Views from Swiss Cottage, Tekek, Tioman Island
That’s Pulau Tioman in Malaysian, assuming I’ve understood correctly. I actually spent a full week in Malaysia without one single guide book: it all came through the web and recommendations from friends (big, big ta out to once and future MSF colleague Ching, who doctored our patients in Nanning until just about this time last year and is now back in London – but who took time from her busy schedule to tell me about good places to let it all go in Malaysia), and I’m happy to say it worked out wonderfully.
Tioman Dive Center is located on the grounds of Swiss Cottage, and is the best and only necessary reason to stay there: the location is perfect, but otherwise the Swiss Cottage feels a bit like a campground: accommodations are basic and spare, and they pretty much leave you alone. Seems I may have gotten a few bedbug bites (at least, I don’t think they’re mosquitos), but other than that I’ve no complaints and many happy memories, as these photos attest: all taken from the grounds, or from the deck in front of my little room, where I watched the waves breaking 10 feet away every morning and evening.
So these were my days on Tioman: run in the morning and watch the sun rise. Go for the morning dive. Have lunch. Relax. Go for the afternoon dive. Relax. Watch the sunset. One evening: go for a night dive (very, very cool: finally saw photo luminescence, or whatever it is where you move your hand in the water and little bacteria light up and luminesce in little sparks in the water). Eat lots of good Malaysian food. Sleep well. Tough life, huh? I did complicate things a bit by signing up to get my advanced open water certification, but considering the dives I got to do, it was certainly well worth it!
If you’re wondering how I got that nifty angle on the sunset – like, not right at beach level, but sort of above the beach? – here’s the secret: I was in the tree house. 🙂 Though I got on my own case a bit about that fact that here I was on vacation – relax, right? – and what do I do but sign myself up for the Advanced Open Water Diver course, which meant theory readings on saftey and decompression illness and underwater navigation etc. But when you consider that the bulk of said readings occurred on this little platform, with the views you’ve just been seeing and many more, you’ll understand that it wasn’t all that painful. And the rewards…ah, those wreck dives. And the sheer coolness of seeing stonefish (highly poisonous, usually well camouflaged and just sitting on the ocean floor) hanging out a the hull of a wrecked ship at 30 meters beneath the surface. Sweet, huh?
Friday afternoon I took advantage of the necessary dive-recovery time (before boarding an airplane, you need rest time for your system to recover and vent all your excess nitrogren) to take a long walk up the spine of the island, partway along the jungle trail that connects Tekek, the main town, with Juara, a little hamlet on the east side. It felt rather like being in the jungle or bird house at a zoo: especially as the sun got lower on the horizon toward 6:00, the monkeys came out and jumped around in the canopy; birds started singing in tones and songs that told me I wasn’t in Kansas any more, and the light under the dense jungle canopy got dimmer and dimmer except where the sun slanted in.Here you see the self-portrait I feel obliged to take every time I’m in some new and unusual place where my inner Ohio-boy can’t quite believe I really am. There are also several general shots of the trail, the jungle, and the cute little rest stop that someone lugged all the way uphill to install for us weary hikers that had toiled our way up that high mountain-hill (tallest peak on the island is about 1,100 meters) through the tropical haze.
Rubber Trees
Final Views of Tioman
How Deep is Your Love?
Ah but the spur du moment to fire up that ‘puter was this: How Deep IS Your Love? This is Bee Gees Week in so much world, so little time land! And we’re not talking “Staying Alive,” or “Nights on Broadway,” or any of those other fine songs that have so sadly vanished from the American airwaves. Please recall: Monday’s highlight was 3 Venezuelans humming and singing along to “HDIYL” in a swank little Indonesian-Burmese joint frequented by embassy diplomats from the neighborhood. Today’s early-morning (it’s 9:15 as I type this) highlight? Malaysia Airlines was playing “HDIYL” a la piano Muzak when I boarded! The stars have aligned! Clearly, at last and long overdue, underappreciated 70s Americana is taking over the airwaves of Asia. Perhaps a Chinese Kung Fu director will soon do for the boys in white pants and bad hair what “Priscilla” and “Muriel” did for ABBA? ‘Nights on Broadway, the Musical’ opening on the West End, anyone? You heard it here first!
离开中国 – Leaving China
亲 爱的，尊敬的朋友们；dear and respected friends, I have much to share with you. First and foremost: be careful what you wish. To quote my dear old self, a mere handful of days ago: “…I’m becoming bored by China and ready to move to whatever comes next.” To be mildly trite about it, the future is now. Eleven days have taken me from fairly confident MSF would keep me here until the end of December, to leaving my mission in China sixty hours from this moment, now, as I sit at my desk on my computer listening to OMD cycling on the MP3 player. Saturday morning I’m bound for a week’s R&R in a soon-to-be-disclosed location (if you watch the blog, you too can find out where and envy me), whence I shall jet to my new assignment in MSF’s Sri Lanka mission.
More about the future when I’ve started living it. For the moment, I choose to look back fondly on the 18 months that have been since I left the US and hitched my star to MSF. This pic of me at the Eastern Qing Tombs Spirit Way arrived recently from Davey, one of the many friends and colleagues I’m sad to be bidding adieu. You must note that I’m holding a water bottle that claims to be Pabst Blue Ribbon Water. Wow – even weaker than the old 3.2 beer! For the sheer fun of it and to honor 18 kick-ass months, I’ve selected this and nine other shots to represent outstanding moments since I boarded that flight in Cleveland.
It’s My Birthday…And I’ll Reminisce if I Want To!
After work today, I had my last class with my Chinese teacher, who’s become one of my best Chinese friends here; then I invited her and her boyfriend for dinner. To my delight, they’d secretly arranged a wonderful cake with candles and even a little cardboard hat. Being 44 and headed demnaechst for a locale which is rather less stable than 北京, I allowed myself to walk all the way home with that cardboard crown on my head. Feeling silly has its merits on occasion.
The week has highlighed the joys and sadnesses of my current life. With my friend and tennis opponent from the Venezuelan embassy for a final lunch on Monday, along with one of his colleagues and her daughter, I had the unique pleasure of observing American influence on the world as all three spontaneously started singing along with the Bee Gees in our Indonesian-Burmese restaurant, “How deep is your love, I really need to know…’cuz we’re living in a world of…” You get the idea. Yes friends, I managed NOT to join the chorus. Had it been Abba, all bets are off…but then that’s Swedish cultural imperialism, ain’t it? 🙂
I’m also very sad. True, adrenaline junkies R Us here at “so much world, so little time.” But I’ve put down roots here. I’m truly going to miss Ditan Park, biking to the gym for my morning swims, an office where I know the ins and outs, and the increasing joy of actually understanding a lot of those street signs! And I’m sad to leave Catherine, 石灿, Davey, Linda, Paul LB, Yuning, Nico, Ahsong and Michelle and all my Nanning colleagues.
On the other hand…the island nation of Sri Lanka awaits me, a land I’ve heard and fantasized about since my college years. Testing my ability to walk the walk. Seeing more of this world. That little kick in my stomach to know MSF trusts me with what’s surely a more challenging spot than where I’ve been so far.
So I say thank you for the memories. (Identify that line if you can. Yup, that’s ABBA, friends. Sweden rules!) Early faltering efforts, last September, at some form of outreach in Nanning have blossomed into an impressive poster and postcard campaign informing the most excluded populations in and around Nanning that we’re there and encourage them come in and get tested so they can get treated if necessary, and stay healthy and productive. (Honestly, I’ve often felt like I’m back in NYC in the 1980s, the difference being now ARVs have rendered AIDS a chronic, rather than usually fatal disease, if treatment is available. Give to your local MSF chapter in order to keep treatment coming for the millions and millions internationally that need it!) Training in Bangkok gave me a chance to explore Ayuthaya with Anthony – good old Anthony, from the good old days on the NYFR running gear committee. Hell I’ma get maudlin soon! And I will never, no never, forget the beauty of Labrang Monastery and Xiahe in Gansu, or walking Tiger Leaping Gorge with Howard and Gene.
The Year that Was
Year, of course, is not literal here. From arrival on the banks of the Seine in the waning hours of February 2005 for my training (all French – those were they days, when that scared the bejesus out of me, knowing my future w/MSF hung on my ability to pass 10 days of training class en Francais), to following villagers up the path from their washed-away houses to the roadside distribution point we’d set up for for NFI (non-food items) distribution. Breaking out of my rut of the moment in Nanning to hop rattletrap honk-happy local buses and explore hidden corners of Guangxi, leading me to the gorgeous Detian Waterfalls, between Vietnam and China. From hiking steep, quiet magnificent karst trails with Steve in Wulingyuan last October, to watching the kids play cards at Baoji’s Children’s Center this March, on the last day of MSF involvement, before Baoji was reborn the next day, like the phoenix, as Baoji Xinxing Aid for Street Kids, an independent NGO. Tonight at dinner, my teacher’s boyfriend asked what I regretted about leaving that corporate life behind. My answer: “non, rien, rien, je ne regrette rien.”
Eastern Qing Tombs: 清东陵 (and a new look)
Yes, friends, after 18 months my publishing instincts have reasserted themselves: I’ve become bored by my own blog, so I’m redesigning it. Actually, on some twisted little level I’m becoming bored by China (gasp, goes Paul’s audience and his inner censor – can this be true?!) and ready to move on to whatever comes next…but more about that later. The point here and now is: I’m trying some new things on the blog, so let me know what you think, OK?
But about that boredom, you’re thinking. Can’t be a midlife crisis – doesn’t selling up all my stuff and leaving the US qualify as a satisfactory resolution to that one? Especially when it follows a few years dedicated to becoming a certified advanced holistic massage therapist and doing energy work in Northern California? Is Paul coming unraveled, we all wonder? Am I regressing? Having been a dutiful little boy who got good grades and never cut school for my entire educational career (yes, folks, I’m boring) and done the career route – am I now dedicated to becoming a flake? J
Nah – just shaking things up a bit so I don’t fall into a rut here. Never ceases to amaze me how much I’ve adapted to the most mind boggling things. Says my friend Ondrej (that’s Mr. Risk to those who’ve actually read the text rather than just skimming the photos), “Surprise? After 16 [in his case, a piddly four] months in China, I don’t know what that word means.” Actually, let’s blame all this on Ondrej, shall we? I lost my beloved first-ever digital camera (one never forgets one’s first): clearly his fault, since it fell out of the cab in which he’d distracted me with his charming ways and handsome looks. I shaved my head: clearly his fault, since he said he only likes dangerous-looking men. So he’s cost me a new camera, several haircuts just keep my pate shiny and tan – and all I get is a new friend who’s now in Brisbane missing the crowds of China. Sadly, it seems I still don’t look dangerous, even shaven-headed. So next I’ll start tattooing and piercing various parts of my body, no doubt. Would a big iron cross tattooed across my forehead make me more sexy-dangerous, do you think? It would certainly be SOOO me.
OK, OK, enough about my summer makeovers and my failed love life. You want to know what you’re looking at. Well, they’re the Eastern Qing Tombs, duh! They don’t appear in any of your tour guides, you say? Haha! Finally got out of the tourist books! And it’s well worth it. Sorry folks, you won’t see these on any guided tours soon: they’re too far outside Beijing to fit neatly in the three-day packages that combine Wall & Ming Tombs, Forbidden City, Tiananmen, Temple of Heaven, and the mandatory stop at Yashow so you can purchase all those pirated clothes China’s no longer making or selling. (Yeah, right, just like all those pirated CDs that we can’t buy here any more.)
Now about those tombs…ever the boring academic, let me inform you that the Qing Dynasty (as noted in my last posts from the seashore) established itself after storming down from the wild northeast (aka Manchuria) and driving out the last of the Han Chinese Dynasties in 1644. (These dynastic dates all make it sound so neat and clean, but of course it really wasn’t – it was civil wars and gradual disintegration throughout China for years, until finally the Manchurians stormed the gates en masse.) It ruled, more or less, until 1911: again, saying “Qing Dynasty, 1644-1911” sounds so tidy. In actual fact, the dynasty reached its peak during the reigns of Kangxi (1661-1722) and his grandson Qianlong (1735-1799), and after that it was one ugly, long decline, during which Europe started trying to boss China around quite a bit. (The French and British, in particular, took a fancy to marching on Beijing and burning down palaces and things in order to make the Chinese open more ports for trade. See – the WTO does serve a purpose!)
What’s interesting about the Qing Tombs is they’re divided: almost everyone’s over here, on the east, spread along the slopes of these mountains at the edge of this gorgeous valley. Then there’s Yongzheng, Kangxi’s fourth son, who came between the other two and was – though quite ruthless – said to be one of the finer Qing emperors. Kangxi, living as long as he did and of course surrounded in the Forbidden City by all those concubines and wives, managed to produce quite a few progeny, of whom something like 13 were sons. If you think your family’s had some inheritance disputes, just imagine how Kangxi’s sons settled their differences! Yongzheng killed all but one (the most loyal) of his brothers and ruled from 1722-1735. When it came time to plan his tomb, though, he suffered some remorse, and chose a separate location far out west of town for himself, his wives and his concubines.
Socio-cultural aside about ruthlessness. In Chinese history – and to tell by my (modern, smart, female) Chinese teacher, still in contemporary culture – it’s accepted among men and emperors. Ruthlessness is just fine. My reading of Chinese history is currently turning up a few ruthless women, invariably the wives or concubines of emperors (or in the case of the Gang of Four, party leaders), and without exception they (Lu Hou 吕后 , Ci Xi 慈禧) are seen as the personification of evil. Just an interesting little note: as my teacher says, women shouldn’t hold power. Bad for them. But men – hell yeah, kill your brothers. No problem! Gotta be cruel to be kind, gotta be firm to rule well, and certainly gotta be a man to rule!
Tidbits about the tombs: there were far more than we could see in a full afternoon, surrounded by fields, orchards and chestnut trees, scattered like jewels along the verdant hillsides at one end of a hill-encircled valley. (Great 风水 – aka feng shui – one understands.) Only a few have been maintained and/or restored – rebuilt, as the critics would say. One great joy is how you feel they’re left in a fairly natural state of deterioration; indeed, Marg and I discussed whether thepeeling and faded paint at one tomb is original from when the emperor was buried there in the mid 1800s, or at least from dynastic-era maintenance (after all, the post-dynastic era didn’t bother much with tomb maintenace until at least the early 1980s, one assumes, given the various obstacles those years presented).
These aren’t ancient, certainly. But they’re old, and they’re dynastic, which places them in a very different time line from the one we live in now, in China. Also, the unrestored ones are very under-visited and atmospheric: the new ones, blesssed with dioramas of tacky statues representing the services that would have been held here to honor the ancestors during the dynastic era, see more tourists. But we spent more than half an hour wandering around one compound and only saw three other people! Final note: the names on the tombs are written both in Manchurian script (which I never even knew existed) and in Chinese characters. Though I’ve been to many Qing-era temples, etc. in China, I’ve never been to official Qing dynastic buildings, so I’d never seen this before.
(July 2016 editor’s note: I’ve edited this post to combine many separate photo-uploads which were necessary when I first posted it, and to take advantage of improved photo-layout options available now.)
Daytripping with Friends from Baoji
Remember the Baoji Children’s Center? MSF ended our management of the project March 31, and it was reborn as Baoji Xinxing Aid for Street Kids, to our knowledge the first domestic NGO serving the needs of street children to be registered and recognized in China. As you can imagine, I’m rather proud of this and of my role in encouraging and supporting the staff to push for this outcome to MSF’s exit from the project.
Managing Xinxing now are our former national staff colleagues, advised by the former FieldCo for MSF, who’s chosen to stay on for some time to help the new NGO get up and running, establish a stable funding stream, and hopefully find ways to make this model viable for other regions of China, by reducing costs while maintaining appropriate quality and so on – essentially making it a development project, away from its roots in a humanitarian aid organization. In any case: I remain in touch with the center, and last week I hosted a visit from Margaret, the now-consultant. At the same time my Baoji friend Davey – who showed me around Xi’an last December – took up my invitation to visit Beijing. He’s just graduated from technical school in Xi’an, and is spending the summer volunteering at the center before continuing his studies in a related field in Xi’an.
I used their visit as an excuse for an overnight excursion, which ended with the Qing tombs you’ve been seeing, but which began with a bus ride to Jixian, the nearest town to the tombs (50km) and an overnight in a lovely courtyard building there. Here we are enjoying our bus ride and a beery dinner after the late bus arrival in Jixian.
(so much world, so little time....) 
