Maybe Next Trip

Tag: travel

  • Mulu’s Many Mighty Wonders: the UNESCO World Heritage Area Impresses with Above and Below Ground Sites

    World’s Largest Canopy Walk at Gunung Mulu National Park

    The World’s Largest Canopy Walk

    I was staring at a green viper while perched some thirty meters above the jungle floor on a suspension bridge the width of two narrow planks of wood and with the stability of a trampoline that a five year old had just jumped on. Luckily, the viper didn’t stare back. My son, just behind me, hurriedly me along so he could have a stare too. At 480 metres, the Mulu Canopy Skywalk in the Gunung Mulu National Park is the longest tree-based walkway in the world. With its bouncy suspension bridges fastened to tropical hardwoods you experience sheer drops over the jungle floor and a snaking river while walking – bouncing more like – at the same level as the tree tops and the birdlife while in the occasional shadow of steep limestone cliffs. The day we went there was only me, my son and our guide — and all that jungle.

    I first visited the Malaysian state of Sarawak in Borneo in 1981. It was an island enveloped with mystique then, with mist-covered limitless jungle wrapped around isolated longhouse communities. I’ve been back to Borneo a number of times since then and watched cities grow, roads cut through dense rainforest and plantations expand. So imagine my delight when the MAS Wings flight flew low over a landscape of mist-covered rainforest and mountains before landing at Mulu’s tiny airport. I told my son, who at nineteen is just a few years younger than I was in 1981, that this was the way I remembered Borneo.

    PARK OF SUPERLATIVES

    Gunung Mulu is a 529 square kilometre park which was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Area in 2000. There’s only 160 in the world and two nature sites in Malaysia, the other one being Mt. Kinabalu. Mulu was selected because of its concentration of caves, river canyons, limestone pinnacles. It is a park of superlatives: the biggest limestone cave system in the world; the largest cave passage in the world; the largest underground river; the largest underground space in the world, Sarawak Chambers, where even St. Paul’s Cathedral can easily fit; a 180 million year old rainforest. The British naturalist and explorer Robin Hanbury-Tenison wrote of the area in his book “Mulu: The Rain Forest”: “all sense of time and direction is lost.”

    And yet it is relatively untouristed with approximately 12,000 tourists a year. When my son and I walked to the Deer Cave on the well-maintained jungle boardwalk it was just us, our Iban guide from the Marriott hotel and another hotel employee. We had the forest to ourselves. The Deer Cave loomed above us like a cathedral whose architect was nature itself. It is not only the world’s largest cave passage but has the world’s biggest cave mouth and is 220 meters at its highest point. Limestone cliffs opened up to reveal the majesty of the cave. The path through the cave – it’s 2.2 kilometres from one end to the other – allowed us to see the frequent pulsating dark patches on the ceiling, where an estimated 2 to 3 million Wrinkle-Lipped and Horseshoe bats hang upside during the day before flying out en masse at sunset. We also passed mini-mountains of guano. If you put your hand on the path’s rail it is soon covered in, well, guano. At the far end of the Deer Cave is the site known as The Garden of Eden, a sun dappled malachite green paradise encroaching on stony darkness.

    SUNSET BATS

    Outside the entrance of the cave we joined the rest of the tourists, maybe only fifty in total, to watch the sunset show. At about 5:30pm the bats started to fly out in spiralling flocks and for the next hour they kept on coming, floating up from the Deer Cave’s entrance like twisting DNA strands until they became black floating clouds. Bats make echolocation sounds to help them navigate. From the ground the sound of tens of thousands of bats creating that noise was like the low rumble of waves washing against a distant seashore, rhythmic yet hushed.

    Bats at sunset at Gunung Mulu National Park

    We stayed for an hour until it was dark and we were the last ones there. The walk back to the park entrance was never dull as the nocturnal creatures revealed themselves: a four-inch male walking stick piggybacking on a female walking stick that was easily double its size; frogs, fireflies, giant snails climbing up trees.

    AN IN-BETWEEN WONDER

    After a day that full we retreated to one of the in-between wonders, the new Marriott Hotel, which was designed to look like a series of native long houses on elevated walkways. It reminded me of the safari lodges in Africa. You may be in a remote place where you don’t expect comfort at all but the lodgings are surprisingly luxurious. And the hotel certainly spent a lot of effort to get it right: over USD16 million on renovating 101 rooms over three and a half years. Everything had to be shipped in.

    The next morning we took a long boat from the hotel’s pier down the Melinau River. As with the forest walk there was only my son and I and our guide and a boatman. We had the tranquil, cliff-and jungle-lined river to ourselves.

    ORIGINAL FOREST DWELLERS

    We stopped first at Batu Bangan, a Penan village. While the Penan were originally hunter and gatherers, only about 200 of them live that nomadic life now. The remaining 16,000 have been settled into villages. The Penan are noted for “molong”, the practice of not taking more than necessary.  The greatest violation in their society is “see hun”, which is “a failure to share.” They have no word for thief and six words for varying levels of “we.” And even though they have a word for every plant and animal in the forest, they have no word to describe the forest itself. They refer to the forest as “tongtana”, the only world they know. With our over-competitive, overconsuming society I felt we could learn a lot from them.

    WORLD’S LARGEST CAVE SYSTEM

    Further down the river, we walked along a narrow cliff clinging boardwalk from Cave of the Winds to Clearwater Cave where we were greeted by dozens of Rajah Brooke butterflies with their iridescent green and black wings. The final ascent from a tranquil pond was 200 steps but well worth the effort. In addition to having the world’s longest underground river at 170 kilometres – only 75 kilometres of which have been explored – the Clearwater Cave is known to be the largest interconnected cave system in the world. The crystalline water racing through the mountain was one of the highlights of the park. The bridge over the water was a great place for meditation or reflection.

    IMAGINATION RUNS WILD

    The stalagmites and stalactites at all of the caves create shapes that bring to mind all sorts of things. The most obvious was the Abraham Lincoln profile near the entrance of Deer Cave but there were wilder interpretations at some of the other caves. The King’s Chamber at the Cave of the Winds looked like a futuristic city from a sci-fi flick. The statue of the lady at the Clearwater Cave. The tropical forest at Lang’s Cave. The caves bring out the best of your imagination.

    Mouth of the Deer Cave at Gunung Mulu National Park

    ON THE WAY TO NOWHERE ELSE

    Getting to the park is something of a challenge. It’s right below Brunei and not on the way to anywhere else. The closest city to the park is Miri but you can also get there from Kuching and Kota Kinabalu on MAS Wings, the only airline that flies there. Of course, the difficulty of getting there means not fighting the crowds when you do get there.

    GREAT FOR FAMILIES…COUPLES TOO

    The park facilities from the museum to the boardwalk paths through the forest and the caves to the motion sensor lights in the caves were all first rate. I saw families with small children enjoying the park. The kids especially loved the bats and caves. Another park attraction is its internet connection — it’s very weak! Which means you may have to talk to the person you’re travelling with — whether it’s your family or significant other. Despite the ruggedness and remoteness of the park, the focus on safety is high. Guides are there to show you the fauna and flora and to make sure you’re safe from them — and of course that they’re safe from you. For the long unguided walks, you’re supposed to register with the park office.

    As a UNESCO World Heritage Area Mulu is one of the rare natural wonders of the world. Not as famous perhaps as some of the other sites such as the Grand Canyon, Mount Kilimanjaro, the Great Barrier Reef and Ayers Rock. But much more special because far fewer people visit it.  As Robin Hanbury-Tenison said: “There is nowhere in the world like the Mulu National Park.”

    Published in Asian Journeys magazine, August-September 2015

  • Bangkok’s Serene Haven in Art-shopping Heaven: Drop After You Shop at the Plush Art-filled Anantara Siam Hotel

    Mural, Anantara Siam Hotel lobby

    Bangkok’s reputation as a shop till you drop destination is so well known it’s practically a meme. From Siam Paragon and Central World in Ratchadamri to Chatuchak weekend market to the newish Icon Siam on the Chao Praya river, listing them all would dwarf a Yellow Pages directory; visiting them all would be more tiring than sprinting up the side of the Grand Canyon.

    Inspiring art to inspire shopping for art

    What is less well known is that Bangkok is a destination for art lovers who love to shop for art. That shouldn’t be too surprising since Bangkok is a center of art from the traditional to contemporary. If art is your focus – and it is mine – then starting it from a hotel with expertly curated artwork gets your mind in the right space before deciding what will occupy a space in your home. The Anantara Siam, designed by leading Thai architect Dan Wongprasat, has a jaw dropping palatial lobby. The mural on the grand staircase landing of a traditional royal scene in hues of gold and red and the mandala painting on the sweeping ceiling by the late artist Arjarn Palboon Suwannakudt, gives the expansive space the feeling of a living, breathing palace that you want to linger in. And would certainly like to stay at.

    Artful champagne brunch fuels my search

    The Sunday champagne brunch to fuel my search for art was so rich – and enriching –  I almost called off the search. After the lobster thermidor, foie gras, fresh scallops, raw oysters, dessert bar and glass after glass of champagne I was feeling a little too comfortable to brave the rigors of art appreciation. But a cup of espresso finally got me off the all too comfortable dining room chair.

    Contemplate life while contemplating traditional art

    Armed with a Bangkok Art Map that I got from the Anantara Siam’s concierge I started my art shopping excursion at Suan Pakkad Palace on nearby Sri Ayutthaya Road. There was nothing to buy at this museum but plenty to inspire me. The palace, once the home of Prince Chumbhot of Nagara Svarga and his consort, features a collection of artwork and antiques in eight houses that are some of the best examples of traditional Thai architecture in the city. The murals, sculptures, and art you see while sliding in your socks across polished wooden floors started the process of deciding what would work best in my home. What I saw there gave me ideas as to what antiques I would like to get. And I know that one of the most renowned centers for antique shopping in Asia is The River City Bangkok mall on the Chao Praya River.

    Suan Phakkad Palace Museum

    Echoes of Frank Lloyd Wright

    My next stop was the Bangkok Art and Culture Center. It’s on the opposite end of the art spectrum from the Suan Pakkad Palace. An eight-story venue for contemporary art and shops selling hip crafts and gifts it attracts a crowd poked and provoked by its art. I went to the top floor to see the wonderful Royal Photo Exhibition, “Photos Wonderland,” and then worked my way down the spiral walkway that took me from one floor to the next for further art contemplation. It reminded me a bit of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim Museum in New York with its top down spiral walkway. One of the shops, BKK Graff, sells cans of spray paint so that you can graffiti a space. Hopefully, not your home.

    Art at Bangkok Art and Culture Center
    Art at Bangkok Art and Culture Center
    Art at Bangkok Art and Culture Center
    Bangkok Art and Culture Center

    Talked about art for your walls

    A short walk from the Anantara Siam are three galleries that are among Bangkok’s best for contemporary art. Le Link Gallery, Tonson Gallery, and Nova Contemporary all feature contemporary artists whose art can dominate a wall and become a talking piece for visitors. Or yourself. Displayed at the Le Link Gallery were the brightly coloured Magenta Blues Artwork by German artist Ingeborg Zu Schleswig-Holstein.

    Before returning to the hotel I had a drink at the nearby Smalls Bar, chockablock with art. It’s rated by CNN Travel as one of the top bars to visit in Bangkok. All the art displayed in the three-story quirky bar is for sale.

    From fine arts to culinary arts at The Spice Market

    After a day launched with a great meal it was time to end it with one. On the way into the hotel lobby I passed statues of water sprites surrounded by water lilies. Their presence is a reminder that you are entering a special world.

    The Anantara Siam’s The Spice Market is one of the finest Thai restaurants in Bangkok, helmed by award-winning Chef Warinthorn Sumrthlphon.

    The ambience of the restaurant puts you in the right mood to savor the food. With a polished teak wood décor, tables topped by Carrera marble, and cotton napkins and pillowcase coverings by Jim Thompson, it is a luxurious setting.

    And the food lives up to the décor. The ingredients are sourced locally to ensure freshness. The fruits and vegetables are all organic. The curry pastes are from the kitchen of M.L. Thor Kridakorn, whose recipes are so famous that they grace the dining table of the Royal Family.

    Some of the dishes I tried were the Tom Yam Goong, a spicy prawn soup perfectly flavoured with lemongrass; Larb Nua Pu Gab Goong Mae Nam Yam, crab meat salad and grilled river prawn; Pu Nim Phad Prig Thai Orn, crispy soft shell crab in peppercorn sauce; Kai Soe Rua Nua, northern style egg noodles in curry with chicken; and, Gaeng Kiew Warn Nua Toon Cab Roti, green curry with braised beef in coconut sauce.

    No amount of description can do them justice. More chamber music than symphony with their focused and nuanced flavours each dish was a distinctive delight. The meal was so filling I couldn’t tackle dessert, much as I wanted too. Next time I’ll pace myself better. I have my eye on the Tubtim Krob, the ruby water chestnuts.

    Only hotel in Thailand to offer sacred tattoo sessions

    Anantara Siam’s commitment to art is more than skin deep. It is the only hotel in Thailand to offer private sacred tattoo sessions by Bangkok’s most famous Sak Yant master, Ajarn Neng Onnut. He has inked Hong Kong star Alex Fong and Hollywood ones Ryan Philippe, Jessica Bradford, and Brooke Shields.

    As one of the world’s most ancient, sacred traditions, to master Sak Yant means learning how to do the artwork for almost a thousand different images. To become a master Ajarn Neng learned how to read and write ancient Khmer and Pali scripts and memorise unique prayers and secret spells, chants and mantras that relate to the sacred tattoos.

    His tattoo sessions at the Anantara Siam are private, either in a guest’s room or a private treatment room. The day before the tattoo he has a consultation with the guest where he learns about their life and goals before deciding on the correct Yant. Prior to the session and afterwards, Ajarn Neng performs a ceremony where the guest’s body and the art are blessed. That gives the wearer of the tattoo an emotional reminder of the experience that links the ink on their body to what it means to their life.

    Leaving an indelible mark in more ways than one

    A session with Ajarn Neng will leave an indelible mark on your spirit and your body. The Anantara Siam offers this unique experience so that you can get beneath the skin of Thailand for a richer appreciation of its culture.

    The same is true of a stay at the Anantara Siam hotel. The culinary art of its kitchens, the prompt, warm service, and the art that embraces you in visual splendor when you enter the hotel will also leave an indelible mark; the kind of indelible mark we all want to experience and take with us wherever we go.

    Water Sprite, Anantara Siam Hotel

    Published in Asian Journeys magazine, February-March 2020

  • Balancing Breathless Bangkok’s Ying with Yang: At the Anantara Siam Even the Fighting Fish are Relaxed

    Anantara Siam Hotel Lobby

    Bangkok leaves you breathless. A pulsating, mega hive of frenetic activity, shopping is in malls wall to wall with branded goods and one of a kind items from one of the world’s most creative societies. Nightlife ranges from the pinnacle of high life in Sathorn and Thonglor — sky bars on rooftops to restaurants and clubs with sky high prices — to tawdry dens of iniquity that operate in dingy, neon lit alleys in Patpong and Soi Cowboy.

    All that activity can sometimes grate like a chainsaw tasting the bark of a tree before it’s cut down. Which is where Anantara Siam comes in. Just a few minutes’ walk from the Ratchprasong shopping district, it’s as tranquil as a posh private club in London. Its Thai design style from leading architect Dan Wongprasat gives you a sense of place and differentiates it from other hotels which have by the numbers luxury. More treat than retreat, you can take a breather here from this breathless city. From its palatial lobby, you view the soaring celling filled with mandala paintings from plush chairs you sink deeper and deeper into. The wall sized painting at the grand staircase’s landing by one of Thailand’s most famous painters, the late Arjarn Palboon Suwannakudt, is worth taking the stairs for to have a closer look. While he didn’t live to finish the work, his children, also artists, helped complete it as well the ceiling paintings in the lobby and mezzanine. It’s an enormous artistic achievement, 700 square meters of work.

    From “Well well” to wellness

    My wife and I had dinner at Anantara Siam’s Biscotti Restaurant, rated one of Bangkok’s best, according to Thailand Tatler and the Bangkok Restaurant Awards. It also received recognition from Michelin. I had a starter of creamy burrata cheese with tomatoes, ciabatta bread, basil dressing and shavings of truffles, while my wife had sea scallops, cream of buffalo mozzarella, cherry tomatoes confit and olives pate. Following our main courses of risotto black truffle with porcini, and grana Padano cheese and black ink angel hair pasta with king crab, prawns, and sundried tomato basil, we were stuffed. But we figured we would diet another day. Dessert was carmello spuma with layered dolce di latte foam, coffee granite, arabica crumbs and cocoa crackers and the Mascarpone Berry Salad with mixed berries, raspberry coulis, mascarpone cheese and pistachio sponge. The theatre of the dessert almost overwhelmed the taste. It was delivered to our table complete with trailing wisps of dry ice like something a sorcerer would prepare.

    “Well, well,” we thought. Not a meal we’d soon forget. Nor our scale. Just describing the meal was a mouthful.

    In the morning, we went from an indulgence ying to a wellness yang. We joined Anantara Siam’s new signature wellness program, “Morning Wellness at Siam.” It’s a program designed for travelers like my wife and I, who have come a long way, are a bit weary yet are eager to immerse ourselves in the culture of Bangkok. The program mirrors what for many Bangkokians, is an everyday routine.

     At 6am my wife and I were in the lobby providing alms to a monk on his early morning rounds. Anantara Siam is the only hotel in Bangkok which offers this unique local experience on a daily basis with staff who explain to guests how to appreciate and participate in this morning ritual. Our offerings were in pink and blue tiffin boxes. One box had curry, another an apple and Danish, a third fruits. Along with another hotel guest we did a Wai Pra, which is the appropriate way to bow to a monk to show respect. The chief concierge taught us: first, you place your palms together, then raise your hands in front of your face – your index finger tips must touch the hairline as your thumbs are placed between your eyebrows.  You need to bend the upper half of your body at an approximately 45-degree angle and bow for a couple of seconds before returning to your standing position. 

    Our alms, along with rice and bottles of water, were delivered direct to the temple the monk was from, Wat Pathum Wanaram Temple, between Siam Paragon and CentralWorld.

    From all twisted up to laid out flat

    The walk on Rajadamri Road to Lumpini park was a sensory feast, the crackling, chopping, cutting, dicing, slicing and munching of breakfast dishes being prepared and enjoyed at a food centre at the park’s edge. Like New York’s Central Park, Lumpini is the green, wellness lungs of the city with people trying to do right by their bodies. We passed a group doing tai chi to find our own spot at the lake’s edge. Two mats were laid down for us and a member of the hotel’s staff tried to teach us basic yoga. Our complete inability to execute the moves we were being taught certainly amused our instructor as well as a couple of monitor lizards who felt it was worth the climb from the water to have a stare at us.

    Once the yoga session was over it was our turn to feast. A huge, healthy spread was laid out for us on a picnic table overlooking the park’s lake. Cold pressed juices, prawns and salad with quinoa, cereal and milk — and handcrafted chocolates. Too much of a good thing, we simply couldn’t finish. It was a relief to have a tuk tuk carry us back to the hotel where we truly zoned out to a Chakra Crystal Balancing massage. In a room as chilled as they come our feet were bathed in a bowl of warm water. Like rare porcelain vases (which we’re far from being) we were gently lowered onto the massage tables, with our faces staring through to a bowl of petals floating in a water-filled brass urn. The masseuses surrounded us with rose quartz for our hearts, amethyst for our minds, tiger’s eye for harmonizing energy, and lapis lazuli for our throats. The throat is, apparently, a centre for spiritual energy. I’m not sure about the science of being surrounded by all of those stones but we were definitely beyond relaxed when it was over. And supposedly detoxed too. No small feat for a person like myself.

    In a single morning, we went from being spiritually centred to being all twisted up like pasta to being laid out flat on our stomachs then backs. We were knocked out — and Muay Thai star Tony Jaa wasn’t anywhere near us.

    Creativity flows by the river

    Energized, we continued our pursuit of Bangkok’s ying by visiting the Creative District.  It runs from Saphan Taksin BTS station along the Chao Phraya river to Chinatown. If you can handle the heat and humidity, it’s a great way to explore on foot what was once Bangkok’s commercial heart.

    The concierge at the Oriental Hotel gave us a map to the district. At the first stop, Assumption Cathedral, a Filipino priest was giving a Sunday sermon. Next to it, abutting the river, was the dilapidated East Asiatic headquarters building from the late 19th century. After strolling by the antique stores and boutiques of the plush OP Place past the modernist French embassy, we explored down a narrow alley to see the old Haroon Mosque with a silent green garden behind it. The pulsing intensity of Bangkok was an alternative universe, light years away.

    Bangkok meets Miami

    A little further on, down another narrow alley, we saw the 19th century Customs House, a once grand building now in disrepair overlooking the river. We walked past the imposing Grand Central Postal building. Built in art deco style in 1940 it had huge pinkish Garudas garlanded with yellow flowers at the top of the central facade. Legend has it that when the Allies bombed Bangkok in World War II, they took flight to protect the building. Soon we were at the Thai Artists Wall. The huge murals reminded me of Miami’s trendy Wynwood district, both in terms of the art and the galleries and cafes nearby. Warehouse 30 was a collection of local fashion boutiques, a café and a restaurant occupying World War II-era military storage buildings. It was founded a little over a year ago by Duangrit Bunnag, one of Thailand’s most famous architects. Given the heat and humidity it was an ideal place to press the pause button on our stroll and have a couple of glasses of ice coffee. My wife bought slippers there from the brand called Other Leathers.

    Mural on Thai Artists Wall
    Mural on Thai artists wall
    Thai artists wall

    Bangkok meets George Town meets Mad Max

    After Warehouse 30, we entered Talad Noi, a neighborhood whose architecture reminded me of George Town in Malaysia, where Pernankan meets European – but this time in a Thai setting. We stopped to see the towering spire of the cream-coloured Kalawar Church, completed during King Rama V’s reign. Down a zigzag of alleys we found Sol Heng Tai, a 200-year old Hokkien-Teochew mansion near the Chao Phraya, which serves drinks in a decidedly quirky environment. complete with a swimming pool that no one was using. Apparently, it is used for a scuba diving school. The 7th and 8th generations of the Posayajinda family still live here.

    We passed banyan spirit trees which sometimes had images of former Thai kings hanging from them, other times were festooned with multi-coloured ribbons. Shop after shop had immense piles of auto parts in front of them, making the area look like both a hoarders’ paradise and a back lot for a Mad Max movie.

    Soon we were in Chinatown, where the throbbing mania of the megalopolis returned, like a feverish dream. We chilled – literally – over a coffee and dessert at Chata Speciality Coffee, a café with creatively named brews and dainty cakes to complement them.

    The Siamese Fighting Fish aren’t in a Fighting Mood

    Statue of water sprite in front of Anantara Siam Hotel

    In front of the Anantara Siam is a statue of a water sprite blowing a conch shell atop water lilies – a harmonious greeting for our return. Our room overlooked the Royal Bangkok Sports Club. two panes of glass giving us the view without the street noise. On the desk, a Siamese Fighting Fish was swimming alone in a fishbowl without a care in the world. One of the world’s most aggressive species — agitation so much a part of its DNA that it immediately fights when it sees another fish — it was utterly at peace. The Anantara Siam was so tranquil even the Siamese Fighting fish doesn’t feel like fighting anymore. Now that’s the right kind of ying to balance Bangkok’s breathless yang.

    Royal Bangkok Sports Club

    Anantara Siam Hotel address:

    155 Rajadamri Road

    Bangkok 10330 Thailand

    http://www.anantara.com

    Published in Asian Journeys magazine, August-September 2018

  • Prince Jefri’s Xanadu: A Palace of Your Own at Brunei’s Empire Hotel

    The Empire, Brunei

    “In Xanadu, did Kublai Khan

    A stately pleasure-dome decree:

    Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

    Through caverns measureless to man

    Down to a sunless sea

    So twice five miles of fertile ground

    With walls and towers girdled round:

    And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

    Where blossomed many an incensed-bearing tree;

    And here were forests ancient as the hills,

    Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.”

    When Samuel Taylor Coleridge envisioned Kublai Khan’s palace in Xanadu he imagined a place of over-the-top luxury, of unimaginable wealth. We’ll probably never know if Prince Jefri, the Sultan of Brunei’s wayward younger brother, had this poem in mind when he dreamt up, then built the Empire Hotel and Country Club through the Amadeo Development Corporation. But he could have.

    Or maybe he was thinking of that Kevin Costner hit film, “Field of Dreams,” where Mr. Costner’s Iowa farmer character heard voices that said, “Build it and they will come.” In the film, ghosts from baseball’s past such as Shoeless Joe Jackson do come – to play baseball on the field the obsessed hero built against all odds.

    In Prince Jefri’s case, he has built his Xanadu but almost no one has come, giving the hotel a ghostly silence. Though maybe they should, as the Empire Hotel is a place of almost unparalleled splendor on the sunny north coast of Borneo. Imagine a hotel that combines the immensity of the huge Hawaiian resorts with the Arabic touches of the Omani and Dubai beach hotels with the luxury of posh London establishments with the wacky fantasy touches – and emptiness – of Hearst Castle.

    The domed lobby of Brunei’s Empire Hotel is supported by six-story-high Italian marble pillars crowned by Corinthian flourishes and trimmed with gold leaf. And that’s not gold-colored paint: that’s real gold. The gold leaf is used generously around the edges of the lobby’s walls as well as the ceilings, giving the whole massive open space a glittering look when the sun hits. In the lobby are generous displays of Baccarat crystal, including a crystal camel with a solid gold saddle. Not to mention the enormous crystal chandelier that hangs over the front entrance.

    The marble floors are inlaid with bright decorations of tropical flora. And there’s a huge mural of one of the sultan’s ancestors welcoming British ships of war at an earlier palace that was far less imposing than the hotel. Just so the vastness of the lobby – and not the empty retail area nearby – doesn’t overcome you, there are a couple of Fazioli player pianos endlessly tinkling out lonely tunes.

    The walk to the rooms is no less imposing, through bouncy thick-carpeted hallways surrounded by a forest of Italian marble pillars. The décor inside the rooms is lavish, with furniture and linen by Meritalia and prints of ancient maps of Borneo in gilded frames. The china and silverware in the guestrooms is all Asprey – as they are throughout the hotel. The bathroom is the size of a typical Hong Kong apartment, with toiletries from Molton Brown. (If you take a suite or villa you get Bulgari.) The plushness of the room might remind you of somewhere in Europe except when you open the drapes to see a huge balcony and further off the crashing waves of the South China Sea.

    To relax you have choices fit for, well, a prince – or a sultan. To get to the clubhouse you ride a golf cart that the staff called a “buggy” past an on-site waterfall and a lake. There’s an eight-lane bowling alley with stylish, aqua-colored furniture – no hard plastic chairs like nearly every bowling alley on earth. My family and I were the only ones playing with a staff of four to cater to our every need. At the club there are two badminton courts. And two squash courts. And a two-story pool and snooker hall. But one thing is missing: players.

    In case racket and stick sports aren’t your game, there’s a golf course and clubhouse with day and night golfing. And tennis. And a Jacuzzi and sauna. And row after row of unused polished wooden lockers in the men’s room, each one containing a fresh, folded terrycloth bathrobe, towel, razor, comb and toothbrush. And even though it is in the tropics, there is a heated indoor swimming pool with lanes on the bottom of the pool covered in gold tiles. Again, that’s real gold. When I used the pool and sauna I was the only one doing so. I never saw anyone using the rest of the facilities either. Friendly staff just hung around, waiting for someone, anyone, to show up and give them something to do.

    There are also the outdoor pools, four of them. The freeform one is the size of a lake with flooring covered in sand to give it that beach feel. There is also a school of stone sculpture dolphins swimming up a grassy hill towards the sea on the other side. My children loved those. They also loved the freeform pool – especially since we were usually the only ones using it.

    Stone dolphins at The Empire, Brunei

    At the Arabic-Mediterranean restaurant called “Falafel,” you can admire the world’s only titanium cutlery and dinnerware collection. The prince had it especially designed in the U.S. and produced in France at a cost of several million dollars. It’s the same metal that is used in fighter planes.

    After dinner, you can visit one of three cinemas on the hotel grounds. Again, the ghost town nature of the place has its advantages. Unlike other hotels, guests here are not limited to small-screen entertainment in private guestrooms because the empty theaters guarantee a big screen practically all to oneself.

    Nearby the hotel is Jerodong Park, another favorite project of the price. This is Disneyland and Coney Island wrapped into one, with everything from kiddy rides to roller coasters for the teenagers or the adults who don’t mind losing their dinner. (Strangely, the park doesn’t open until 5 pm, so your lunch will have been digested by then.) For a mere $3 my children could ride on all the rides they wanted – all night long until 2 am. But as with the hotel, the prince may have built but “they” didn’t come. As for lines, forget about those. My children were almost always the only ones on any of the rides, randomly selected. Whether it was the bumper cars, the merry-go-round or the flying swings, they were all empty. Same for the adult rides. It wasn’t exactly like being in a Twilight Zone episode, but at times the complete desertion of having one’s own private palace got close.

    Finally, not to be outdone, Prince Jefri’s Xanadu has a musical fountain. Near an imposing gate flanked by ancient cannons, there is an immense fountain with water sprouts that dance and sway to the music. Again, on the beautiful, starry night of our visit, my family and I were the only ones watching the spectacular light show. While it might have started off with the cheesy “Eye of the Tiger” it soon moved into hotter tunes. My favorites were those by Tina Turner. With the balmy breeze off the South China Sea and the sense of being in a kingdom – a real kingdom, not a fantastical Xanadu – where everything seemed to be done just for you, sometimes literally, the big, colorfully lit droplets hanging magically in mid-air suddenly made Brunei seem like a really cool place to be.

    Published in The Asian Wall Street Journal, June 21, 2002

  • For the Birds: Another Concrete Canyon in the Making

    Screenshot

    The Mai Po Marshes in Hong Kong have always been an anomaly. They are a conservation area of international importance in a territory where environmental conservation of any kind has always played second fiddle to economic growth. Breathe the air or swim at any beach and you’ll see how low a priority conservation really is.

    The marshes are a habitat for up to 320 species of birds, yet they straddle the border between Hong Kong and mainland China. The suburbs of Hong Kong’s New Territories are creeping up on one side and the skyscrapers of the sprawling mainland city of Shenzhen are getting closer on the other. In this place of tranquility in the middle of urban hustle and bustle, quiet stepping birdwatchers compete for space with boot- and khaki-wearing Hong Kong coppers protecting their side of the border.

    Mai Po marshes near Shenzhen

    In a sense the Mai Po Marshes are the summation of the past, present, and future of this part of Southern China – and the fate of the birds is a subject that should be important to anyone concerned about the quality of life in the region. We humans who squeeze the abode of our fine, feathered friends on two sides ought to reconsider any future construction here, for this hiding place is one of the area’s last resorts for a variety of natural wonders.

    The Mai Po Marshes and Inner Deep Bay in the New Territories of Hong Kong were created as a conservation area in 1984 by the World Wildlife Fund. This area was set aside so that migratory and waterbirds such as gulls, ducks, shorebirds, herons and egrets would have a place to call home or rest on their flight southward from Siberia during winter months. For the migratory birds a resting place is essential as the round trip between their Siberian summer breeding grounds and their winter home of Australia can be as long as 33,000 kilometers.

    Endangered species such as the Saunders’ Gull and Blackfaced Spoonbill frequent here. The mangroves stand is the sixth largest in China. Also in the reserve are 24 traditionally operated shrimp ponds that are the last of their kind in Southern China.

    Mai Po marshes in Hong Kong

    A visit, however, reveals much more than flora and fauna. The first thing one notices upon arrival at the marshes are the watchtowers and huge fences topped by coils of barbed wire, with a lone flag of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region hanging limply in the humid air. This stretch of land is the border, the demarcation zone, between the two systems that exist in one country. To be allowed into the Mai Po Marshes you need a passport, a “Frontier Closed Area” permit and a Mai Po Marshes permit. The hard edge of a heavily policed no man’s land contrasts with the tranquility of the natural environment.

    My family entered through the border gate and walked on a pontoon bridge made of planks of wood strapped to empty barrels. We balanced precariously as the barrels bobbed in the water of the marshes. Every now and then we would stop to see white bursting flowers above or crabs below, distinctive with their one large claw as they scamped among the mud of the mangroves.

    On two occasions heavily armed Hong Kong police in military fatigues passed by us. They were searching for illegal immigrants hoping to slip into the SAR through this nature zone.

    At the end of the walk we came upon a “hide” – a concrete hut with slits for windows, the better to silently watch the birdlife. Inside, we saw before us the vast mudflats that lead to the Shenzhen River and a freighter cruising up the river. Through telescopes and binoculars, we spotted groups of birds and mud skippers sliding up from the mud and slipping into it again. We also spied a man who seemed to be skiing across the mudflats – stopping and stooping on occasion – and then continuing. I asked the guide who he was and he told me he was a poacher, grabbing mud skippers for the markets of Shenzhen. “Hong Kong people,” I was told, almost as an afterthought, “don’t eat then.”

    I asked why the police didn’t catch him, and the guide smiled: “He can move faster than they can in the mud.” And he was right: in no time at all he was out of sight, with his illegal goods in a bucket.

    After the hide we continued on our hunt for birdlife, passing a traditional shrimp pond where a sluice gate was opened to force the water out and the hapless shrimp into a net. We visited an empty museum that was filled with bird models and monotonous exhibits. I could have dismissed it offhandedly as being for the birds – but it was, more accurately, about the birds.

    Mai Po marshes, Hong Kong

    We also visited another hide, the mountains of the New Territories visible behind it. As the afternoon wore on, we found that the birds were perhaps a bit more sensible than we were. As the day got hotter, they flew to cooler environs. The guides, armed with portable telescopes on tripods and awesomely sharp eyesight, often found birds for us – hidden in thick foliage. They fluttered their wings to stay cool. Sometimes we spotted birds’ nests, aerial homes built with mud, twigs and leaves.

    Throughout our visit, the watchtowers, the barbed-wire-topped fences and the buildings of densely populated areas were never out of sight – or mind. I don’t know how the birds felt, but as for me, I thought it was getting about time for them to start looking for a new home and resting place for their long annual journey. Despite the promises of authorities on both sides of the border to protect the wildlife reserve, it seems likely that the Mai Po Marshes will be developed into yet another concrete canyon. After all, local people need a place to nest too.

    Published in The Asian Wall Street Journal, March 7, 2003

  • Clubbing in Calcutta: The World’s Largest ‘Museum’ of British Colonial Architecture

    Victoria Monument, Kolkata

    The graffiti on the outside wall has the look of urban scrawl everywhere: “We protest against the dictatorship of the club president!” The president of the Bengal Club in Calcutta, founded in 1828, was just trying to enforce some club rules, and he seems to have run headfirst into a wider force. Calcutta’s genteel clubs are having to reckon with the culture of protest that has always existed outside their forbidding white-washed walls.

    The Bengal Club, Kolkata
    The Bengal Club
    Traditions live on at The Bengal Club

    Inside the Bengal’s stately building, members speak in hushed tones. A steel-gated elevator clatters you to the second floor, where the same dining tradition has been maintained for over 150 years. The waiters, wearing white tunics with brass buttons and wide black sashes for belts, look like they stepped out of a Rudyard Kipling book. The paintings on the walls are of old British sahibs – the respectful Indian term for Europeans. Those men are now probably buried in the crow-filled, weed-covered South Park Street Cemetery a few blocks away.

    The Bengal’s graffiti hardly fits with the gentlemanly, antiquated spirit of the place. But then again, Calcutta is notorious for its culture of protest. People in this city have always taken to the streets, whether to be among the first to fight colonialism – or later, whatever happened to the national government of the day. It was this spirit of rebellion that led the British to move their capital to New Delhi in 1912.

    Clubs are popular in Calcutta, now officially known at Kolkata. No, not dance clubs where girls in short skirts and guys in tight shirts hang out. Calcutta’s night life is pretty tame in that respect. These clubs were started by the British to deal with homesickness and the dull, distant colonial lifestyle. But when they left, the tradition stayed – carried on by the society’s elite: barristers, lawyers, doctors, engineers, businessmen, even the occasional maharaja, or local prince.

    Calcutta High Court
    Rickshaw puller

    Another landmark, the Saturday Club, was founded in 1875 by the Calcutta Light Horse Regiment. The current club premises, built in 1900, are entered by passing beneath a series of flags and a small balcony where a dignitary might wave to well-wishers. On the other side of the grand ballroom, covered in a parquet floor with huge fans hanging immobile from the ceiling, you can reach the Light Horse Bar. When the regiment was disbanded after India gained its independence, its trophies moved there.

    Saturday Club

    Then there’s the Royal Calcutta Golf Club, also known as the “Royal.” Founded in 1829, it’s the oldest golf club outside of the British Isles. It was King George V who gave the club its “royal” title at the Delhi Durbar in 1911. The building that houses the club now was opened in 1914. It looks like a sprawling lord’s manor with a red-titled roof and red trim around the windows, doors and grand entranceway. The lawns are vast and manicured. Inside, it has the austere atmosphere of a British public school. Long mahogany boards list the names of gold-medal winners in gold lettering all the way back to the 1870s. Black and white photos of stiff-looking club presidents line the stairway to the second floor. Beneath the striped awning out back you can watch golf, or just sit and drink tea.

    Royal Calcutta Golf Club
    Past presidents of Royal Calcutta Golf Club
    Royal Calcutta Golf Club

    Nearby is the Tollygunge Club, founded in 1895, which is spread over 100 acres that surround a more than century-old clubhouse. You can find golf, tennis, squash, swimming or even horseback riding here – just like those denizens of the Raj did so many years ago. In a city mired by poverty, this is where the gold leaf thin top tier of society spent their leisure time.

    Tollygunge Club

    It might seem strange that Calcutta should play host to so many antiquated British institutions. Yet up until 1912, Calcutta was the second-largest city in the British Empire. The Victoria Monument here was built by Lord Curzon between 1906 and 1921 in memory of his empress and was meant to be larger and more impressive than the Taj Mahal. The former Dalhousie Square, now known as BBD Bagh, was the bastion of British bureaucracy, with impressive colonial-era edifices surrounding it. The massive 200-year-old British Government House is now known as the Raj Bhavan and is the seat of the West Bengal government. Nearby is the Doric-style Town Hall and the High Court, copied from the Staadhaus at Ypres, Belgium and opened for justice in 1872.

    Mother Teresa’s tomb at Missionaries of Charity
    Nuns praying at Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity

    Because it has seen so much war, poverty and turmoil, Calcutta has not torn down its past. It has simply been too poor to build many new buildings. The result is the largest “museum” of British colonial architecture in the world. Think of it as a tropical 19th-century London. Add to that the antique-looking Ambassador cars with styling that hasn’t changed since the 1950s and the human rickshaw pullers, and you could be worlds away from the rapid development of Indian cities like Mumbai and Bangalore.

    Great Banyan Tree, Kolkata, the widest tree in the world

    The graffiti on the wall does suggest that tradition could rapidly slip away from the clubs that Calcutta has nourished since the days of the British Raj. Nevertheless, these traditions are still more intact here than in most other parts of the world.

    Shaheed Minar erected in 1828

    Published in The Asian Wall Street Journal, August 12-14, 2005

  • If You Have One Night in Bangkok

    Since my first visit to Bangkok in 1981, I’ve been back dozens of times. For a few years I even commuted to a job that was based here. I’ve seen the city transform again and again from a seedy backwater with a “reputation” to a glittering, glamorous metropolis with some gritty corners.  But there’s one label that no one has ever put on Bangkok and that is boring.

    So imagine the challenge I set for myself on my last trip: if I only had one night in the city what would I do?

    For inspiration I used the lyrics from the Murray Head song, One Night in Bangkok:

    One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble

    Not much between despair and ecstasy

    One night in Bangkok and the tough guys tumble

    Can’t be too careful with your company

    I can feel the Devil walking next to me

    With those alarmist lyrics I decided I needed a really good meal to fuel the long evening ahead.

    SPOILED BY BANGKOK’S BEST STEAKHOUSE

    For fortification I started with a perfectly executed Citrus Martini, shaken not stirred, at the lushly appointed “Manhattan Lounge” at the JW Marriott Hotel. I followed this with dinner at the “New York Steakhouse” next door, consistently rated as Bangkok’s best. That’s a tough accolade to get year after year in a food-centered city like this. I couldn’t help but compare the experience here with a famous steakhouse in Palm Springs, California earlier this year where a grumpy, BMI-challenged waiter gave my family and I a Tomahawk-steak on a large platter where we all tucked in forks and sharp knives at the ready. The “New York Steakhouse’s” version of the Tomahawk-steak was altogether a different, much more elevated experience.  When the waitresses with model-like looks and killer smiles draped the elegantly cut slices of meat on the Tomahawk bone I knew it was going to be tough to dine at an American steakhouse again. I’ve now been spoiled.

    ASIA’S MOST HAPPENING STREET

    Properly nourished, I headed out with a friend to explore nearby Soi 11, in my opinion Asia’s most happening street.  When you think of nightlife areas in Asia, Hong Kong’s raucous Lan Kwai Fong springs to mind, or its more trendy, edgier sister Soho, or the upscale Xintiandi district in Shanghai or Singapore’s tony Club Street or Seoul’s fashionista Gangham district. But whereas those other nightlife areas

    give you a non-representative slice of those cities’ lives, on Soi 11 you feel the entire human spectrum and kinetic energy of the city, Bangkok on full display and in your face.

    Soi 11 is where I was going to spend my one night in Bangkok.

    Our journey up and down and from ground-level to high above the Soi was a both a trek across broken sidewalk pavements and a peek into the aspirations of the people there that make the Soi a place of unyielding buzz. From “Cheap Charlie’s” with its outside pavement seating and a reputation for the cheapest beers in Bangkok to “Above 11” for a contemplative view of the city that looks a lot tamer 33 floors up, away from the stumbling crowds and the cruising pink and yellow and green taxis that always seem to barely miss hitting someone. The skyline’s supercharged sparkle was borderline surreal. Emerald City on steroids.

    PEOPLE-WATCHING PERCH

    We found a central perch at “Oskar’s”, which gave us a panorama view of the Soi in action. With a counter seat, you can see the denizens of the street marching purposely towards a destination or lurching from one bar to the next. Usually packed after 9pm, it becomes the Soi’s defacto people watching fulcrum: inside the bar everyone is rubbing elbows with everyone else, in a hurry to meet or make friends. It is not a place for a solitary drink. Or soulful chats for that matter. Meaningful encounters just isn’t on the menu in this place.

    Having a tough time hearing each other, my friend and I made our way to the quieter “Wolff’s”, owned by former private investigator Malcolm Schaverien who writes thriller novels under the pseudonym of Harlan Wolff. Mr. Schaverien provided a bit of oral history of the Soi and its rise up Bangkok’s neon rankings: “Soi 11 became the local…nightspot when Q Bar first offered the option of trendy nightlife for those living on Sukhumvit. Before that we had pubs, gogo bars, cocktail lounges, restaurants and hotel bars – that was about it. So we would mostly make the trek to Silom or Siam Square for nightlife. After Q Bar came Bed Supper Club and others making Soi 11 a ‘trendy’ destination.”

    Sadly, both Bed Supper Club and Q Bar are now closed. A hotel is now being built where Bed Supper Club was. Q Bar is being transformed in a new venue called The District. The Soi’s reinvention continues.

    When I asked Mr. Schaverien why he created “Wolff’s” he said: “I was nostalgic for the classic bar I remember from my early days. The sort of place where people meet and talk over cocktails or a glass of wine. I couldn’t find one in my area so I built one with bricks and a copper top bar.”

    A few steps away we visited Brew, for a stylish beer-focused experience. Owner Chris Foo said the bar was “based on a space under a Trappist…Monastery in the mountains where monks produced beer. The water coming down the mountain would

    be collected and used to make the Trappist Beers and then they would store the beer

    in oak casks for fermentation.” With “the largest selection of beers and ciders in Asia,” Mr. Foo’s aims to make his bar a destination for beer-lovers. The menu was amazingly long. I could imagine drinking a different beer there almost every day of the year. Not a bad goal to set yourself.

    MUSIC YOU DON’T USUALLY GET ELSEWHERE

    At some point in any long evening music is as good a reason as any other to visit a bar. And Soi 11 is one of the best destinations in Bangkok for the more unusual types of music. At “Apotheka”, blues is played every evening except Sunday, when it’s jazz. With its dark wood interior the bar could be in Chicago or New York, only it isn’t. It’s completely open in the tropical heat and we briefly lingered on the sidewalk before being sucked into the bar for a better view of the band leader playing the trombone with aplomb while coaxing his fellow musicians. Munching on popcorn while sipping a craft beer was a great way to pass the time.

    Above “Apotheka” is yet another refuge from the Soi, “Nest”, where we sought temporary solace. With plants and alcoves and a floor covered in sand in places to reinforce the you’re-in-the-tropics feel, a guitarist provided the music to make it a chill place to hang.

    SINGLE-DIGIT TIME

    There comes a point in any evening where the drinks start to hit the double-digit point and the hour hand single digits. That’s when noisier, more primal venues hold greater appeal. “Levels”, on the 9th floor of the Aloft Hotel, fit that bill. It too had a view, of Soi 11 as it marched through the chaotic tide of humanity to not-so-distant Sukhumvit. With a more aggressive but more snappily dressed crowd, it was an ideal place to see the Soi from a different vantage point. It has a gigantic curving bar with a colossal sparkling chandelier above it, like a fountain of descending glass that never quite splashes down.

    After a drink there I too started my transformation into one of the lurching zombies of the late night Soi. Not quite an extra from the movie World War Z but in a few more hours I might have passed for one. I walked past brightly-lit drink and food carts that lined the streets selling pad thai, seafood of all kinds packed in ice, stacks of coconuts. There was even a shiny yellow van with seats out front called Taco Taxi. I thought of some more lyrics from Murray Head’s song:

    “One night in Bangkok and the world’s your oyster.

    The bars are temples but the pearls ain’t free.”

    ONE NIGHT ISN’T ENOUGH

    The Soi has startling variety of venues: from an Indian nightclub called “Daawat” in the Ambassador Hotel, to a German bar called “Old German Beerhouse”, from an Italian pizzeria called “Limoncello” to a bar called “The Alchemist” tucked away on an alcove just off the main Soi, to a wine bar called “Zaks” to a Thai restaurant, “Suk 11”, set in a traditional wooden building. That doesn’t begin to describe the diversity of choices on the Soi. One night in Bangkok isn’t enough to explore this street.

    I landed with a delightful thud in a basement after hours club named “Climax.” Given the way I was feeling, the long night clearly tugging on me, it certainly wasn’t the climax of my evening but with a glazed view of the revelers it seemed to have lived up to its name for some people.

    No night in Bangkok is complete unless you have a place to R & R (rest and recover) afterwards. The nearby JW Marriott certainly provided that for me. In the morning, I sweated out the previous evening’s indulgences with a lengthy session in the steambath and sauna at the hotel’s state-of-the-art spa. With a swim afterwards I was practically as good as new.

    Relaxing on a lounge chair by the soothing aquamarine pool, I considered with a clear head the challenge I had set for myself. What was I thinking? Who wants to spend just one night in Bangkok?

    Published in Asian Journeys magazine, December 2015-January 2016

  • Under Tibet’s Breathtaking Cobalt Sky

    The highest point of my trip to Tibet is the Kharola glacier on the road from Lhasa to the province’s second largest city, Shigatse. At 5,500 meters, the air is thin – a short jog winding me – but the scenery rich. Poles topped by yak hair and wrapped with flapping prayer flags flank a simple white stupa that has as its backdrop the glacier draped over a craggy mountain while outlined by a sky of such an extraordinary cobalt blue that you want to lick it. Literally.

    OUT OF THIS WORLD YET WITHIN IN

    Tibet is a place that feels out-of-kilter both with the country it sits within as well as the earth it sits upon. The flight to Tibet teases you as it soars over the Himalayas, icy peaks defiantly punching through cloud cover while far below remote, deserted roads struggle to find a path in the barren plateau. When the Air China flight lands in Lhasa, the disembodied voice on the intercom says to be careful of altitude sickness. At 3,656 meters that warning resonates with me.

    THE ALTITUDE CAN BRING YOU DOWN

    While I didn’t experience altitude sickness on trips to Bhutan, Nepal or the altiplano of Peru and Bolivia, I realized it is a risk. It seems to strike at whim. Diamox, a medication effective at preventing it, works for me. While I vowed to take it very easy on my first day, Lhasa’s kinetic energy and otherworldliness, pulls me forward. Fortified by a lunch at the atmospheric House of Shambala restaurant I walk more than 20,000 steps. I experience sunset on the rooftop of the Tibetan Family restaurant over a dinner of fried yak-filled momos. The diminishing light of day illuminates the nearby golden canopies of Johkang Temple. Upon my return to the Gang-Gyan hotel, people in the clinic off the hotel’s lobby suck on oxygen from tarnished tanks while a nurse with crossed arms stands nearby.

    LHASA’S SPIRITUAL AND COMMERCIAL HEART

    The spiritual and commercial heart of Lhasa is the Johkang Temple and the adjacent Barkhor Square, ten minutes stroll from my hotel through twisting, narrow alleyways. A hive of religious fervor, to get onto the square requires passing through a gauntlet of very tight security. Omnipresent cameras on rooftops and along the eaves of buildings watch everyone. The security checkpoints have metal detectors, X-ray machines and card readers that capture locals’ identity information. Elite SWAT squads control these checkpoints while scattered around the square small squads of police in full riot gear stand at the ready. Their presence provides an ominous sense of the Chinese government’s heavy hand and a recognition that the surface calm is perhaps superficial.

    On Barkhor Square I follow the pilgrims’ circumambulation around the Johkang Temple, passing restaurants, tea houses offering Tibetan butter and sweet tea, shops selling prayer flags, beads and other religious items, and antiques of various authenticity. The effect is an ever-moving, ever changing kaleidoscope of people with different poses, emotions, hopes, prayers, despair, physical conditions, and triumphs of sorts moving like a human tide clockwise around the temple and wondering if their life’s lots might change en route – or ever. It’s as turbulent as a Tibetan sky. A scrum of people surrounds a one-legged pilgrim who slams metal bricks together before prostrating himself on the ground. Then he lifts himself up and repeats the process again a few steps further on. It’s easy to hook onto the devotees’ tide and get pulled into their mania. Maybe the thin air helped —oxygen deprivation giving a light-headed perspective on the scene, like lining up a shot through fisheye lens for a distorted view of the world.

    MAGNETIC “HOUSE OF MYSTERIES”

    King Songtsen Gampo started building the Johkang Temple in 652 to honor his Chinese and Nepalese wives. Known in ancient times as the House of Mysteries it was finished nearly a thousand years later in 1610 during the reign of the 5th Dalai Lama. Two giant incense burners in the front and rear of the temple help give Lhasa its distinctive aroma.

    Just outside and within the temple the fervor approaches fever pitch, dozens of people prostrating themselves then lifting themselves up in hope before throwing themselves down again in repetitive demonstrations of piety. The crush inside is driven by the determination that their prayers be heard. Blessings by monks are seemingly cursory as they try to move the crowd through. I don’t understand what people are asking for but I do recognize hope as a universal need. The temple’s magnetism keeps me close to it and the square during my Lhasa visit. That evening I dine on grilled mushrooms and ginger carrot soup at the packed Makye Ame restaurant overlooking the rear of the temple. The yellow-painted building it is in was the 6th Dalai Lama’s palace and named after his mistress. He wrote a poem about her here.

    ONE OF THE WORLD’S GREAT PALACES

    About 1,000 meters away is the administrative heart of Tibetan Buddhism, Potala Palace, the residence of Dalai Lamas until the 1959 Chinese invasion ended the Tibetan uprising and forced the 14th Dalai Lama into exile. The 5th Daiai Lama started building it in 1645 on the remains of an earlier one from 637 by King Songtsen Gampo. Its location is strategic: between the influential Drepung and Sera monasteries, and Lhasa’s old city. It took three years to build and another forty-five before the interior’s completion in 1694.

    It’s a massive edifice: 400 meters from east to west and 350 meters north to south with stone walls around 3 meters thick in most places and 5 meters thick at the base. It’s more than 117 meters high on top of Red Mountain and rises more than 300 meters above the Lhasa Valley floor. It has over 1,000 rooms and some 200,000 statues. The areas painted white are the administrative parts of the palace, while the red painted ones are where the Dalai Lamas resided and ruled. Assembly halls, shrines and thrones of the past Dalai Lamas are located here, including the cave where King Songtsen Gampo meditated. Gilt-covered roofs reflect the intermittent sparkling sunlight giving an unusual sense of lightness to such a sturdy structure. It was lightly damaged during the Cultural Revolution, Mao’s premier Chou En-Lai having protected it.

    One of the world’s great palaces, perhaps France’s Versailles or Russia’s Winter Palace come close to matching its splendor. I pass through a number of security gauntlets before entering. At the palace’s base, flowers are in full bloom — Tibetan summer and spring converging into a single, very short season of vibrant colors in a landscape that is dour and forbidding most of the year. Potala Palace tickets are timed and visitors move quickly up the stairs in the thin air to meet the various deadlines. Unlike other museum-like grand palaces, it is a place of devotion. Tibetans prostrate themselves in front of shrines and religious relics. Security brusquely moves them along.

    SPINNING PRAYER WHEELS TO WIN AT LIFE’S LOTTERY

    The various Dalai Lama thrones give an indication of their personalities and styles of ruling. Many are modest elevated platforms to preside cross-legged over subjects. The 6th Dalai Lama was probably the most controversial because of his notorious lifestyle as a womanizer and magician. He has by far the largest throne. The second largest throne belongs to the current Dalai Lama. I also notice the size of his throne at Norbulingka Palace, known as the summer palace. His throne of gold with silver steps is the largest of the Dalai Lamas with residences there. After exiting Potala Palace down steep steps in the back I come to an endless line of prayer wheels which devotees spin — for luck or health — to help win in the lottery that is life. The sound of the spinning wheels rubbing against aging wood creates a humming that rises in the air to create another dimension of etherealness to the palace.

    PROTECTION AGAINST NIGHTMARES

    If the Potala Palace and Johkang Temple are the administrative and spiritual hearts of Tibet, Sera Monastery is the intellectual heart. Founded in 1419 the sprawling monastery sits at the foot of the mountains at Lhasa’s edge, a remote nunnery high on a hill above it. Parents take their children here to inoculate them against nightmares. After a monk’s blessing ashes are smeared on their noses and they walk away with smiling faces — safe in the knowledge that sleep will be just blissful dreams. In a sun-dappled courtyard nearby dozens of monks in pairs, one standing and one sitting, debate with vigor. The standing monks, fiddling with prayer beads and stamping their feet and clapping their hands, hurl Buddhist doctrine questions from the Five Major Texts at the sitting monks. The questions are theological ones with rhetorical twists and the gift of constructing eloquent responses prove the intellectual rigor of the monks. Eventually, they switch places. This sparring is mesmerizing to watch, like mental martial arts. The voices rising in challenging tones create a strangely melodious sound like binaural beats from a Haight-Ashbury hippy store. During the 1959 revolt, hundreds of monks were killed here and survivors set up a parallel monastery in exile in Sera, India.

    BREATHTAKING’S DOUBLE MEANING

    The Lhasa to Shigatse road gives an indication of Tibet’s magical landscape and breathtaking vastness. Just outside Lhasa a tunnel reveals the Yellow River, one of China’s and the world’s longest, beginning an over 5,000 kilometer journey to the sea.  As the van climbs switchbacks, proud owners display regal Tibetan Mastiffs at scenic turnoffs and charge 10 yuan to have a photo taken of them. The Khamba La pass at an elevation of 4,998 meters overlooks Yamdrok lake. The scimitar-shaped lake has a turquoise colour transforming chameleon-like in front of you as if reflective of volatile moods. Such a sacred sight at such an elevation brings a double meaning to the word breathtaking. It’s forbidden to eat the abundant fish from its crystalline, holy waters. At the shore Tibetans charge for sitting on decorated yaks with stoic demeanors.

    In a few hours, past the Kharola glacier, is the city of Gyantse. The Dzong, fortress, lords over the city. I visit the Penchor Chode monastery, guarded by red, parapet-topped walls. The monastery’s main building, built between 1418 to 1425, is closed that day as the monks are engaged in a secret chanting ceremony. Having watched burly monks from the Yellow Hat sect chant at Ramoche temple in Lhasa I can imagine the intense, rumbling sound as the prayers emerge deep from their chests.

    WHERE THE BRITISH INVADED TIBET

    The Kumbum, a type of pagoda, next door was founded in 1497 by a Gyantse prince. It has nine levels, 108 gates and rises 35 meters. It has 76 chapels and is filled with entrancing Buddhist religious paintings that remind me of the legendary Mogao caves in Dunhuang. The Gyantse Kumbum is the most famous in Tibetan Buddhism. I climb ladders to reach the highest level, heavily lidded, all-seeing eyes painted at the top. The fortified red walls of the monastery seem to reach out finger-like to the forbidding heights of the nearby Dzong that protects it. The Dzong was the site in 1903 of a fierce battle between Tibet’s best troops and a colonial British invasion force known as the Younghusband expedition after Colonel Francis Younghusband. The battle was overseen by Brigadier General James Macdonald under the auspices of the Tibet Frontier Commission. Sent by the Viceroy of India Lord Curzon, the invasion was part of the 19th century “Great Game” between Great Britain and Russia for influence in Central Asia. Great Britain preemptively invaded Tibet to keep it out of Russia’s hands. After Gyantse fell, the British went on to seize Lhasa and dictate the terms of the 1904 Treaty of Lhasa where the Chinese government agreed to not let any other country interfere in Tibet.

    PANCHEN LAMA’S HOME

    After a night at the garishly decorated Gesar Hotel in Shigatse, I visit the Tashi Lhunpo Monastery. Founded in 1447 by the 1st Dalai Lama, this is the home of the Panchen Lamas, Tibetan Buddhism’s second highest rank. The current Panchen Lama is only 28 years old. The Gorkha Kingdom sacked the monastery when they invaded in 1791 but they were quickly pushed out by a combined Tibetan and Chinese army. It was also damaged during the Cultural Revolution. The monastery climbs up the mountain and is protected by a nearby Dzong. Inside there is a vast assembly hall, now empty, that I can imagine being filled with chanting monks sitting cross-legged. At a temple, the guide points out what looks like a gold-covered statue of the previous Panchen Lama with a yak hair wig and a golden bell in his uplifted hand. Only it isn’t a statue but the mummified body of the lama, deceased since 1989.

    The train back to Lhasa follows the Yarlung Tsapo River Valley. When the river leaves the Tibetan Plateau, it carves a canyon deeper and longer than the Grand Canyon — one of the world’s great sights few people get to see.

    FROM SUMMER SUN TO STORMY SKIES

    On my last night, I join a couple at Po Ba Tsang restaurant, featuring Tibetan dancing. The dancing strikes me as something from one of the Central Asian stans — aggressive leg thumps creating mini earth tremors on the wooden floor. Dinner is momos floating in a broth with fried yak cheese on the side. Crisp Lhasa beer helps down it.

    That night I see Potala Palace perched high above the vast Potala Square on the opposite side of Beijing Middle Road. Potala Square has dancing musical fountains, a billboard featuring past and present Chinese leaders and the angular Tibet Peaceful Liberation monument guarded by soldiers. Lit against the blackest of nights, thick clouds obscuring stars, Potala Palace is revelatory, apparition-like. While my Tibet visit is in the midst of the summer rainy season I experience warm, mostly sunny days during my stay. It is ironic then that on my walk back to the hotel a nightmarish thunder and lightning storm sky splits the sky and spits hail. I wish that a Sera Monastery monk had put some nightmare inoculating ash on my nose too.

    A few weeks later during an Uber ride to New York’s LaGuardia airport, I ask the driver where he is from. “Tibet,” he says. I tell him what a coincidence that I got him for my driver as I had recently been there. He smiles at me in the rearview mirror and says, “Karma.”

    TRAVEL TIPS:

    Restaurants:

    -Tibetan Family Kitchen

    -Makye Ame Tibetan restaurant

    -Po Ba Tsang restaurant

    -House of Shambala restaurant

    Hotels:

    -The Gang-Gyan Hotel in Lhasa’s old city has quirky touches: a humidifier that looks like a character from an animated cartoon and motion sensor activated hallway lights that provide light where you are and pitch darkness everywhere else.

    -The Gesar Hotel in Shigatse is garishly decorated like a Disney-fied version of yurt fit for a khan.

    Tibetan Travel Permit:

    A China visa gets you into the country, but not Tibet. You’re not allowed to travel alone or even visit a temple without an official guide. A tour company can get you a Tibet Travel Permit. Mine is checked four times before I enter Tibet. It has a holographic-like stamp stapled to a paper with my details.

    Altitude Sickness:

    Consider how to prevent altitude sickness before your trip. Diamox, a well-known medication, works. The supplement Ginkgo Biloba supposedly helps. Going to a high elevation in phases allows the body to adjust. I stay two nights in Chengdu at 1,640 meters before travelling to Lhasa. My uncle, a doctor with high altitude climbing experience, notes that going straight from sea-level to Tibet will almost certainly get you sick.

    Photography:

    In Lhasa, photography isn’t allowed at the temples and monasteries. Outside Lhasa it is allowed but sometimes at a very high cost. At Shigatse’s Tashi Lhunpo monastery, some of the temples requested a 150 RMB photography fee.

    Getting there:

    Flights to Lhasa leave from a number of Chinese cities. My round trip airfare on Air China from Chengdu during the peak summer season is a pricey US$577. The flight is 2 hours.

    Published in Asian Journeys magazine, October-November 2018

  • The Price of Peace: Where the Last Global War Ended

    Tinian runway where Enola Gay and Bockscar took off on their missions

    As the free world hunkers down for the first global war of the 21st century it’s worth taking a glimpse at a place where the last global war ended: at Tinian Island, where the planes that dropped the atom bombs on Japan took off. My family recently took a trip to Tinian, a Manhattan-shaped island in the Mariana Islands where the Manhattan project neared its end. Colonel Paul Tibbets, piloting the B-29 Superfortress named Enola Gay, took off from here to drop the bomb, “Little Boy,” on Hiroshima. Three days later, Major Charles Sweeney, also took off from here in the airplane named Bockscar to drop the bomb on Nagasaki.

    Atomic pit No. 1 where Hiroshima bomb was loaded

    At the end of World War II Tinian was the busiest airfield on earth, with six gigantic runways. Nineteen-thousand combat missions flew from here. Now it’s a quiet place with some unusual attractions. With a population of less than 3,000 people in an area of 39 square miles, it lies next to Saipan in the Mariana Islands and is politically part of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory.

    Atomic pit No. 2 where Nagasaki bomb was loaded

    When we got off the boat from Saipan, my family’s first stop was the casino that today is the island’s largest business. Tinian Dynasty Hotel and Casino is a flash place — a Macau-style casino occupying a piece of South Seas paradise. But unlike other hotels in the tropics, it doesn’t leverage its location. No al-fresco dining to pull you away from the gaming tables. The windows in the rooms don’t open to let in the warm breezes. After all, you might be tempted to enjoy the tropical weather outside — leaving the pleasures of the slot machines behind.

    Plaque to commemorate that planes with atomic bombs left from this airfield
    Sign to where atomic bombs were loaded

    We started our touring by driving to the Suicide Cliffs on the south side of the island. As American troops were invading the island at the end of July 1944, Japanese civilians chose suicide rather than surrender. They jumped to their deaths from here. Their fanatical behavior has an eery parallel with the terrorists of today. The site is spectacular and empty with vertical cliffs dropping to crashing waves and a sea of startling blue. We were the only visitors, deepening the natural solitude of the area and making it feel as if we really were in a sacred place.

    Jungle encroaching on Tinian road

    From there we drove clear across the island. Because Tinian is shaped like Manhattan the military named the island’s roads after streets in New York. Broadway is a long straight avenue, but unlike its famous namesake there is no traffic at all, no pedestrians, and only a few gutted buildings from World War II days. Weeds sprouted from the asphalt. Jungle is starting to creep in at the edges.

    Unexploded World War II ordnance on Tinian

    At a roundabout there was a ruined Japanese shrine. We drove around it to a truly forbidding part of the island. The road narrowed and every couple of yards there were signs on jungle-covered barbed-wire fences that warned of explosive ordinance. After a couple of miles there was a dirt turnoff to the left where we stopped next to a large grave-size plot with a few flowers on it and a headless palm-tree in front of it. A wooden sign read, “Atomic Bomb Pit No. 1.” The plaque described how the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was winched into the belly of the Enola Gay at this spot.

    Ruins of World War II barracks

    About 50 feet away was another signpost: “Atomic Bomb Pit No. 2.” Another atom bomb, “Fat Man,” was winched into the belly of Bock’s Car here prior to its journey to Nagasaki.

    I’ve visited the Los Alamos laboratories in New Mexico, where the U.S. atomic bomb project feverishly was pursued, and its museum. I’ve also visited the museums at Hiroshima and Nagasaki and saw the horrors that befell the victims of the bombs. But this site at Tinian affected me the most: the silence; the complete absence of tourists or any other people; the sense of decay as if we were standing in a post-nuclear war world, one decimated by atomic weapons.

    Abandoned World War II tanks

    Further on we discovered the runways, monumental ribbons of concrete, now silent and slowly being reclaimed by the lush vegetation of the surrounding jungle. Near some Japanese bunkers on the side of one runway were plaques honoring the U.S. military units that served here. Then we found ourselves driving down the very straight 8th Avenue towards the hotel. We passed the sign for the 509th Bomber Group and its slogan bragging that it was the first to use atomic weapons. This was Col. Tibbets’s unit.

    Tinian as seen from Saipan ferry

    With some relief we reached the town again. We visited the ruins of a previous civilization: a collection of huge latte stones — like a South Pacific Stonehenge — that were the foundations of a home belonging to a legendary Chamorro chieftain, Taga the Great. Within moments we were back at the familiar surroundings of the casino. Other than the gambling and eating the only other entertainment at the hotel was a troupe of Russian dancers. But as I sat down to watch them gamely doing their routine I realized that I was the only one in the audience. It was an empty house.

    Foundations of home belonging to Chamorro chieftain Taga the Great

    Published in The Wall Street Journal, March 1, 2002

  • Bandung: the Heart of Java

    A journey to Bandung allows you to traverse the past, present and even future of Indonesia all in one city. The capital of West Java and Indonesia’s fourth largest city with 2.6 million people, you can see everything from the colonial to the kitsch. And it’s only 180 kilometers from Jakarta. With the new highway cutting travel time from five hours to two, it’s an easy day trip.   

    First, the past. Bandung was established in the late 19th century by the Dutch as a garrison town. In 1920 they opened the Bandung Institute of Technology, Indonesia’s top scientific university. Its luscious, sprawling campus has Indo-European architecture with pointy Minangkabau-style roofs on many of the buildings. On the Saturday that I was there, students were chilling on lawns, singing, playing guitars, dancing with drums —- even studying, using typewriters. Yes, typewriters. The founder of Indonesia, Soekarno, lived here from 1920-25.

    Students at Bandung Institute of Technology

    At the outskirts of the city, at the Museum Geologi, a massive colonial building that used to house the Dutch Geological Service, are a number of stuffed animals, nature exhibits and fossils, the most famous of which is the skull of Pithecanthropus erectus, the prehistoric Java Man.

    Dutch colonial-era architecture

    In the center of town at Jalan Braga, rundown Dutch colonial buildings form a shopping street with some great antique stores. The dust-coated stores give you a sense of Bandung’s multi-ethnic heritage with Javanese, Chinese, Dutch relics all competing for space and buyers.

    Art deco buildings in Bandung

    But it’s the art-deco buildings nearby that define Bandung’s notable architectural footprint. From the Savoy Homman Hotel to the Grand Hotel Preanger to the Gedung Merdeka complex, Bandung is an art-deco museum. Frank Lloyd Wright would have appreciated the grey, almost Mayan angular touches that make Jalan Asia-Afrika unique among major boulevards in Asia. Think a tropical version of lower Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.

    Art deco building in Bandung

    At the Gedung Merdeka Bandung reached the height of its fame. In 1955, Soekarno, Chou En-Lai, Nasser, Ho Chi Minh and other third world leaders met at the AfroAsian Conference, otherwise known as the Bandung Conference. The building, dating from 1879, was known as the “Concordia Sociteit”, the meeting hall of Dutch colonial associations. In April 1955, it was literally the capital of the third world. The Bandung Conference’s 10 principles defined the Non-Aligned Movement throughout the coming Cold War period until the collapse of the Soviet Union. Some of those principles, such as non-aggression, respect for sovereignty, non-interference in internal affairs, and peaceful co-existence are as timely today as they were then. The conference lit the fire of a number of anti-colonial movements that followed in the coming decade. The massive hall where the delegates met is filled with flags of the 29 participating nations. In the museum you can learn about what happened here and see wax figures of some of the most famous leaders who attended, including Soekarno, speaking from a podium.

    Wolverine statue on Jeans Street

    Now, the present. You should have lunch at a Sundanese restaurant at the hillside suburb of Dago, where elegant mansions populate lush tree-covered roads. Nearby is Jeans Street, Jalan Cihampelas, where Bandung today defines itself. On the Saturday I was there, it was packed with cars, tour buses and shoppers. In front of its denim shops were massive statues of superheroes: from Superman to Spiderman to Wolverine from X-men. Buskers serenaded the crowd. Kitsch is cool here.

    So what of Bandung in the future. With that new highway, it’s a favourite weekend destination for people from Jakarta. Whether it’s buying jeans, eating Sundanese food or breathing cool mountain air — at more than 700 meters the air is better here than Jakarta — it’s a great getaway. And with the Bandung Institute of Technology having produced great Indonesian leaders in the past, you can bet those of the future will come from here as well.

    Published in South China Morning Post, June 17, 2009