Watch What You Say in Burma’s Sacred Forests
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Environment
What’s a more powerful conservation incentive – a government jail or a spiritual punishment? ZEE O THIT HLA, Myanmar Myint Naing has one of the easier jobs in the Myanmar forestry department. Since 1999 his task has been to protect the Zee-O Thit-Hla sacred forest, which has been a government forest reserve since 1988. No […]
Read MoreReligions on the Wing
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Environment
Everyone in Irian Jaya wants a piece of Zakarias’s soul MINYAMBOU, Irian Jaya. When the fundamentalist Baptist missionaries in this isolated valley in Irian Jaya now West Papua] asked for contributions to build a new church, Zakarias chipped in with the most valuable thing he could find — a bird of paradise. The irony of […]
Read MoreBorneo Native Group Scores Land Claim Victory
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Environment
How a poor Iban longhouse took on Big Timber and won; sort of RUMAH NOR, Sarawak, Malaysia “There is no greater sadness on earth than the loss of one’s native land.” Euripedes We park the car along the side of a rutted dirt road in the middle of an acacia tree plantation five times […]
Read MoreLife and Death on Shiva’s Beach
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Environment
Is a turtle worth risking your life? PULAU ENU, Aru Islands, Indonesia A newly-hatched green turtle wandered into my tent this evening, attracted, perhaps, by a lantern that the reptile thought was the reflection of the moon on the sea. A few hours later I wander the beach on the windward side of this small […]
Read MoreTo Cut That Tree, Cut Through Me
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Environment
Chipko women’s movement keeps on huggin’ RENI, Uttaranchal, India Any new-age nature-lover can hug a tree, and many do. But it takes a special kind of person to embrace a tree which is about to be chopped down, and challenge the woodsman “if you want to cut the tree you’ll have to cut through me.” […]
Read MorePrayer Flags Over Rio
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Environment
Should we trust the eco-bureaucrats or the farmer in Bhutan for eco-solutions? JANGTSIKHA, Bhutan I was cleaning up my office and stubbed my toe against the printed version of Agenda 21, some 700 pages, 2,079 recommendations, guidelines and treaties resulting from the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio — the largest eco–bureaucratic gathering ever held. I […]
Read MoreUzi Fever
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
Letting the macho urges go out with a bang in Cambodia PHNOM PENH, Cambodia In this uncertain world of drive-by killings, high school massacres and gonzo postal workers, is there nowhere a guy can go to blast an Uzi for fun without being labeled a politically-incorrect barbarian? Well, there’s always Cambodia, where Taiwanese entrepreneur Victor […]
Read MoreThe God Who Flew Off With a Mountain
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
It takes chutzpah for an Indian villager to stay angry at one of the most popular gods in the Hindu pantheon, but Padhan Patti wants her mountain back DUNAGIRI, India It takes a bit of Hindu chutzpah for a remote Indian villager to stay angry at one of the most popular gods in the pantheon, […]
Read MoreThe Sultan and the Mermaid Queen
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
A love story for the ages SOLO, Indonesia The instructions, given by a friend of Javanese nobility, were tantalizingly vague. If you look really carefully, and if the wind is blowing right and you are of good heart and you let yourself “switch mode” into a semi-trance, you just might see a tenth dancer. That […]
Read MoreSearching for Small Folk at the End of the Trail
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
A visit with three types of Hobbits on the isolated Indonesian island of Flores FLORES, Indonesia Imaginary short people fascinate us, and they take up an inordinate amount of space in literature and mythology. We’re all familiar with the Lilliputians who entrapped Gulliver, Snow White’s pals Dopey, Sleepy, Grumpy and the rest of the Seven […]
Read MoreMoses Dreams of Reversing Jewish Exodus in Burma
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
Caretaker of Rangoon’s only synagogue dares to dream. Will his children go forth and multiply? RANGOON, Burma “Ah, you want to see Moses Samuels,” says R., the front desk manager at a Rangoon guest house. “He’s an old school friend. He’s a Jew and I’m a Moslem, but we all got along just fine. Give […]
Read MoreSearching for Orwell
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
A backwater town in Upper Burma was the site for Orwell’s Burmese Days, a book that takes no prisoners KATHA, Burma There are worse travel strategies than to visit places with evocative names. There’s Timbuktu, Congo and Okavango in Africa; and Salvador de Bahia, Darien and Patagonia in Latin America, names which purr with history […]
Read MoreBurma’s Generals Hope White Elephants Provide Jumbo Support
Posted on 25. Jun, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Curious Travel
Burma’s Generals Hope White Elephants Provide Jumbo Support Trying to restore some of the good vibes that come with rare pale pachyderms RANGOON, Burma Most new national capitals feature monumental architecture, statues to independence heroes, broad boulevards, cultural centers and shopping malls. Burma’s new, deliberately-isolated and rarely-visited capital, Naypyidaw (which means “royal capital” in Burmese), […]
Read MoreThe Skies are Alive in Lanka
Posted on 30. May, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Curious Travel
Sri Lanka is Ground Zero for hard-to-explain aerial phenomena ANGULLUGAHA, Galle, Sri Lanka I was swimming, just after sunset one night, with my friends Dhanapala and his daughter Vidhisha. One of us, I forget who, pointed to the clear sky and said: “Is that a plane?” No, it seemed, it wasn’t. Nor were about ten […]
Read MoreThe Girl by the Side of the Road
Posted on 07. Apr, 2010 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles, Personal essays
The Girl by the Side of the Road Thirty years on, searching for the girl whose eyes said “I’m going to surprise you.” LADAKH, India In 1979 I took a black and white photo of a young girl in Ladakh. She was perhaps ten. She wore a rough robe of homespun wool, she carried a […]
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