Ministers finger fags

Any day of the week, Samoa is definitely one of the greatest destinations in the world; awesome beaches, wonderfully lush mountains, natural water slides off the sides of said mountains, fantastic beer, relaxed vibe (bordering-on-coma) and a serious commitment to food (my kinda peeps).

There're also the wonderful, friendly locals; always joking, laughing, dancing and singing, that make the place so welcoming and so much fun. 

Hang-on, did I just say "always friendly"?  That's definitely not quite right ... for starters, Samoans – all of 'em, at one time or another - suffer from the "musu".  This is a cultural phenomenon which, for no apparent reason, turns your normally laughing, joking, cheeky colleagues/friends/partners/waiters/hotel staff into brooding, inpatient, aggressive ticking-emotional-time-bombs in the blink of an eye. 

Seriously, the musu can easily turn a happy, convivial conversation into a spiteful verbal barrage.  For example;

Donkey:  Thanks for taking me to the pub last night, I had a great time.

Mose:     Hey no worries, Donkey, me-ol'-mucka.*  Yeah, it was really fun.  You're pretty good a darts.

Donkey:  You think so?  Ah thanks.  Yeah, I really enjoy it.  Wish I hadn't drunk so much, though.

Mose:     Ha!  It was kinda funny when you downed 17 Vailimas and spewed all over the pool table before passing out on the sea wall.

Donkey:  Urgh!  Don't remind me – woke-up with a washed-up, fermenting coconut next to my face.  Still, good fun.  How 'bout we do it again some time?

Mose:     Fuck off!

And that'll be it for Mose for the next couple of hours.  Next time you see him, he'll be his old self again.  Ah, the musu.  It can make inter-cultural relationships pretty difficult to negotiate for the uninitiated.

So as I was saying, apart from the musu, Samoans are great fun to be around; very generous with their time, their praise, their food.  Great people; very open to newcomers ... oh, unless they happen to be palagi (foreigners).  For those of us who aren't Samoan, there's a special kind of Samoan Pride (read: arrogance) which anyone whose been there for longer than a week will have been exposed to at one time or another.  It's not too bad, really; no violence or hate crimes, just a very Samoan way of talking to make you feel that you're less than the dirt under their shoe ... um, sandal.

Actually, this pride (read: arrogance) isn't only reserved for foreigners, but for all who are considered beneath the speaker in question.  So in the hierarchy of Samoa, a man will display arrogance to a woman, who'll beat-up on the kids, who'll have a stab at the dog, who'll take-on the cat, who'll chase the rat.  And we palagis are right at the bottom (luckily there's no plague in Samoa!).

At the other end of the spectrum are matais (chiefs) and church ministers.  These morbidly-obese blokes lord it over everyone, as the next story demonstrates.

Now this story is completely true (I think ... at least, I've certainly told it many times as though it's a true story ... I've even made it slightly better from time-to-time with a few Donkey-specials, just to make sure my audience is on-board ... so yeah, it's pretty true).

Many years ago, some foreign anthropologists from The States were conducting an investigation into the origins of the Pacific races.  They spent many years researching in countries all over the Pacific, and many years in Samoa, particularly.  At the end of nearly a decade of research, they offered to share (in person) their findings with the various countries of the Pacific, and were invited to do so in Samoa, where they would address a gathering of the Council of Chiefs.

This was back in the days before PowerPoint, but they had lots of slides, and went to great pains to ensure the audience understood the rigour of their research, and the ultimate findings that the peoples of the Pacific, including Polynesians, all drifted east from what is now Southeast Asia, settling, then moving on, then settling again.  They described key evidence of language, art, cultural practices, mythology and DNA as supporting these findings.

After a day of talking, explaining, demonstrating and answering questions about their research, the Paramount Chief stood up, and in the spirit of fine Samoan oratory, went on a one-hour verbal bender which can basically be summed-up as follows;

"Thank you very much for coming here today to tell us about your work.  But we know that Samoa is the Cradle of Polynesia; God put us here and from here all the Polynesian nations were settled."

Nods all 'round.  Paramount Chief ... who's gonna argue?  The researchers (both inferior and foreign) hung their heads, packed-up and went home.

Donkey, too, has come up against this closed-minded, unquestionable Samoan arrogance.  I was running a consultative workshop about health promotion; how to do it better in order to meet the needs of Samoa's most concerning health problems.

I'd wanted to get a few young people along to discuss the cause, and possibly throw-around a few ideas towards a solution to the very high rate of youth suicide in the country.  When I asked the gathering of Church Pastors and Village Chiefs why no young people had come along, I was informed by one particularly large gentleman who, despite his profusely sweating brow, managed to pull-off a spotless white sports-coat with nary a blemish, "We are the representatives of God here on Earth and we speak for our communities, which includes our young people".

OK, so by this time I'm getting the message, loud-and-clear, on the high rate of youth suicide.  "So," I asked, "what can we do about it?".

"Our young people need to be more involved in the Church ... they need to pray more and be closer to their parents and leaders, and especially to God".

Exasperated, I looked to my practical, street-savvy, scientifically-minded, Health Promotion colleagues for a life-line.  All I got were beaming smiles and,

Nods all 'round.  Church Pasters and Chiefs ... who's gonna argue?  This health promoter (both inferior and foreign) hung his donkey-head, packed-up and went home.

And now someone else has come-up against the ol' Samoan Pride.  This time it's an international climate change summit to which, for no apparent reason, someone decided to invite a bunch of senior Samoan Church Ministers.  And the result?  What is the Number 1 root cause of climate change? ...

... wait for it ...

Homosexuals!  Ha!

I love the line in this article from The Register, "...Academics were apparently thrown off their consideration of "Arts in the Age of Global Warming" and "Ecology in Poetry / Poetry in Ecology..."

Nods all 'round.  Church Pasters ... who's gonna argue?  Those academics (both inferior and foreign) hung their heads, packed-up and went home.

* OK, so clearly Mose doesn't talk in cockney-rhyming slang – I was just translating from Samoan into some kind of cross-cultural equivalent ... I think I nailed it!

Wonder-twin powers...activate!  The white-coated Church Pastors from Samoa power-up to tackle climate change in their own, unique, homophobic way.  Pic: adventist.org.au

Churning and burning: tales of human butter, politics and religion

Know any good Kora stories?

I know a few stories; whether or not you think they’re any good might depend on your social or political point of view, but let’s see what you reckon.

First though, perhaps I should have a stab at enlightening those who are a bit lost.

The Kora.

A Kora is the circuit around a place, building or thing of Buddhist religious significance, which the faithful circumnavigate in a clockwise direction, as an act of spiritual devotion and cleansing. This thing can be a religious artefact, a religious building such as a temple or shrine, or even a natural place of spiritual and/or historical significance, such as a tree, rock or spring.

In Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, the most significant religious shrine is the imposing, Jokhang Temple; a huge, squat structure, perhaps the city’s oldest remaining building, lying slap in the middle of the city which has grown, fallen, been re-built, razed and re-built around it for centuries.

For over a thousand years, beneath the gilt spires and statues adorning the roof of the old temple, the complex has expanded from its original size to house the growing legions of monks and novices who came from all over Asia, from as far away as Bangladesh to the south and Mongolia in the far north-east, to live and learn from the great gurus and lamas, and it now occupies a space of roughly a square kilometre.

Sadly, the once-thriving monastic community within those metres-thick walls seems rather lack-lustre these days, but this is in tremendous contrast to the tides of humanity which circle the complex every day, lighting incense, murmuring their prayers, fingering their beads and leaving offerings for good fortune in this life and the next.

The narrow streets surrounding the Jokhang mark the Kora, along which a rushing torrent of furry-hatted and coated pilgrims, adorned with jewels in their hair, ears and belts, and regularly with babies lashed to their backs, work their way around the great walls. The unsuspecting, curious tourist needs to be careful as s/he manoeuvres for a closer look, as the rushing masses, from dawn to dusk, can literally sweep you off your feet.

Kora Story 1: The back-breaking road to Lhasa.

If you’re lucky enough to scam a permit which allows you to see something of Tibet other than Lhasa, your mind will be opened to vast skies; friendly (although very dirty) faces; unwavering, humbling hospitality; spectacular, high altitude vistas and a people with an almost super-natural commitment to their faith.

The latter can be viewed amongst the hundreds of pilgrims visiting any of the thousands of shrines, chapels and temples dotting the plains, mountains and gorges of the Tibetan plateau. But the most extraordinary demonstration of this devotion can be witnessed along the main highways within two or three days drive from the capital. Here you will see small groups of Tibetans ranging in age and demographic, from buff young men, to wrinkled, gnarled, stooped old women, making a very special pilgrimage to Lhasa.

For weeks they will make the journey on foot, through shrieking mountain passes, deep, frozen valleys and across dusty, rocky plains. And if the blasting, high-altitude sun is not enough of an impediment to their progress, consider that after every three steps, they raise their hands above their heads in prayer, drop down upon their knees, then lie flat on their stomaches with their hands still raised above their heads, before climbing back to their feet for another three steps!

One sees these pilgrims, covered in the filth and dirt of the land, sometimes with wooden paddles on their hands to save their bloodied palms, moving slowly along the shoulder of the highway as they make this agonising, exhausting devotion to their faith; each prostration taking them slightly closer to the blessings they will receive from the holy temples of Lhasa.

And so they go, surely with every muscle and sinew in their frail bodies shrieking to the highest heavens, until they reach their destination in the city, where they will circumnavigate the major shrines, three times each, maintaining their excruciating devotions with every third step. Their commitment is remarkable, and valued by all; the regular pilgrims undertaking their daily Kora take extreme care not to trample these revered folk mid-prostration.

But the weirdest thing for we outsiders, with our limited understanding of this ancient faith (and this amongst an enormous collection of very weird things), is that inside these most holy of temples, in which most pilgrims shuffle past the sacred icons and statues with a brief pause, and a murmured prayer at each, those who have taken the afore-mentioned, weeks-long, back-breaking journey (as distinguished by their being covered from head to toe in dirt and bloody gashes from their frequent clashes with the earth), literally run through the temples with barely a nod towards the most holies, before disappearing out the back door.

It’s quite remarkable – all the physical pain and torment they endure, not to mention the emotional toll their devotions must play upon them, in order to reach the holy shrines of Lhasa and complete their agonizing Koras, and they barely glance at the sacred relics on their way through the temples. Obviously, by the time they get inside, their work towards the next life is done, and they’re off for a much needed couple a’ dozen snorts of chang (fermented barley beer).

Kora Story 2: Taking the barnyard to church.

In addition to the sacred Kora surrounding the Jokhang Temple (known as the Barkhor), there is a much larger Kora which circles the other main, holy temples and monasteries of the old city. This Kora (known as the Lingkhor) marks the edge of what remains of Old Lhasa, and on the auspicious, fifteenth day of each month, it is not uncommon for the traffic to be ground to a halt by a flood of pilgrims rushing along the sidewalks and streets from as early as first light until dusk.

Now it’s hard enough to manage cycling along Lhasa’s streets when so many of the out-of-towner pilgrims know little of traffic rules and behaviours, so spare some sympathy for those of us trying to get to work in the dim light on a dark, icy, mid-winter’s morning, and having to negotiate herds of sheep and goats who are being dragged along with the rest of the family for an enlightened blessing. Fifteen goat bells certainly make quite the mockery of one's handle-bar 'ting-a-ling', I can tell you!

Not that I suffer from bell envy...

Kora Story 3: Make yerselves right at home.

Did I mention that these Koras are a pretty big and holy deal amongst Tibetans? Yeah, I thought I did. In fact, the Old City, which is surrounded by the Lingkhor, is considered so holy, that in a city which boasts a thriving, broadly located commercial sex industry, the Old City contains virtually the only streets where sex is not sold.

Now I’ve mentioned my thoughts on the Global Circus before; how smelly, self-centred back-packers believe their aimless journeys can be re-packaged and marketed to the rest of the world as some kind of international quest for enlightened consciousness, and how they believe that their 'unique' behaviours and values are the envy and awe of all.

Well I am sorry, you dirty, hairy, singlet-wearing bogan slobs! But wandering through the crowded, narrow streets of Old Lhasa with your scantily clad girlfriends, while necking imported beer from large bottles is not endearing yourselves to the local populous. And I don't think you need so much as a smattering of Tibetan language to notice that those young, Tibetan men shrieking agitatedly at you are not wishing you well on your spiritual journey ... they are telling you, and none-too-politely, to fuck-off back to whatever savage shit-hole civilization you squirmed from!

Kora Story 4: Private eyes, are watchin' you.

Remember SARS? Remember all those pictures in the papers and footage on the evening news back in 2003 of Asian people getting around in face masks? Well enter the throng of folk making their way along the Jokhang's Barkhor on any given day, and you could be forgiven for thinking that the deadly virus is back!

Thankfully it's not for protection from a fatal disease that Tibetan women and men wear masks while conducting their circular, devotional journeys around the great temple. In winter, one could be forgiven for thinking that the masks are protecting their faces from the extreme Tibetan cold, but when the masks are out and proud on a twenty-five degree (Celsius) summer's day, you know there's some other reason for it.

And that reason lies in a Tibet Government decree that workers in the public service are forbidden from engaging in rituals of Tibetan Buddhism (like climbing sacred mountains, burning incense or completing a Kora); to do so can result in severe reprimand and possible dismissal.

But the good news for those Tibetans unwilling (or unable) to denounce their faith is that it is very hard to distinguish the identity of a single, masked figure amongst a hundred others when viewed through the public security infrared closed-circuit TV cameras mounted on walls every twenty metres along the Barkhor.

Kora Story 5: A grave disturbance in the Force.

Another reason for the masks might relate to a regular disturbance to the clockwise flow of pilgrims around the Jokhang Temple since March 2008, when extreme military might was 'let loose' on the populous to quell city-wide riots. Since that time, every devotional, prayer-mumbling pilgrim meandering along the Kora has had their forward-looking view blocked by the cold, menacing stares of armed troops circling the same route in a most-unholy (and potentially insulting), counter-clockwise direction.

These hard, young soldiers make it their mission to stare-down the devotees through their riot shields, ostensibly to ensure that none of them (comprising mostly gnarled and stooped old people, children, nomadic graziers, rural farmers and labourers) don't rise up to disturb the peace of Lhasa's streets.

Armed troops traverse the Jokhang Temple's Barkhor against the regular, holy flow of pilgrims. Can you spot the sniper?

The power of metaphor

The Populous Security Bureau bugging devices must’ve been popping like cherries at a B&S ball the other night as I sat in one of the world’s highest restaurants discussing the history and current political situation in Burma with my high-altitude colleagues.

You can imagine the freedom I felt after a week (and in their case, a lifetime) of being careful about everything one said and did, so as not to openly express any opinions or attitudes at odds with the government, openly discussing in a public place the activities of an undemocratically appointed, unlawful military regime, imposed upon the people, and which restricts religious, political and social freedoms, whilst deliberately and systematically culling huge swathes of the population, from the urban intelligentsia to the rural peasantry.

You might also imagine what was going through the minds of these colleagues as they lapped-up information about events and government processes in this neighbouring country; happenings which, although having never heard about them before, must have seemed so very familiar. Occurrences such as the systematic and aggressive persecution of monks, violent military responses to peaceful protests, restrictions upon the populace in terms of their freedom to worship according to their religion, lengthy incarceration of citizens without charge or trial, the unspoken and unexplained disappearance of generations of loved ones.

It is no surprise that they were so interested in asking questions and listening to what I knew of the happenings in “Burma”. I wonder if they wondered why they’d never heard this before?

I also wonder about the poor drone up there in the communications control tower who was deciphering our monitored conversation, and writhing in anguish and indecision as to whether they should bring the discussion to the attention of their superiors; whether they would be praised for their diligence, or chastised for wasting the time of their betters on a conversation about another country’s irrelevant activities. Being a bureaucrat cog must suck.

We all thought it would lead to change - again this sounds oh, so familiar. Pic: www.apheda.org.au

Gaggin' for a shag

S'no wonder I'm such a sexually and emotionally repressed Donkey, I've been deprived of the basic human right to an education! Let me explain, I'm not talking about the usual, reading, writing and arithmetic kind of education here (believe me, I've had Shakespeare, spelling bees and calculus coming out of my whatsit for years!). No, I'm talking about the fundamental building blocks of education which exist in the form of children's fairy tales.

Now before you hit speed-dial to dob Ma and Pa Donkey into the child protection authorities, I must clarify that I did get the usual, Mother Goose-style fairy tales from my folks, such as Hansel and Gretel, Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Beanstalk etc, but what I didn't get were the "real" fairy tales, as compiled by the good Brothers (indeed very Grimm by name and nature).

Such as the one I've stumbled across this very early morning while struck with an almighty, new year's hangover and unable to sleep with Mrs Donkey snoring away beside me. The story's called Old Hildebrand, and features a silly peasant whose saucy wife's having it off (I kid you not) with the fat parson. The two illicit lovers, in order to get Old Hildebrand out of the way so that they can "...spend a whole day happily together...", concoct a scheme in which the trusting peasant is sent by the sly, randy, old Churchman on a holy pilgrimage to Italy.

Of course, thanks to the wily intervention of a travelling egg salesman (who has no doubt been around the block a few times himself), Old Hildebrand comes home early, where he finds that "...everything was already very merry...". Very merry indeed! It seems Old Hilde's Missus and the dirty old Man of the Cloth were well into things by the time he got home, described by the Brothers G as follows;

"...The woman had already had nearly everything killed that was in the farmyard [a euphemism, if ever I've heard one], and had made pancakes [ooh err], and the parson was there, and had brought his fiddle with him [I'll bet he had, the dirty old bastard!]".

Why didn't anyone tell me about this before? How is it that the real world was denied me so callously? How different my adolescence would have been if those brave princes looking upon an enchanted, sleeping maiden, or up at a flaxen-haired beauty trapped in a tower, had done so, not with a melting heart, but with a raging erection! How different Sunday school might have been if I'd known of Old Hildebrand's saucy minx of a wife and what she and her kind get up to with Father O'Flannagan in the pantry out the back of the Presbytery (I almost certainly would have had a different answer for Father McNaughton when he tapped me on the shoulder and put the vocational question to me if I'd known it was all about "making pancakes" with the parish ladies while their hubbies were at work, and almost certainly, were this knowledge available to the young Catholic lads of Australia, the dwindling numbers of recruits in seminaries across the country could have been prevented right from the outset).

And by far the best thing about the story of Old Hildebrand, unlike those told by the fusty old Goose with the straw hat and wire specs, is that, just as in life, there doesn't have to be any great moral message at the end of it. In Old Hildebrand, there's no "don't talk to strangers", no "even ugly people have hidden qualities", no "respect your elders and loved ones". Rather, far from having to be portrayed as some moral crusader, when he learns of the treachery against him, Old Hildebrand gives the parson a flogging and then throws his leg over the Missus for a bit of pancake-making himself. Great stuff! There should be more of it ... much more, in fact. I'm as angry as all get-out to have been deprived for so long; blinded as to the true nature of children's fairy stories. I've missed so much, and need to make up for some pretty serious, lost time. Please excuse me, I'm off to church...


Why didn't anyone tell me it wasn't all virtuous chastity? A few more learning aids like this wouldn't have gone astray. Pic: http://www.measureformeasure.co.uk

What the parents don't know...

Ma and Pa Donkey and I have a bit of an unspoken understanding – they don’t ask me what I do, so I don’t have to lie to them. It’s a pretty good system, ‘cause although they know I am out there saving the world from horrible, nasty things, and can bandy-about down at The Club that their little baby and his Missus are kind of … um … “modern-day missionaries”, they may not be very happy to learn about what it is I am doing to make the world a better place, some of which may not go down too well over a few stiff, mid-afternoon gins and a couple of rounds of bridge.

It’s a bit of an odd conundrum, I guess. On the one hand they know that I am doing good stuff, and they are clearly proud of it (even though I think they’d secretly prefer to be able to stick-it to Lord and Lady Wexford-Southerby-Smith by boasting that their son is clearing six figures a month), and yet on the other hand, if The Club ladies actually knew what I talk to people about all day long, and what I teach others to do, Ma’s reception at the first-Tuesday cake stall would be frostier than the top of Mrs Whitaker’s prize-winning lemon sponge.

Basically, the problem comes down to values. Y’see, Ma and Pa Donkey are strict Catholics, and I was brought up in the full traditions of the Church; Sunday mass, weekly confessions, love and respect for one’s neighbour, faith, hope and charity and, of course, not to touch oneself.

(With that knowledge finally out in the open, no doubt many of you will be nodding in satisfaction as the penny finally drops regarding why I am such an emotional and sexual cripple).

I was a pretty good religious sponge, too. I took on-board all of the various rules and teachings of the Mother Church, and like so many others, never questioned a thing. Unfortunately, the whole dogma of the Catholic Church is flawed, because to be “a good, young Catholic gentleman”, and to adhere to all the teachings, one ended up contradicting oneself.

The case in point was the one about providing charity, love and support to all those in need, or, to quote the Ten Commandments, that whole “do unto others as you’d have them do to you” thing. At about the time that I was struggling to do everything right, and trying to follow all that religious gaff to the letter, there was something going on in the world which was really throwing the cat among the religious zealots … that thing was called AIDS.

All of a sudden, from about 1984, there was this thing out there called AIDS that was killing everyone. It didn’t seem to matter whether it was wealthy tycoons in New York, movie stars in Europe or poor, peasant farmers in Zimbabwe – the pictures were the same; emaciated bodies, no hair and horrible pain.

Our Catholic upbringing went into overdrive to do something about all this – to help the poor, the afflicted, the helpless, and indeed there was a distinct half of the media who were urging us to do something. But oddly enough, in support of the other half, who were telling us to leave these poor wretches well alone, were our very own clergymen, and of course, head amongst them, none other than his Holiness, The Pope. Because, despite a couple of typically misguided reports from tabloid current affairs media that the disease was carried and spread by household cats, it soon became apparent that AIDS was getting around thanks to a world which had “suddenly” gone crazy for sex!

While thousands of gay men and drug users were dropping like flies, we, the Faithful remained firm; singing our hymns and saying our Rosaries. When AIDS moved-on from the streets of San Francisco and took hold in Africa, we looked-on and prayed for the souls of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children. As the pictures on TV and in magazines got more graphic and the stories more personable and real, our spiritual leaders stood firm on their condemnation of condoms, and even began to spread lies about them.

By this time, however, some of us had snapped-out of the secure daze of ignorance. By this time, some of us had realized that to be a good Catholic was impossible, because you couldn’t just stand by and watch innocents suffer and die when something could clearly be done to prevent it –put simply, you couldn’t obey all the rules about sex and condoms AND help those who were in need. The two were incompatible.

So, poor, ol’ misguided Donkey had finally realized that there were more important things amongst the religious teachings than just a set of rules to be followed. He realized that humanity needed to be valued above the dictates of a faceless following; that a human life was worth saving from suffering, regardless of what the person had done or continues to do. In coming to this realization, I realized that the Catholic rules about sex and condoms were ridiculous – they were simply rules to be obeyed, and absolutely nothing to do with caring for people.

So nowadays I devote my time to preventing the transmission of HIV (which causes AIDS) and other nasties created by an individual inserting their dick into someone’s bum, vagina or other orifice, of which one or both of the owners are infected, or a used, infected syringe into an arm. I go out into the world, ramming condoms down people’s throats (not literally), and I tell them to use these all the time. I ask detailed questions of men who stick their dicks into each others arses, of young girls who sell sex for money or new clothes and of young men who sell their bums for money to buy drugs which they shoot into their arms with (hopefully, but not often enough) sterile needles. I work solidly to try to ensure that the people who are the least likely to be invited to Ma Donkey’s bridge games, namely sex workers, drug users and men who have sex with men can have the knowledge and resources they need to live for as long as they should, with minimal pain and suffering.

While some who sit along the pew from Ma and Pa every Sunday morning would not approve of the offspring of two of their number peddling the sinful, depraved wares of Asia’s latex manufacturers on a daily basis, I am convinced (and I think, deep down, so are Ma and Pa) that the Big Bloke Upstairs is nodding in approval at what some of us are trying to do, even if we are breaking a few of “his” rules.

It’s World AIDS Day again. Please go out and buy a red ribbon, and wear it proudly to commemorate all those who have died from, or who are living with AIDS. But most importantly, try to find out about the organization from whom you are buying that red ribbon – no doubt they’ll be the ones who are out there doing all the things that Ma and Pa Donkey’s Club friends would disapprove of, and that’s definitely an organization worth supporting.

Icarus flies again

Ah, but first…:

A couple of years ago, back when Donkey first started this thing, he was working for Saving the World HQ. To be brutally honest, despite the name, it was not the greatest job in the world, and was about as taxing as eating a sandwich! So while one never actually wrote blog posts when one was at work (well not very often, anyway), Donkey generally found that he had plenty of energy when he got home to sit down for 2-3 hours to pound-out some magnificent missives for you and all.

That’s not been the case, however, since one day, waking up with a keyboard imprint in the side of my snout and a gallon of Donkey Drool cascading across the desk and onto the floor, I decided I’d had enough of being bored out of my pea-sized brain, and hot-footed it to the oxygen-starved streets at the top of the world, where I re-discovered the invigorating claustrophobia of not having enough hours in the day in which to get everything done.

The result of that, of course, is that when Donkey finally hangs his chaff-bag on the top hook at the end of the day, he’s way too knackered to think about something to say or some witty observation to expound. No doubt for some of you, that’s more a blessing than a curse, but for me, it is a great sadness, ‘cause I love being an active member of your community, rather than a sinister, lurking, dirty-ol’ Donkey-type.

Anyway, I just thought I’d let you know that I’m not really all that slack, just incredibly busy and exhausted at the end of the day after all the odd things I have to do in order to keep the good folk safe and healthy. If I could, I would let you know all of the certifiable, ridiculous imaginings I’ve got chasing a piece of cheese on a treadmill in my mind, but I’m only equine, after all (I think) and I can only do what I can.

And now on with the show…:

As I was saying, two years ago, when this all started, I was living in a place that was so stiflingly hot that at 3am on any given day it was still 35°C, and it had been hot in that hell-hole for so many centuries that the stink outside your door was beyond belief. Add to that a billion, crappy, window-unit air conditioners rattling away at the same time, and before you know it, the volume of the world outside had been pumped-up way higher than eleven, and was rumbling and shaking as though the Japanese International Sumo Team had devoured twelve pots of Mama Flatulina’s famous stewed beans. The noise, and the stink, kept everyone locked-up in their airless tombs, day in, day out.

The thing about this place, however, due to the massive industry associated with illegally tapping-into the electricity supply using only a paper clip and some elastic from a pair of Rajiv’s old, brown underpants, is that perhaps only five of the fourteen million residents of that place had ever paid an electricity bill (that’s five, not five million). As a result, the electricity authorities believe that only five (again, that’s just five) homes actually receive electricity, and when the demand (from the additional thirteen million, nine-hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine-hundred and ninety-five, undetected users) gets too large, the system (developed and built in 1943, and only upgraded after the total customer-base of Yamuna Power Inc. exploded overnight by an unprecedented 25% in April, 1945, when a Mr Sanjoop Nankernee finally got sick of the late Mrs Nankernee’s whining about the outside light not working) goes into complete shut-down, and all five people jump on the phone to demand immediate action.

And everyone out there in the massive urban sprawl who is drawing on the illegal electricity knows this. They know that the system can’t cope, but Devji from No. 32 will be damned if he’s going to run only one air-con unit, when Sanjay from next door is running two. And when Sanjay learns that Devji’s upped the ante, so too, will he switch on all four of his. By 7.33am, the whole city’s running at full load, and everyone knows that the power will be all gone by 7.35am … and yet no one switches anything off. It’s just the way it is.

And when the power does go out, a sweeter silence you have never in your life heard … there are actually birds out there somewhere in the haze … you can hear their melodic calls … until six million generators kick-in at 7.36am. Then we’re back to business as usual.

Jump forward a couple of years, and I find myself in stunning Fiji, this time on assignment for Saving the Herd. As you’d expect from your intrepid Donkey who’ll stop at very few lengths to ensure the readership receives a complete overview of what some of the World’s exotic locales have to offer, I hit the bars and nightclubs of Suva last night in a mighty fashion comprising the consumption of a great many beverages and the some rather odd, shouted conversations. Indeed, a casual passerby who happened to peer through a darkened window of O’Reilly’s at about 12.42am may have seen a shaggy, barnyard beast swinging from, and grinding against the raised poles situated around the seedy dance floor, and the resultant looks of horror on the startled faces of the young locals thereon. Needless to say, by sunrise this morning, the only things anyone should have been expecting to get out of Donkey would have been repulsive snores and another bucket of Donkey Drool swelling his pillow.

But instead of sleeping on until mid-afternoon, being careful to lay completely still so as not to rock the bed and create a great, jolting, Fiji Bitter-induced stab to my head, Donkey was wide awake at 5.30am thanks to the wonderful, competitive devotion of the good people of the Friendly Islands. Because at 5.30am, from right outside my window, came not the gentle, soothing trill of the morning sparrows as they greeted the dawning sun, but rather the thumping bass of a mega-amped PA system, amplified electric drums, guitars and a host of mic-ed-up, happy-clappin’ angels singing their praises to Heaven on high … en masse!

Anyone who’s ever been to the Islands will recall well the myriad of multi-coloured churches that have been erected to The Almighty, often numbering in the realm of 3:1 churches per member of the population, with almost as many denominations, sects, break-away evangelist communities and “outreach” centres to match, and Suva by far has the largest and most diverse range of these compared with any other city in The Pacific. Now despite their common, constant promotion of working towards spiritual and community harmony, in Suva, as with anywhere that you have a great collection of conflicting, doctrinal dogma, the many churches are in heavy competition for the immortal souls (not to mention the substantial financial contributions) of those “poor, lost souls crying out in the spiritual wilderness”. Unfortunately for Donkey, the way to win that competition amongst the spiritual majority of Suva, is to play music louder than any other congregation, and to play it earlier.

So at 5.30am on Sunday morning, equipped with the biggest hangover Donkey-kind has experienced in … weeks, I was holding onto the bed head as the room was spinning around with increasing, alcohol-induced velocity, while the bed bounced all over the floorboards with each base-line from the church next door.

But that wasn’t the worst of it. Just as I was getting the room under control and starting to cope with the jolts, the hymns and clapping started-in on 6:4 time. Even in my delicate state, I thought that was pretty amazing, until I realised that every second bass line was slightly louder than the other. When it started in on 8:4 time, I finally twigged that my plush little, abode – oh-so-peaceful during the week - was situated bang in the middle of a weekly religious war zone being fought on multiple, spiritual fronts.

I guess it’s fair to say it did get me praying, “Jay-zus! Will you shut the fuck up!”, I bellowed before turning green and being forced to hang onto the pillow again for stability. There was nothing for it, I was going to have to sit this one out, and I lay there snivelling in misery as new players joined the cacophonic war outside, and the musical crescendo continued to build.

And then, by 7.45am, completely at my wits end, and with every non-fixed item in the room having moved six feet from where it had been the night before, it all stopped in mid-beat “Alle-fucking-luiah! It’s a miracle! Praise be to Him on High!”, I cried.

It seems that air-cons and musical devotions are not dissimilar when it comes to keeping up with the Joneses; just as Devji and Sanjay had gone head-to-head with the cooling, only to create a meltdown, so too had the spiritual soldiers of Suva battled with weapons of over-amped bass until there was nothing but silence. Clearly, in the armoury of the churches of Suva, electricity is not a bottomless gift from God, and no army can fight a war without appropriate resources to ensure back-up.

The result? Donkey was able to sleep-off his aching scone until afternoon, and not one of those well meaning institutions managed to enjoy his hooves upon their hallowed floors last Sunday.


They may look cute (from afar), but I think the close-up on those eyes suggests a deliberate, satanic ploy to hurt Donkey's head. Pic: http://lh5.ggpht.com/_9FazTC7TfeA/RsKSyqH8LmI/AAAAAAAAAFk/LYn3naHXSwY/CIMG0128.JPG

Mormons, Man, they MUST be taking the piss!

I mean, they’ve just got to be. Sit in the cool, hazy shade of a decades-old mango tree between the shimmering hot hours of 11 and 3 in any Samoan village on any day of the week (except Sunday), and look out into the sweltering white heat to see what you can see. The air is so stifling that even the bloody chickens that squawk-out the hour all night long and who contribute a solid, uninterrupted, sleep-depriving racket from 7am until 10 seem to have gone to ground and are following your lead underneath some bush or coconut tree. With the exception of the gentle swish from the swaying coconut fronds, the world is silent and still; not a soul is out there … not a single sign of human life.

That is unless you count the members of the Church of Latter-Day Saints as human, in which case there they’ll be, wandering along beside the sizzling, bitumen road in the full heat of the blazing sun, their black, woolen trousers intensifying the blistering heat, their starched, white, long-sleeved shirts plastered to their backs and chests with sweat and their black ties at full-mast, turning wet from the top down as they soak-up the rivulets which run down cleanly shaven necks.

Only a harsh practical joker could conceive of this most ridiculous concept; to force their own to put on the most inappropriate clothes and move through the world in the hottest part of a hot day in a hot, hot country, with nary but a holy book to hold above their heads as a means of shading their eyes from the sun’s fury. Even the latter is funny, as those tricksters in the LDS Church hierarchy, I presume in an attempt to see just how far they could push their prank before someone would call them on it, have decreed that the compulsory, standard-issue holy book be of such minute dimensions as to provide not a sliver of shade.

These senior-ranking, nutty funsters, holed-up in Utah and sitting around in their uncomfortable ceremonial underwear don’t stop at these hilarious attempts to give their young brethren sunstroke, either. Not content with taking the piss out of their only-recently-embraced, darker-skinned communities of the Pacific, they’ll also have a stab at their own kids, by sending them “on mission” to these new, fertile hunting grounds of the Pacific. Now even I admit that it’s pretty funny to send a skinny, white, blond, crackling-voiced, acne-ridden teenager from the outer-suburbs of Utah to a village in Samoa to convert to Mormonism people who speak a completely different language, by knocking on doors of houses that don’t have any. I mean, this is the stuff of those stupid practical joke TV shows, isn’t it? Surely there must be a TV camera hidden somewhere up in the rafters of the thatched roof, capturing every confused facial expression of these young kids as they stand awkwardly outside the traditional, wall-less house, sweating profusely in the midday inferno, reading out passages of a tiny book in a language that the people dozing inside cannot even understand? MasterCard my ass! That stuff is priceless!

The senior-ranking Mormons are even trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the rest of us. Did you know that until relatively recently, black people were forbidden from joining the hierarchy of the LDS Church? Fortunately that’s all changed now, and the Mormons have been churning through the Christianity-rich Pacific Islands ever since, swelling their numbers and making piles and piles of steaming, hot, tax-free cash in the process. The practical joke part of it is that a new, sacred “tablet” allowing black people to join the Church was found at about the same time as the financial data about modern Christian expansion in the Pacific became available, and now, thanks to a new, instructional tablet from God (allegedly discovered down the back of someone’s couch), there’s a brand new, community-funded LDS Church going up every couple of kilometers in Samoa. What’s funny about that? Only that every Tax or Inland Revenue Department in the world seems to have swallowed this stuff hook, line and sinker!

But for me, the best indicator that the Mormons are having an almighty lend of the rest of us lies in their promotion of the saintly, virtuous young Mormon. They and their youth-oriented literature bang-on-and-on about chastity before marriage and being faithful to both God and their wives (although if being faithful to one wife seems a little too difficult, they can always marry another), and yet, in the villages of the Pacific, when it comes to converting potential new members, the Mormons seem to have gone with the age-old adage of advertising agencies the world over; “sex sells” … or at least it certainly helps the salesman to get his foot in the door.

I am sure it is not by coincidence that most of my female friends in Samoa have looked dozily-out from the shade of the mango tree on a hot afternoon and seen a buff, young Samoan Hercules, his six-pack visible through his soaking, see-through white shirt, and thought, ”Mmmmmmm, that’s nice”, before proceeding to call him over for a chat about the Mormons. I am also sure that it is not by coincidence that I have later seen my female friends, after a night of sweaty, close-up dancing in a sweltering Samoan nightclub, wander out along the sea wall, hand-in-hand with that very same Mormon missionary. Virtuous chastity indeed!

And the practical jokes aren’t just for the Pacific, either. Just as white Mormons send their kids “on mission” to idyllic tropical locales to flounder around in the heat, trying to recruit new converts without a scrap of common language, so too, do some lucky Pacific Islanders get to become missionaries also. Just the other day, on a freezing, blustery afternoon in Melbourne, I watched a couple of young Mormons in the same black trousers, white shirts and black ties, standing at a tram stop reading passages of their book and trying to give out their riveting written material. While one of the guys looked local, seemingly from one of Melbourne’s wealthier suburbs, the other guy was a buff, young Polynesian lad who was shivering in the bitter cold (again, that old fish-out-of-water gag - you just can’t beat it!).

The Australian kid was standing on a chair and proselytising, while the other guy, through chattering teeth, was “working the room”; roving amongst the assembled passengers, handing out magazines and whispering words of salvation … or so I thought, because while the written material that he was shoving into the faces of unsuspecting commuters, like all the others I have ever seen, almost certainly contained lengthy diatribes on the need for young people to stay “pure”, his next action was quite unexpected indeed.

I watched him approach a very well-dressed, good looking young lady in a short skirt and stylish, knee-high boots, to whom he said something. In reply, she looked up from her book and shook her head, to which, with a flash of sparkling teeth, he gave a loud laugh, dumped the collection of magazines and brochures he was holding on the ground at his feet and sat down beside her (very closely) for a chat. Before long, they were both laughing at each other’s jokes and getting along very well indeed, and although Donkey is not the most intuitive guy when it comes to cross-gender signals, there was enough cross-legged toe-pointing, twirling of ringlets of hair and showings of the inside of wrists to send the message loud and clear that they were not talking about eternal life.

So they may have pulled the wool over the eyes of their own, and the tax fraud investigators all over the world, but the Mormons aren’t fooling me with their claims of purity and chastity; young people are the same the world over; when beautiful people are pointing at you and saying “Mmmmmm”, it doesn’t matter how many copies of The Book of Mormon you read to stop the urge. Sending this young kid to Australia might have been a clever little prank designed by the powers-that-be in the LDS Church to humiliate him, but for this young missionary and his new, tram-riding friend, the next few hours were shaping-up to look as though the joke might definitely be on the mugs who coughed-up the cash to send him here to spread “the word”.


This really has nothing to do with the story, but I laughed to find the "Mormon hunks calendar". Told you they were having a lend. Pic: http://www.jewishjournal.com

Indignant spiritual indigestion

You know, I don't really mind if people want to have opinions that are wrong, but why-oh-why must some (for want of a more appropriate term) FRIGGIN' IDIOTS insist on banging-on about them in public places, to all within ear-shot? For example, I'm a hard-workin' Donkey, and so, when it comes to Sunday morning, I like to rise late and take a leisurely stroll down through the multitudes of monks, beggars, vendors and pilgrims, past the massive gold ornaments of the Jokhang Temple and make my way to my favourite, chilled-out eatery where I like to sip two or three cups of dark, steaming Colombian, eat my over-easies and grilled tomatoes and sit in the bright Lhasa sun, keeping to myself as I read a book or, if I am lucky (and I was very lucky today) an Australian newspaper lovingly brought over by some thoughtful friends. Not too much to ask, now is it? A bit of Donkey-time as I sit and drink-in the atmosphere of old Tibet.

But I really cannot understand why other patrons of Donkey's favourite, chilled-out eatery seem hell-bent on shattering the quiet ambience with megaphonic observations of "the thing that's going wrong with Tibet", in a pompous, American East Coast, Ivy League drawl. Try as I might to ignore this twit, by the time it had gone on all the way through coffee numbers one and two, and through the first googy and tomato, I had to get up and stick my head around the corner to see just who this loud-mouthed braggart was actually talking to.

And what do you know? The poor sod who had been stuck listening to this nit-wit for the last hour as he spouted his opinions on why there were no monks at this or that monastery, and why Tibetans are no longer interested in spirituality and the old secrets was perhaps the only person in Lhasa who was not allowed to turn their back on an obnoxious, ill-informed prat. She was the poor, young, Tibetan waitress who, without this job (and all the trials that go with it), would be forced to return to her family and spend a long, draughty winter without a steady fire for warmth. In essence, she just had to endure it.

What else could I do? I gave her an out by calling her over and ordering another Colombian. My incredulous shake of the head was answered with a pleasant, conspiratorial grin, and for a short time all was calm and peaceful in the land, until some more of his countrymen came in and forced me to endure the whole procedure again – this time in stereo! That was it! I scalded my tongue as I downed the last caffeine hit and ducked out of there as Mr New England was proclaiming all the reasons why Tibetans today will never reach a state of heightened consciousness through tantric meditation.

My walk back home, usually very pleasant in the warm midday sun, had been soured. I had been cheated out of my pleasant weekly ritual, and now all I could think about were his last, anger-generating words about heightened consciousness. I was angry 'cause a) it wasn't true, and b) 'cause he was just another ill-informed, Martin Scorsese-worshipping "Boo-dist" who'd been here a week. Besides, of all people, he was the least likely to reach a heightened consciousness through tantric meditation ... certainly a lot less likely than the poor waitress with the bleeding ears.

Besides, what's so special about a heightened consciousness anyway? I've been clubbing - I know what it's like to have all my friends e-ing off their heads and hugging and drooling down each other's shoulders. And I've seen people lying in the gutters off Smith St, blissfully oblivious to the freezing Melbourne rain pelting down around them, or of the warmer, darkening patch around their groin.

And me. I get pissed pretty often, allegedly as a means of reaching a heightened state of consciousness, but I can't say that the results are all that cosmic or spiritual. For instance, just the other night, after about ten Lhasa beers, I got into a heated argument with someone who didn't believe that in the Tom and Jerry cartoons, the only humans are the housekeepers, who we imagine to be big, black, Queen Latifah-like ladies, although all we can see of them are a pair of stripy socks. Strike me down if it isn't true (unfortunately this place prevents me from Google-ing it), but either way, I'm sure you'll agree that neither of us seemed to be approaching Nirvana through our heightened consciousnesses.

Crikey, see what happens when I don't get my quiet, Sunday morning breakky?


Tom and Jerry, the new spiritual quest for weekend "boo-dists" everywhere. Pic: http://www.tomandjerryonline.com

Did you hear the one about the Racist, the Anti-Semite and the Suburban Australian Family?

This is a bit of a lame post, really, but rest assured I’m working on something a bit more worthwhile and more likely to make a contribution to society, which I’ll post in the next day or so. This post, on the other hand, is a bit of an interactive jobbie ‘cause I need some opinions.

Y’see, I’ve been a bit emotionally sore and sorry for myself these last few weeks, owing to the fact that I am still in transit on my way to Tibet, and my enforced exile in Melbourne, which should be making me feel great, is, apart from the SPECTACULAR coffee, making me feel lonely, alienated and arrogantly uppity.

It all stems from my catching-up with friends and loved ones over the last few weeks, many of whom live reasonably affluent lifestyles in the outer suburbs, and all of whom seem to be pretty free with their opinions. Me? I tend to cower a bit with my opinions, but lately, having reached the limit of what I will let through to the keeper, I have been sticking up for myself and my beliefs, which has certainly resulted in a degree of ill feeling between myself and certain parties … the consequences of which, unfortunately, are me feeling lonely, alienated and arrogantly uppity.

So I have been questioning my recent actions, and had been coming to a decision that I was just going to have to shut up and hope that it will all go away, however this week I have read a couple of blogs of people who it would seem have similar views to my own, and it gives me a little bit of hope that I am not alone in this world, and that in some places, and amongst some people, there are still intelligent people with informed views and opinions.

Geez, Donkey, will you wipe the rabid foam from your mouth and just get on with it? OK, so this is some of the stuff I’ve heard over the last few weeks, and I just wanna know if you think the following comments and opinions are OK, right and proper for a modern, learned, informed society. So, here we go;

- In reference to a neighbour: “The squinty-eyes next door…”

- As a joke, in front of his children, in response to his wife’s nagging: “I’m sorry, did I fall into a bucket of black paint? I must look like a nigger the way you keep telling me what to do tonight…”

- Regarding local governance: “The council is run by Jews and they all look after each other. If you wanted to open a childcare facility, you’d never get it through council, but if it was for Jewish kids, it’d be approved tomorrow”

- In regards to seeing the Indian foreign minister on TV saying that his government will not stand for the continued incarceration of Dr Haneef in Queensland: “But I bet it’d be OK if you wanted to send a bit of money his way”.

- In regards to Muslim women in Australia not being prepared to remove burquas or headscarves, “When they’re in our country they have to adopt our customs … this is a Christian country after all”.

- Regarding government-funded, public education versus (increasingly) government-funded private education: “People who say they haven’t got enough money to send their kids to private schools are probably the ones who don’t really value education as important for their kids”.

- In regards to public shower cleanliness: “In our country, they should have to adopt our customs, or not be allowed to use the showers”.


For this roving Donkey, it has been a difficult process to return home recently to a government who has finally noticed something wrong with the health and social systems in indigenous Australia, and thinks that the best way to prevent further child abuse and improve indigenous health is to send in armed soldiers; accordingly I have been increasingly dismayed at the rising tide of hatred and xenophobia that seems to have infiltrated the suburbs.

It almost feels to me like some of these enclaves of white Australia have become like those Biospheres; y’know the ones, where nothing (such as good ideas and reality) gets in, and nothing gets out (at least we can be thankful about the latter, although I am fearing that their ideas seem to be leaking through some undetected crack in the dome!).

So, tell me, am I wrong to feel down and outraged about this? Is it just a case of the times moving along, and me being slow to catch up? - it wouldn't be the first time Donkey had been caught napping while the world flew-on by, as evidenced by my pink side-winders and bright orange pair of pants. Has the re-emergence of global terrorism changed society so much that it's now acceptable and normal to opine hatred and intolerance of cultures and beliefs which don't mirror our own? It's possible that this is the case, but I still can't help but think it's a tad irresponsible to bring up children with a sense of what is right and wrong, and then just throw it all out the window when it suits and say that all those immigrants, Muslims, Jews, protestants (Geez, don't get me started on what I've been hearing about those guys!) and everyone else are fair game for mistrust and abuse.


I suspect this prototype for outer suburban planning could be good for both sides of the political spectrum; it locks the racists inside and keeps out any of those disgusting, drug-smoking, free-loving lefties with their ideas about equality and racial tolerance. A win-win situation, if ever there was one. Pic: www.ec.gc.ca

Boom! Boom! Boom! Let’s go back to my room…

It was lovely being submerged in warm, liquid dark chocolate and having juicy, red strawberries drop into my drooling maw by 60s go-go dancers, but all that came to an abrupt, dramatic halt as an almighty boom shook the bed and room, and indeed Donkey from his slumber.

Still addled by my adventures in Candy Land, and three days on the punishing mountain roads of Pakistan, I was initially somewhat confused, and I thought that Mrs Donkey had just farted in her sleep again. But just as I was working out where the hell I was, and wondering why I had a hankering for Lindt and girls in tie-dye minis and knee-high boots, there was a second earth-shattering explosion which sent me to the floor with a nasty expletive as I discovered that the bed was solid; my stinging forehead informing me that there was no where to hide from the impending collapse of the ceiling.

I couldn’t believe this was happening - we were under attack! I shouldn’t have been surprised; in the last four days, my journey through Pakistan had been brought to you by the term “extreme military hardware”, and the Pakistan landscape was littered with it. Indeed, the first monument to the fresh eyes of a visiting tourist on the way from the airport to the capital is of a massive, stern-looking President Musharraf sitting atop a mountain in full, imposing military regalia, and beneath it, Hollywood-sized letters bestowing the virtue, “Discipline”.

The military theme was further emphasized by a massive collection of surplus military machinery decking out tiny town-squares in even the smallest backwaters of the country. Single-pilot jet fighters were arranged in poses of active flight outside all government buildings, and beside the bazaars, (hopefully) demobilised, camouflaged tanks hulked imposingly, their guns pointing up the main streets as a reminder to all “visitors” that their hosts were ready for any false moves. And then there were my favourites; real missiles mounted on cement buttresses and pointing to the heavens like enormous, military penises the likes of which feature in George W’s wet dreams every night. Add to these ‘monuments to the death of nations’ a sizable military academy in every large town and three ordinance factories, the smallest of which would dwarf Monaco, and it’s not hard to appreciate that Pakistan spends upwards of seventy-five percent of its national budget on the military, even while most of its population are illiterate and losing their children every year to vaccine-preventable diseases.

And there I was, stuck in the middle of a full-scale attack and wondering why my security briefing hadn’t mentioned anything about what I was supposed to do when receiving fire while dressed in nothing but a pair of boxer shorts decorated in humorous pictures of monkeys. “That’d be right!”, I moaned, “Twelve years of suffering under the right-wing military regime of John Howard, without finding myself within even a dull roar of some military intervention, and yet my unwitting membership of the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ was unlikely to save me now, all the way up here in this remote border region, miles from any of my wonderful Pakistani coalition allies, who would be the only ones who could save me from the marauding hoards of Afghani militants who must surely be surrounding my hotel right at this moment, firing mortars directly at my room”.

On the floor next to my bed, in a snivelling, quaking mess, I was praying to God for my life, and I even tried a bit of an offering to Allah as well, although in my panic, the only Urdu I could remember was “As salaam alaikum”, so in my final hour, all the Most Holy would hear was me rapidly squealing “Hello”, in a very shrill voice, over and over again.

After half an hour, there had been no further explosions, and I had dozed off until an insistent knock at my door at 8am. Preparing to meet Osama himself, I opened to see my colleague tapping her watch in a frustrated signal of my tardiness. “But … but the explosion? Aren’t we under attack?”, I stammered. She shrugged and assured me that the Chinese were building a hydroelectric dam next door, and that they sometimes have to explode holes in the mountain. She then fixed me with The Stare, which told me in no uncertain terms that I’d I better get out of those ridiculous shorts, and get moving immediately.

So hang-on, maybe it’s fair to suggest that my initial assumption of an Afghan invasion of Pakistan was a bit far-fetched, but in my defence, do our East Asian engineer friends really need to do their practicing for Chinese New Year at 4am? Here I was in one of the most harsh and brutal regions of the world, in a country where children are taught to disassemble and reassemble a Kalashnikov while suckling their mother’s breast, and I’m supposed to know the difference between nocturnal excavation and an enemy attack?. As I sheepishly approached the vehicle under the glowering gaze of my impatient and unforgiving team, I surmised that Pakistan, Donkey and un-forewarned explosions DEFINITELY DO NOT MIX!

Cricket World Cup Fever is one disease that cannot be cured by any vaccine, and it is rampant in the mountains of Pakistan. Photo: Hagas

Losing my religion

One thing you notice, when listening to the REM song, is the anguish in Michael Stipe’s voice as he struggles with his new-found torment. It seems from the song that, prior to some recent events, he has been a man of faith, comfortable in the knowledge that there was something out there for him when his time comes to shrug off his mortal coil; there’s something for him to move towards; something to drive him to do good.

But for reasons unknown to the listener, that promise of something great to come is lost to Mr Stipe now, and he is tormented about the great and difficult task that lies ahead of him … the task of living. A task which, I’m sure many of you will agree, is difficult enough as it stands, but for Michael Stipe, with the added fear that he is now facing, fear of having to continue to live-on and to experience all the pain and frustration that the modern world inflicts upon its inhabitants, without any material or heavenly reward at the end, is proving to be more than he believes he has the strength to withstand. Michael Stipe is desperately and dangerously close to despair, and right now, at the time of singing this song, he can see no way to continue.

Losing one’s religion, or faith, or spirituality, can be an enormous moral and physical calamity for anyone.

Saving the World HQ has recently sent Donkey to Turkey to attend a summit of the World’s Super Heroes, and yesterday we were granted an afternoon off from the high-level discussions to take-in a bit of history from this incredible part of the ancient world. We visited Roman, Greek, Christian and Persian ruins on the western coast, and we were all suitably shocked and awed at the magnificent civilisations that have grown, flourished and disappeared over the centuries. For this na?ve Donkey, coming from a country whose oldest buildings are not much more than about 170 years old, it was truly an awesome experience.

On the way back to the Super Hero Summit, we stopped at what is said to have been the last known house of the Virgin Mary. St John, entrusted by Jesus to look after his sacred and beloved mother as he perished on the cross, is said to have taken Mary with him as he set about spreading Christianity throughout the world, and the last place they lived before dying was here at Ephesus, high up on a windswept hill.

The location of Mary’s last days remained unknown until a German nun had a vision sometime in the mid twentieth century, and after years of searching, and finding, and partitioning the Vatican, the Church declared the authenticity of the site in the mid 60s. Now, of course, pilgrims flock to the little stone chapel which has been built on the site, and yesterday, Donkey too stopped for a look at what perhaps may be “one of the most holy sites for Catholicism in the world”.

Amongst the Super Heroes gathered, there were Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus, and with the exception of the first and some of the second group, many of the visitors had questions about the site, and the lady to whom it is dedicated, and Donkey, being both the hoary old Catholic and social butterfly that he is, found himself explaining the whole Jesus, Mary and St John thing to them all as we wandered up the hill to the little stone chapel. So by the time we burst through the door, Donkey was more into an historical, explanatory frame-of-mind than one which might normally have been expected from a Catholic lad entering “one of the most holy sites for Catholicism in the world”.

It was the looks of rapturous, spiritual wonder radiating from the faces of the other Catholics from our party, who had reached the chapel before us and who were silently kneeling and praying, which startled me into realising where I was, and I quickly checked myself and made the appropriate, habitual gestures before quietening my thoughts with a view to some kind of respectful prayer or reflection, but you know what? Nothing came.

“What’s going on?”, I wondered. Once upon a time, Donkey would have shut everything else out, and would have concentrated on this place and moment, affording it all the love and respect that “one of the most holy sites for Catholicism in the world” deserves. But I felt nothing from the place – there was no power, no inner strength, just the cold stone from a 40 year-old building which could not possibly have been anything like the last house of Our Lady of Efes, which would have been built some 2000 years before.

And it was with these thoughts, very much focused on the academic (“this could not have been the house she lived in, it’s too new”), rather than the spiritual (“the last known house of Holy Mary, Mother of God”), that I wandered back down the hill in the rain, feeling as though I had just been taken to another dodgy tourist attraction. I knew in my heart that this was the wrong approach, and that I perhaps had just missed a great, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but it was my head, not my heart, which was calling the shots that afternoon.

Upon rejoining my colleagues, I could see how uplifted were the Catholics amongst them, and it made me feel even worse, not because they had felt so much, and I nothing, but rather that I was so disturbed by my lack of feeling.

You see, for years now I have based my spirituality on a belief in people, and the power that they bring to me and each other through compassion and interaction. It is this which empowers me to interact with people from all faiths, and all walks of life, and it was probably this which resulted in my patiently answering questions about the Bible from Buddhists and Hindus as we wandered up the hill towards Mary’s House.

I have believed in the good will and power of mutual interaction and love for years now, and have been convinced that it is by far a greater road to world peace and harmony than following a confused collection of antiquated dogma. I believe … no, I know that it is the right way forward … so why then do I feel so bad about my lack of any spiritual epiphany at Mary’s House? After all, I can sit quietly in a Hindu or Buddhist temple, or under a tree or by the sea, and after a period of quiet self-reflection, feel completely up-lifted.

Am I starting to get scared that I don’t have a contingency plan if the end day comes and I’ve in fact been wrong all these years? Should I be hedging my bets and put a bit more effort into trying to feel something in a cold stone chapel in the mountains of Turkey … y’know, just in case?

Losing one’s religion is indeed very painful … but so is searching without and within to try to hang onto it. Sometimes I wonder if it’d be less painful to just follow blindly … but, deep down, while I might back myself to be able to fool God, or gods, I’m not sure I’d ever really be able to fool myself.


REM's Michael Stipe; haunting anguish in Losing my religion. Pic: Google images.