my chest because of insufficient sunblock and too much time in the water. Liberal doses of aloe vera have eased the pain.

School is out for the beginning of Pansa, the Buddhist Lent, and I have too much time on my hands. Also called the Rains Retreat, Pansa lasts three lunar months and is a time for Theravadan Buddhists to refrain from travel and renew their spiritual vows. Because of ceremonies associated with the holiday, I have no classes to teach for nearly three weeks. The last thing I want to do is stay home and meditate. One afternoon on Ko Samed, Nan and I walked up to the temple near the port at Na Dan. We watched monks swimming in a pond while workmen swept leaves off the paths. An enthusiastic monk sold us candles and incense for the altar in front of a giant Buddha image. Then he rummaged in the pocket of his robe and found several amulets which he also offered for a generous donation. Nan was upset that the monk was so mercenary. "Why can he do that?" she asked me. Because the offerings from tourists are slim right now, I thought. Walking with Nan hand in hand down the narrow lanes of the island, I felt incredibly fortunate. Even though several generations separated the two of us, I felt that my tribe would understand. Growing old should be a liberation rather than a defeat. Even though cultural rules continually try to suck us under, the only way to live through the horrors of aging is to take deep breaths and swim like hell. Rock on, Zimmers!

Absent Fathers

Sunday was not Father's Day in Thailand. They celebrate that occasion in December on the King's birthday. I spent the day in blissful ignorance, recovering from a hangover resulting from an expedition to Nana with Jerry and Nan the previous night, eating a hamburger at Sizzlers and watching "Up" in 3D (the late night misadventure made it difficult to concentrate, but it's a cute film with lots of dogs). When I came home there were messages by email and on Facebook from three of my four progeny. I know it's a Hallmark moment, but it still warms my heart to be remembered. Over the years I've felt much guilt for the times I was absent as a father, working and playing too hard away from home, pursuing my intellectual curiosity alone, or losing my compass on the internet, all to the neglect of my kids.

But at least I could always be found. Edward has never known his father. He'll be eight in August and he lives with his aunt in Phayao, a northern province of Thailand. His mother died of cancer a few years ago. Edward has been told that his father, Johannes Somers, was from the Netherlands and raised sheep in New Zealand. He and his mom met during a vacation in Thailand, and he returned several times. According to the letters and postcards he wrote, they were in love. But back in New Zealand he was married to a Maori woman with whom he had several children. After telling his wife not long after Edward's birth about his Thai family, a "descent into hell," he wrote, the letters stopped. I learned about Edward from his cousin, Nan, who says he's a "lovely boy" who has just started school. She asked me for help in finding his father and gave me the only letter with a return address which was unreadable. "My mother loves taking care of him," Nan said, "but he would like to know his father." All I had was a name, Johannes Somers, which I suspected was not very uncommon.

Google brought quick results. A Johannes Somers was involved in a Maori court action in 2005 along with Erna Karan Somers. And a search under her name came up with a blog posting that announced her women's bowling team had won a tournament at the end of 2006. I emailed the blogger and he quickly sent me her email. There were not many other hits for Johannes Somers but I did find a man with that name who ran a sweatshop (over 700 workers who made various kinds of clothing) in Vientiane, Laos. The firm's web site gave his email address. Despite the warning of friends that I was poking a hornet's nest, I sent what I thought were diplomatic and tactful emails to each address without giving many details. The blogger had actually talked to Erna so I knew her address was good. I figured that a quick denial would send me looking elsewhere but no response could mean (but not necessarily) I'd struck pay dirt. It's only been four days, but I've not heard back yet.

I can't imagine having a child somewhere and not wanting to know about it. Biology does count for something. And then there is the moral responsibility for bringing new life into the world. Given the availability of birth control, there should be no "accidents," but there is no accounting for passion. I do believe in the "what goes around, comes around" truth of karma. We will pay for our mistakes somehow. I wonder how many illegitimate children there are from the liasons between Thai women and GIs during the Vietnam War when thousands of Americans were either stationed at Thai bases or came to Bangkok and Pattaya for R&R. They would be in their late 30s or early 40s. I've not met any during my forays on Thai dating internet sites, but I suspect they exist. Thais seems to find Thai-farang children quite beautiful so I suspect there is not much discrimination.

Graham Wills was a doting father when he and Pen had twins, Michael and Helen. He was the divorced father of two grown sons and had met Pen during a visit to Pattaya where she worked in a bar. In England he had been a butcher. They went to live in her village in Surin, and he commuted back and forth to Europe where he could find periodic work. But at a processing plant in Norway he cut off part of his thumb, and the expected compensation never materialized. He was unable to find work in Thailand and the injury healed slowly. So he finally returned to his home far away and effectively disappeared. Pen, already the mother of a married daughter, struggled to make ends meet. Google didn't help and a lawyer who volunteered to make inquiries in London fell ill and couldn't make the trip. When I met the twins during a visit to Surin for the marriage of Jerry's stepson, they were almost feral, running naked around the dusty yard before cooling off in the fish pond. You can see the mixed parentage in their faces. How many children are like this in small Thai villages, many being raised by a grandmother or aunt while their mothers seek employment in Bangkok? Their absent farang fathers, who came to Thailand in search of easy sex and a woman unaware of the demands of women's liberation in the West who would care for them, now hide far away.

My children have accused me at different times of abandonment. It is true that I walked out on my first wife and left my two sons to be raised by a clearly disturbed woman ("eccentric" is too weak a description). I was present more often in my second marriage and stuck around until the kids were almost grown. But while my wife was reveling in motherhood, I fell in love with the intellectual life and spent over a dozen years at the university. With only a part-time job, I was home and on duty more often, but my nose was all too often stuck in a book. And now I am an expatriate in Thailand, far from my old California home. The children again feel abandoned by me. Although I have no plans at the moment for a trip back, eventually I will no longer be able to afford the luxury of a periodic visit. What will draw me back? Marriage? The birth of a grandchild? (I'm beginning to give up on that dream) I argue that I'm just a key click away on the internet, but that doesn't seem to satisfy. Maybe we are all potentially absent, locked in our skins of separation. Of course, it happens that mothers sometimes make it impossible for fathers to perform their duty. It wasn't my idea to break up my last family. And the Thai mother of Marcus's son Joseph took him away and has denied him any contact. There are also cases of absent mothers, but I have no stories about that.

There are many other ways of being absent. Nan's parents have been divorced for many years and now her father "drinks too much." He was in the hospital a couple of weeks ago and she went home to see him and ask him, "many times," to stop drinking. The other night her uncle called to tell her that he was drunk again. "I don't know what to do," she said, her eyes full of tears. My ex-wife's father was also determined to drink himself to death, pursued by imaginary demons. She asked him to quit, but he wouldn't, and was taken to the hospital many times before he expired, his dark wish fulfilled. My son Luke suffers under the same black cloud. It's impossible to know whether alcoholism is an incurable physical addiction (a genetic blemish) or the result of poor choices. One of my uncles was an alcoholic and my son's mother has an addictive personality. Those of us standing helpless on the sidelines can only throw up our hands and cry, "Why? Why?"

Yesterday I met at a Thammasat University coffee shop with three Thais involved in the Buddhadasa archives project. Santi is a former investment banker who now raises funds for the facility. His wife Oraya teaches in the English department at Thammasat and showed me the ambitious texts she is using for a class in media studies. Both studied at institutions in Massachusetts and speak excellent English. Accompanying them was Kai who is the general manager for the archives which will hopefully be moved next year from Buddhadasa's monastery at Suan Mokkh in the southern province of Sura Thani to the new location near Chatuchak Park in northern Bangkok, more accessible for researchers. We had a wide-ranging conversation about Buddhadasa's impact on Buddhists in Thailand (mostly on the educated and the elite) and around the world (he remains relatively unknown in America, despite the work of his disciple, Santikaro, at Liberation Park in Wisconsin). A major influence on engaged Buddhism through his student, Sulak Sivaraksa, I find many parallels between Buddhadasa and Thomas Merton, the monk who reinvigorated modern Catholicism (and the current gate keepers have been trying to close the doors ever since his death in Bangkok in 1968). I offered my help with English translations and with spreading the word about the archives to expats in Thailand, and my Buddhist contacts in America. What is urgently needed is a good collection of Buddhadasa's key thoughts for an English audience, similar to the volumes of writings by Thai forest monk Ajahn Chah that his admirers in America have produced.

We were joined by Prinya Thaewanarumitkul, assistant rector for student affairs, who had a lively discussion, in Thai, with Oraya and Santi about creating a class in morality or ethics for incoming students. Prinya was a student leader during protests against the government in 1992 that led to a bloody crackdown. A frequent visitor to Suan Mokkh, Prinya now teaches constitutional law at Thammasat. Santi and Oraya would like to see Buddhadasa's teachings offered to students. After all, the monk was a friend and adviser to Pridi Banomyong who founded the university in 1932. But there are some objections about the possibility of religious indoctrination, which is odd given that "church and state" are not separated as they are in the U.S. I told them about how the religious students department at UC Santa Cruz was disestablished in the 1980s by academics who felt religion could only be taught with scientific objectivity and believed that faith has no place in the classroom, either for students or teachers.

I am following the events in Iran with intense interest and have noticed the criticism that Obama has not been vocal enough in his condemnation of what may or may not be evolving into a revolution, one that would certainly serve U.S. interests in the region (although Mir Hussein Moussavi may be every bit as conservative as Ahmadinejad). I like that he's holding his tongue (something Bush would never do). America has blundered more often than not whenever it meddles in conflicts in other countries. For the truth about America's crimes against Iran, read Chris Hedges powerful article "Iran Had a Democracy Before We Took It Away" on Common Dreams. It's up to Iranians now to decide their fate. They do not need our guns or our cheerleading.

Here in Bangkok, momentous changes are in the air. The all-powerful Electoral Commission has just banned 16 senators for violating the constitution by holding shares in companies that do business with the government. This may mean that 66 members of Parliament, similarly charged, could lose their positions. If so, the fragile coalition keeping Prime Minister Abhisit afloat, will sink dramatically and new elections might be called. But over the weekend the candidate in Sakon Nakhon for the Thaksin-backed Puea Thai Party defeated her opponent by a landslide in a by-election. The loser was a member of the rival Bhumjaithai Party which was founded by former Thaksin associate Newin Chitchob who himself been banned from holding office by the EC. This continuing support for the fugitive PM in the northeast of Thailand must have the power brokers in Bangkok shaking in their shoes. Would they encourage yet another military coup to avoid letting Thais yet again attempt to elect a government of their own choosing?

Further to my post of last week, a continuing critique of the government of Israel. Historian Tony Judt, who in the past has argued persuasively for a "one-state solution" to the problem of Israel and Palestinian (which would remove the nation's Jewish character), has written a brilliant op-ed column in the New York Times, "Fictions on the Ground," in which he explodes numerous myths perpetuated by the Zionists and challenges Obama to "break with two decades of American compliance, acknowledge publicly that the emperor is indeed naked, dismiss Mr. Netanyahu for the cynic he is and remind Israelis that all their settlements are hostage to American goodwill." Anything else "would be the worst possible outcome of the present diplomatic dance. No one else in the world believes this fairy tale; why should we? Israel’s political elite would breathe an unmerited sigh of relief, having once again pulled the wool over the eyes of its paymaster. The United States would be humiliated in the eyes of its friends, not to speak of its foes." This from one of the few Jewish intellectuals to challenge the reigning rhetoric is a must read.

Jewish State Treats Gazans "Like Animals"

Visiting the unreconstructable ruins of Gaza on Wednesday, former President Jimmy Carter said that Palestinians in the Gaza Strip were being treated "more like animals than human beings" by Israeli rules that limit travel, ban the import of all but basic goods and prevented rebuilding since a three-week war ended earlier this year. "Never before in history has a large community been savaged by bombs and missiles and then deprived of the means to repair itself," he said. Carter called the situation "a terrible human rights crime," and demanded that this "abuse must cease. The crimes must be investigated. The wall must be brought down, and the basic right of freedom must come to you," he said to Palestinians at a United Nations school during a visit to Gaza.

Carter's has been one of the few American voices of sanity for years on the deplorable situation in Palestine. His most recent book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, paralleled the oppression of Palestinians by Israelis with the years of white occupation of blacks in South Africa. In the 2006 book he wrote, "Israel's continued control and colonization of Palestinian land have been the primary obstacles to a comprehensive peace agreement in the Holy Land." He could have added that this instability has poured fuel on the conflict between Muslims and the West. He was, of course, accused of anti-Semitism. In a Los Angeles Times Op-Ed column, Carter wrote: "The ultimate purpose of my book is to present facts about the Middle East that are largely unknown in America, to precipitate discussion and to help restart peace talks that can lead to permanent peace for Israel and its neighbors. Another hope is that Jews and other Americans who share this same goal might be motivated to express their views, even publicly, and perhaps in concert." Obama's recent speech in Cairo, however, raised fears that the Israeli tail continues to wag the American dog. While he urged a "freeze" on current settlements and reiterated the U.S. call for a "two-state solution," voiced even by George W. Bush, he did not explain how a viable Palestinian state could ever be constructed in the West Bank if numerous Israeli settlements and the wall took up much of their land.

Obama's feeble suggestions were answered with a resounding "No!" by Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He rejected demands for a settlement freeze and declared a Palestinian state would only be acceptable if it were "demilitarized" and recognized Israel as a "Jewish state." Calling this his "vision of peace," Netanyahu referred repeatedly to the West Bank, the territory presumed to comprise the bulk of a future Palestinian state, by its biblical name of Judea and Samaria, declaring it “the land of our forefathers.” He rejected the Palestinian demand for a right of return for refugees of the 1948 war and for their millions of descendants, and insisted that Jerusalem remain capital of a Jewish state (although an estimated 20 percent of the population of Israel are not Jews). The chief Palestinian negotiator argued that Netanyahu did not really accept a Palestinian state. "Instead, he announced a series of conditions and qualifications that render a viable, independent and sovereign Palestinian state impossible,” according to Saeb Erekat. He"left us with nothing to negotiate as he systematically took nearly every permanent status issue off the table.”

Will the Obama administration fall for this (Muslims are already charging that his Cairo speech lacked the support of any concrete actions)? The White House reacted positively to what it called “the important step forward” of Netanyahu’s support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Huh? Just because he used the words "two states" is meaningless if the definition he uses continues to maintain the apartheid of an occupied people who are denied the basic necessities of existence by a cruel overlord. And the the illegal settlements in the West Bank must be dismantled rather than frozen as countless United Nations resolutions have demanded. Anything less makes Netanyahu's "vision" of two peoples living "freely, side-by-side, in amity and mutual respect" hypocritical nonsense that only successive U.S governments have thought realistic. Watch Obama very closely in the coming week to see if he can take his eye off Iran long enough to call Netanyahu's bluff.

Obama's host, Egyptian President Hosnu Mubarak, whose country signed a peace treaty with Israel three decades ago, says Netanyahu's demand for Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state "aborts" any possible peace agreement. The Arab League, which endorsed a 2002 initiative seeking land in exchange for peace with Israel, criticized the Prime Minister for imposing what it described as “impossible” conditions on the Palestinians. Neither Egypt nor Jordan, the only Arab states with full diplomatic ties with Israel, were required to recognize it as a Jewish state before signing treaties. A newspaper in Lebanon said the Israeli leader’s remarks were more “like a declaration of war than an offer to negotiate.”

Recently an old friend told me it was unacceptable to call Israelis "Jews." It is true that the population includes Arab Christians and Muslims but it is not at all clear to me that they have equal rights with Jews. However, Neltanyahu's assertion of the Jewish character of Israel makes that argument moot. I believe that nations defined by the religion or ethnicity of its dominant residents is a luxury the world, with it's limited land, cannot afford. Benedict Anderson famously calld nations "imagined communities." There are two dangers: the tyranny of the minority, and the suppression of minority views by the majority. Israel can maintain its Jewish character only by denying the rights of return of Palestinians forceably expelled during the country's bloody establishment after World War Two. Western nations eased their guilt over denying refuge to Jews persecuted by Hitler by giving them land occupied for centuries by Muslims, Christians and Jews. Zionist terrorists (by any definition of the word) did their best to ethnically cleanse the land they say was promised them by God (a dubious claim). Homes and olive groves were plowed under and the new residents "made the desert bloom."

A lifelong student of religion and spirituality, I hold many Jewish scriptures and wisdom texts (including the mysticism developed in 12th century Spain) in high regard. What the Christians called the Old Testament, however, is rife with ugly passages where God's favored brutalized the residents of the "promised land." Bede Griffiths was forced to edit the Psalms for his ashram in India to remove obnoxious passages. Of course all religious scriptures smuggle in ugly cultural views and need to be interpreted carefully.

The irony is that many Jews in Israel (most?) are secular rather than religious. They identify as Jews (just as some New Yorkers identify as Yankee fans) based on beliefs about the continuity of ethnicity handed down by their ancestors. They imagine their community. Nothing unusual about this; it is the way human beings socialize (there are no real universal or earth citizens). Unlike gays, however, Jews have no physical basis for their unity. Despite hateful tracts, Jewish blood is no different than Christian (or Muslim) blood. Biologically, we are the same. But just as Native Americans and Hawaiians try to justify their rights by reference to "blood quanta," as if biological descent can confer privilege, Jews determine their identity through matriarchal descent. I know some Jews, though, who hang onto their identity through a father that married a gentile mother. Even though criticism of Jews is usually called anti-semitism, Jews do not identify with their fellow Semites, the Arabs. Which just goes to show that all ethnic or religious identity is ultimately political.

My guiding principle, or morality if you will, is to oppose injustice wherever I find it. There's plenty to go around in the world. The injustice to the Palestinians is particularly blatant. And because U.S. policy for too many years has supported and enabled the Israeli oppression, I consider this case one of the most important of our times.

Life on a Roller Coaster

The Vortex is no ordinary roller coaster, as this video from YouTube illustrates. What was I thinking? The Big Dipper in Santa Cruz, perhaps. There's one of these death-defying machines at Great America in Santa Clara. There's also one at Six Flags (which just filed for bankruptcy, fun being no longer affordable). That we were securely strapped in as if taking off to the moon should have been a clue. I teased my friend when she threatened to close her eyes. We began to move and slowly climbed to the top. The rest is a blur. I was barely able to open my eyes, much less see anything. I screamed, we all screamed. "I thought I die," Nan said afterward. I nearly tossed my cookies.

And that's how life is, right? A slow climb, then a jerky and heart-racing middle passage with many strange and scary twists and turns, followed by a gradual slowdown as your car nears the end of the track. A neat metaphor, but it doesn't seem to apply to me as I race down the track in Thailand. I should be listening to a slow tune on the merry-go-round now that I've reached the sunset years, my efforts to grab the brass ring over and done with. I suppose the big impending seven-oh colors everything. A shrink would say that my association with young Thai ladies is a blatant attempt to hold onto my youth. Other seniors hit the treadmill or the tanning salon. I went with my new sweetie to Siam Park on Saturday, Bangkok's answer to Disneyland, and rode the Vortex and other assorted amusements for thrill seekers (she refused to get on the Boomerang).

Siam Park wasn't exactly a disappointment, but it's day had clearly passed. I expected big crowds on a weekend, but you could hardly gather a quorum on the rides. We rode in an enclosed revolving platform up to the top of a 100-meter Si-Am Tower for a magnificent view that included the skyscrapers of Bangkok in the distance, and we spun around in the Condor's bird-shaped cars at a height of 50 meters. We plummeted from a height of 75 meters in Giant Drop (I was asked if I had heart problems) which took our breath away. And we stumbled in the dark through Big Double Shock as mouth-eaten and dusty cadavers tried to scare us. There were fountains and giant statues of cute animals and Asian warriors and numerous snack stands without customers. Several new rides were under construction including a Log Flume ride that reminded me of the Boardwalk back in California. Groups of teenagers and families with kids strolled the nearly empty lanes. Where were the people? Located on the eastern outskirts of the city, Suan Siam (the Thai name) would be easy to reach by private car. But our journey by bus was a different matter. We took one bus to Victory Monument and then discovered that the bus we wanted to take to the park had been replaced by numerous buses going to Ramkhanhaeng University for Saturday classes. Finally one arrived that would get us to the park, but the entire trip took nearly two and a half hours. Life as a journey to an amusement park?

After a few hot and sweaty rides, we headed toward "Asia's largest water park," a collection of pools and slides that occupied the biggest slice of land in Siam Park. Yes, that's me by the Speed Slide, obviously in need of Kramer's notorious invention. This one and the Super Spiral were loads of fun, and there was no waiting in line for the downhill plunge. The largest body of water featured a machine-generated wave and a wall of waterfalls surrounded the kiddie pond. Sling-back chairs were everywhere, some occupied by picnicking families, and the air was filled with happy screams and shouts (we were too far from the Vortex passengers to hear their cries for help). Canals with rivers of flowing water meandered between the islands where the old people ate and slept. Fat gray rain clouds drifted overhead but the only water I experienced came in the pools and down the slides. Even though we missed Jurassic Adventure and African Adventure, Siam Park was a delightful place to pass a Saturday afternoon.

My son observes that "your recent blogs have been less personal." Sometimes one has to be oblique. Today I wrote to a new woman friend in my age bracket on Facebook who lives in Bangkok that I was "the typical older farang with a young Thai girlfriend." Truth in advertising. That same son does not support me in "dating women so young." Imagine, he suggests, "your father being with a woman so different from your mother," and I confess the image boggles my mind. My father always seemed old. He would come home smelling of booze and fall asleep in his chair before the TV. Maybe a younger woman would have done him some good. My son wants me to "find someone to grow old with, rather than someone to take care of you and be of service." I tried to grow old with his mother but she wasn't having any of it. So I've come to Thailand in hopes of finding someone who would care for me and that I could love until I die. But I will grow old -- am indeed already old -- well before the women I have loved here in Thailand.

I promised Mot when we separated that I would look for someone much older than her to take care of me. I had been seeing Mot for several months and our feelings for each other were deep and mutual. But she made it very clear the first night we went home together that she could not be my girlfriend. She lives on the other side of the city with her sister who is studying law at Ramkhamhaeng and she teaches English six days a week. Besides the logistical problems, Mot felt her mother in Roi Et could never accept such an old man into their family. So our affair was doomed, Romeo and Juliet for the 21st century. During my first date with Nan I discovered that most of what she had published in her online profile was false. Even the photo was of someone else. While younger than Mot, Nan told me that her mother in Phayao had taught her to be independent. She had her nose pierced when she was younger and wore multiple earrings in one ear. And she lived openly with with her boyfriend during college. But he got another girl at the factory where they worked pregnant. "I hate factory girls," she told me yesterday. When she moved to Bangkok to work in an office a year ago, she decided she wanted to meet an older farang. I fit the bill.

Now we are getting to know each other, and a rocky road (or a jerky roller coaster) it is proving to be. I've discovered that it's very easy to talk about myself. Of course we converse in English. But I know less about her. Yesterday she told me rather abruptly that she had to go back to her room to see her younger sister. Ann is a college student with a Thai boyfriend not all that much younger than me. Nan took her belongings and left, saying she would come back in the evening. I began to think she had other plans, even a date with another man, and angrily sent her an SMS telling her not to return. Then I wrote her an email detailing my worries and upset. A few hours later she sent me a long email (her ability to write in English is vastly superior to that of others I've met), explaining that her sister and boyfriend were fighting over the sister's visit to a disco last night and she had to mediate between them. But she had been unable to explain the complexity of it to me in English. In the evening we talked on the phone. She laughingly called me "Mr. Upset Man," not the first time that label has been applied to this temperamental farang.

Speaking of age differences, I've been doing some research into the lives of Anna Leonowens and King Mongut of Siam, also known as Rama IV. In the spirit of intellectual inquiry, I downloaded and watched all three films based on their encounter in the 1860s. The first, starring Irene Dunne and Rex Harrison, came out in 1946, and the last, with Jodie Foster and Chow Yun-Fat, was released in 1999. The best known film was "The King and I" starring Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr, which was released in 1956. All three were based on the diaries of Anna, the governess to King Mongut's many children, including Prince Chulalongkorn, and the novel based on the diaries by Margaret Landon. According to Wikipedia, the King was born in 1804 and Anna in 1831, which makes their age difference 27 years, and the King was 58 and Anna 31 when they met. But their movie counterparts are closer in age. Dunne was 10 years older than Harrison, and Brynner a year older than Kerr. Foster was 7 years young than Chow Yun-Fat. After seeing all three films, I sympathize with the Thai decision to ban the film and the books from which they were created. The King in all of them is a bit of a buffoon (less so in the more recent film) and Anna is portrayed as a beacon of western civilization, come to bring culture and knowledge to the Asian barbarians. It's a clear case of "orientalism" (as Edward Said has explained it), an attempted colonization of the culture. The equivalent would be a film with Abraham Lincoln tap dancing with Suzie Wong.

Last week I played "America" by Simon & Garfunkel for my class of monks. The theme of our unit was "The Way We Live" with a focus on America. I explained that Simon was writing about a couple traveling across America by bus and told them the meaning of "turnpike," "Michigan,""hitchhike" and "scenery." This week there is a section on James Bond and I'm going to play them Lulu's version of "The Man With the Golden Gun." Finding songs to play for my students is a kick, and I'm glad I've got a selection of over 11,000 on my iPod to choose from. Their suggestions are from the English pop library that young Thais seem to prefer, Britney, Robbie Williams, Maroon 5 and Mariah Carey. Last week I asked them to talk about what they missed from home. Most of my students come from countries bordering Thailand -- Cambodia, Laos and Shan State, Myanmar. Even those from within Thailand come from distant villages. Typically, they missed their family and friends, and perhaps the local cuisine (Isan food is distinct, and I learned about the tastiness of Shan noodles). When I asked if they missed their language, many of them got the connection. Some of them, particularly from Burma, had to learn three languages just to be able to study English as a fourth. They are extremely versatile.

Born Aware? Or Just Bad to the Bone?

The distinction between Mahayana and Theravada, the two major branches of Buddhism, is quite important on this side of the Pacific. The Theravada tradition is the oldest school (the name means "Teaching of the Elders"), and it moved from India to Sri Lanka and from there to Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand. Mahayana (the name means "Great Vehicle") developed perhaps five hundred years later in India as a reform movement and moved north to China, Vietnam, Japan and Korea. Vajrayana ("Diamond Vehicle") was influenced by Mahayana and evolved its own character in Tibet. While each claims to follow the Buddha's teaching, they study and venerate different religious texts. And although enlightenment is the common goal for Buddhists, practitioners of the different schools often disagree on how one gets there. In order to understand the Buddhism of my adopted home, I have tried to sort out the differences with some difficulty. I need more years than I have left. It's the story of the blind man and the elephant, mostly a matter of perspective.

I've seen grown men almost come to blows here over the use of the term Hinayana ("Lesser Vehicle") when comparing Theravada with Mahayana. The primary distinction came up again on Sunday when I attended the monthly forum in English held by the World Buddhist University at their headquarters in Benjasiri Park on Sukhumvit Road. Dr. Tavivat Puntarigvivat, a Buddhist academic schooled in Western philosophy, spoke on the different theories of human nature developed by each school of Buddhism and argued that they were essentially the same. The structure of his argument was simple: In the encounter with Taoism and Confucianism in China, Mahayana Buddhist developed the idea that humans are born with "Buddha nature." This is the idea that everyone is born with "natural awareness," or what I might call "sentience." In the Theravada tradition, however, all are born "ignorant." Enlightenment for the Theravadin is the reduction of ignorance, while, for the Mahayanan, it is an increase in and deepening of awareness.

"Same Same" as the expression goes here (a popular tee shirt slogan). But is it? Is ignorance simple unawareness? Is awareness a diminution of ignorance? Are we born good and only need to get better, or are we born bad and must either be saved or succeed by our own efforts? Perhaps this is the nature vs. nurture debate in a different format. I recall the distinction made by early Jewish and Christian theologians and mystics. One side believes human beings are infected by original sin and something must be done to purify this fragile vessel in which we abide. The other side focuses on God's "original blessing" (in the phrase coined by Matthew Fox), and sees human beings as inherently good, possessed of the sparks of God or the Holy Spirit. For this group, if the glass windows in our house are cleansed,then the light of the divine will shine brightly within. The doctrine that humans are born bad or good has consequences.

I asked Dr. Tavivat what consequences the different theories of human nature would have for the practices of Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism. But the professor, who chairs the department of comparative religion at Mahidol University, seemed more interested in harmony than further discord between the schools. Mahayana Buddhists tend to be more socially active, probably because of their belief in Bodhisattvas who forgo enlightenment until all beings are fully aware. Theravada Buddhists are more concerned with their own individual rebirth and enlightenment. Can this be the result of their different views of human nature? What is it that makes some Catholics as well as Buddhists more concerned about the suffering of others than their own fate? If we think human nature is irredeemably flawed in actually existing people, then we might be more concerned about saving their souls and our own for a future heaven, or working towards a satisfactory rebirth. We will be less interested in improving life for all here and now. But if we believe humans and their bodies are good and holy, and damaged only by cruel and unjust social structures, then we will engage with the issues of our time to improve the life of all. So one's theory of human nature DOES make a difference, and conflicting theories cannot easily be harmonized.

I was interested in meeting Dr. Tavivat because his bio mentioned that he'd studied economics in Thailand, philosophy in Hawaii, and at Temple University in Philadelphia he wrote a Ph.d. dissertation on "Bhikku Buddhadasa's Dhammic Socialism in Dialogue with Latin American Liberation Theology." That got my attention. Buddhadasa, who died at 86 in 1993, was an influential and prolific Thai monk who argued for the reform of many aspects of Theravada Buddhism. He included laypeople in the definition of the Sangha (formerly reserved for ordained males alone) and incorporated aspects of Mahayana thought in his understanding of the Buddha's teaching. Unfortunately, he is more accepted here by educated Thais than the rural poor whose practice is restricted to rituals and tamboon (making merit) to insure a good rebirth. One of Buddhadasa's students is Sulak Sivaraksa, a Thai spiritual gadfly who, along with Thich Nhat Hahn, helped to develop the practice of engaged Buddhism. I had always looked upon liberation theology, the teaching spread by activist European priests in Latin America in the 1960s, as a kind of engaged Christianity. Even though condemned by the Vatican (in particular, by the current Pope), the work of Catholics for social justice in Nicaragua, Brazil and Peru, made it possible for me to convert to that faith twenty years ago. Unfortunately, this side of Catholicism is rapidly disappearing. So now I look for an explicit practice of compassion and justice in Buddhism and find it in Buddhadasa's teaching. I'm hopeful that Dr. Tavivat will let me read a copy of his 1994 dissertation, as well as an article scheduled to be published in a forthcoming collection, Liberation Theology in the World's Living Religions.

Last week I read in the Bangkok Post that the Buddhadasa Archives will open in a new facility here next year. Two web pages were mentioned in the story and I tried both, only to find them in Thai with no translation. So I sent an email off to the secretary of the archives foundation and offered my services. Given a rough translation from Thai, I could turn it into readable English. I received an immediate reply, and then another, from two different officers of the archives. They suggested a meeting and I hope it will take place soon. The archives will be located in north Bangkok near Jatujak Park where the mammoth weekend market is held. It's easily reachable on the Skytrain which ends at Mot Chit next to the park. When I retired from teaching over five years ago, my intention was to continue to study the relevance of religion to economics and ecology. Maybe that goal can be fulfilled.

On the way home from Dr. Tavivat's lecture, I stopped at Central World to see an outdoor exhibit of photography of the sea and its creatures. Planet Ocean: a Voyage to the Heart of the Marine Realm opened last Friday and is co-sponsored by Zen, the large department store in Central World, and the French Embassy which is putting on its annual cultural festival, "La Fête." (Also this month the Italians are having their own cultural festival which includes the showing of films at the Emporium cinema.) The incredible photographs were taken by marine biologist and professional diver Laurent Ballesta and show a variety of strange undersea denizens as well as garbage and other noxious effects of pollution which endanger the world's oceans. Ballesta's book, Planète Mers (Planet Ocean) was published by National Geographic and 88 of his photographs have been enlarged for the show which is on display until August 12. Captions on marine biodiversity and the conservation of the marine environment were written by co-author Pierre Descamp.

This just in:



Apparently that lunatic preacher Pat Robertson said on his TV show, The 700 Club, that if proposed hate crimes legislation was passed, then perverts who like to have sex with ducks (or children) could be protected under that law.

A couple of women activists for gay marriage, Riki "Garfunkel" Lindhome and Kate "Oates" Micucci, took him seriously and created this fantastic video.