Books & Music

​I like to search out a regional book or two to accompany my travels. In Thailand I read Bangkok Wakes to Rain by Pitchata Sudbanthad. Set in the 19th century colonial era, fast-forwarding to post-WWII coming to terms family drama, then again to a not-too-distant dystopian future when global warming and rising tides has enveloped much if the city with rivers. (I say nit-too-distance because you may recall my early blog about meeting new friends for lunch at a riverside restaurant where the entry was ankle-deep in water and we walked narrow gangplanks to a stairway that took us up to the dining area in the 2nd floor).

In Laos, my Aussie-friend, Sue, tipped me to the murder mystery The Coroner’s Lunch, first in a series in the 70s that also served to poke fun at the idealistic albeit inefficient and supply-starved Communist government at the time. 

In Vietnam, I listened to Ho Chi Minh’s remarkable autobiography which hardly prepared me for the visit to his expansive mausoleum, museum and gardens in the center of Hanoi. I plan to expand on this in a separate blog which I’ve drafted, along with several others, promising myself that I’ll find time to polish and publish them. (Hopefully during these hot 90+ afternoons in Siem Reap (Cambodia) when air-conditioning is my go-to though, so far, I find napping to be my default.)

Here, my reading has been focus on history: the 600-hundred-year (802-1431AD) highly-advanced Anghor Civilization (Khmer Empire) contrasted with the tragic 4-year reign of terror waged by the Khmer Rouge from 1975-1979 when an estimated  2-million people were tortured and murdered. (You may remember the 1984 movie “The Killing Fields”, a movie you’d prefer not to remember even as it’s imperative that we must never forget.)

— 

As I write this, I’m listening to a Spotify soundtrack of Cambodian/Kymer traditional music (and such 60s psychedelic hits like: “Old Pot Still Makes Good Rice”, an accompanying routine I’ve developed as I travel the world. 

Eastern music is so counter-to Western music in ways I really can’t describe. Leave it to the musicologists. Suffice to say it transports me even more deeply into the here and now where I walk, where I live and where I now sleep, both soothed and disturbed by my always other-worldly dreams.

Popular posts from this blog

Amazing Graces

Image
Off to the most amazing start, finding this guesthouse and, today, meeting with Topsi, the Servas host here. She’s amazing and well-connected throughout Thailand. Was the action coordinator for Greenpeace in the early 2000s, flying a hot air balloon and unfurling banners over a coal plant that was a major polluter in Northern Thailand, and leading a flotilla to confront the first Argentinian ship bringing GMO soya into Thailand. Then coordinator for “Ecoversify” in Thailand, and now a director of “Pilgrimage Asia.” Tomorrow she’s introducing me to a monk-friend at the famed Wat Saker (Golden Mount Temple) here, and connecting me with her Chiang Mai friends, in particular the founders of Pun Pun Organic. Not bad for my first 48 hours. We lunched long with a Japanese woman-friend on the banks of the Chao Phraya river — a place a tourist would never discover on their own, called Chaopraya Antique Cafe . Amazingly, you walk a plank since the lower floor (kitchen and living room) has a foot...
Read more

Shokhothai - A Diamond Island in Town Square

Image
I’m moving north from Bangkok with several stops along the way. Perhaps no surprise, but Buddha and Buddhism is everywhere! Oh, the temples! By my reckoning, much more visible than in India and Nepal. Arriving in Sukhothai at orange-dusk last night, I was later washed-over by the brilliantly lit sight of the moated Wat/Stupa in town. You can approach it over four lantern-lit bridges coming from the four directions. It was stunning at night and, after the magic and adventure of morning and checking out tomorrow’s cute little guesthouse (with the weed store next door); and a fine latte with an oat-coca biscuit - and definitely the heat if the day - my trusty shoes walked me over the north bridge to the Stupa where I found a shaded stone bench awaiting me.. It’s a wholly holy peaceful scene. Not a soul about. I wish I had brought my inflatable meditation cushion. Around the far side, there is hubbub. It’s all quietly done, but they’re setting up for an event, rolling out tons of gold ca...
Read more

Tomorrow

​In the wee hours of the early morning a flight from Rochester to JFK then onto Bangkok. Another journey into the unknown that I sense will be familiar in enough ways to find the treasures I seek. 
Read more