The Three Stooges in China: Pursuing the Sacred Mountain in 1984
A True Record of an Actual Journey
By Raymond Barnett
www.raymondbarnett.com
For Kyle and AJ: Sacred mountain, Sacred friendships
The Three Stooges:
Ray. The Professor
Chinese History and Language at Yale.
Duke PhD in Biology; has taught at CA State Univ., Chico for 8 years
AJ. The Rebel
American Studies at Yale; lives in Kyoto; travels Asia studying Qi Gong body work
Kyle. The Adventurer
Studet of Ray t Chico State; avid world traveler; handsome and sunny
The setting: China, spring 1984
Eight years after Mao's death and end of Cultural Revolution
Kyle and Ray return to China for first yeear IIndependent Travelers permitted..
Their goal: travelf "with the people" to Szechuan's Emei Shan: the sacred mountain
Chapter Six: Second Temple on the Mountain: Monsoons and Dried
Snakeskins to the Bathing Elephant Temple
The storm grew in intensity during the night. Wind howling down the corridor awoke Ray once, not long after he had fallen asleep. He lay there, listening to the whoosh of the wind, which nearly drowned out the chiming of the frogs. The sweet smell of rain mingled with the remnant of the smell of Kyle's candle. The sound of water cascading off the roof and being blown back onto the balustrade in the corridor was very loud also, seemingly next to him, in the room. He drifted back to sleep.
Bam! Bam! Two loud noises woke Ray. The sound was coming from the corridor. He pushed the mosquito netting aside and got out of bed, the floor wet and cold on his bare feet. He groped his way across the room. As he neared the door, a dim light reflecting down the corridor from the temple showed their hinged window blowing in the wind. It blew shut again, with another Bam! He quickly reached out and secured the clasp to keep it shut.
Looking out the window, Ray noticed the T-shirt Kyle had washed and hung up to dry was now lying crumpled on the corridor floor. He opened the door, retrieved the T-shirt, and draped it across the chair beside the desk. Closing the door, he listened briefly to the roar of the water dripping outside. Strange. Even with the door closed, the sound of dripping was still loud. He turned toward the sound. Inside the room. He groped toward it, and found himself touching the third, empty bed. Well, not quite empty. His daypack sat on the bed. In approximately eighteen inches of water, which was pouring down onto the daypack from the ceiling above.
"Oh, hell!" He snatched the daypack off the bed. Too late, by far. The daypack and all its contents—everything he had on the mountain save the T-shirt he was wearing—was completely soaked, having sat in water for several hours. He groped on the desk top for candle and matches. The light revealed the grim situation. His passport, his traveler checks, his camera, clothes, sweater, long-johns—everything was soaked, cold and clammy. He stood there for a solid minute, absorbing the situation.
Kyle stirred. "What's up, Ray?"
Ray couldn't answer.
"Ray?"
He roused himself. "A leak above the other bed. My daypack has been sitting in a lake all night."
Kyle laughed. Then caught himself.
"How much of a lake?"
"A couple of inches more than the height of the pack."
"Oh, no."
Ray nodded his head. "Where's your daypack?" he enquired, looking around the floor.
Kyle cleared his throat. "Uh, not long after you came to bed, I heard rain blowing into the room through the window. I hauled my daypack into bed with me."
Ray nodded miserably.
"Didn't dream that there was a leak over the other bed," Kyle added.
Ray nodded. "Me neither."
"Everything soaked?"
"Yup." He roused himself, and opened the daypack. Pulled out the passport and travelers checks, shook what water he could off them, and spread them out on a dry corner of the desk. He hung his own soaked camera in its case from the chair. Then he got to his clothes, soggy and cold. With a "Goddammit" he shoved them back into the daypack, put it on the desk, and stumbled back to his bed. Ray heard the temple bells at four, five, and six. In the faint light he noticed it was now only lightly misting outside. He forced himself out of bed and stood shivering on the wet floor in the early morning coolness. Kyle was still fast asleep, clutching his daypack with his warm, dry clothing and gear.
Ray turned to his daypack on the desk and removed the sweater he had been carrying all over China for a month so he could wear it on chilly days like this on the mountain. He wrung the cold water out of it and stretched it over his quilt. No chance of it drying on a cloudy day. He knew with certainty that there wasn't an electric clothes dryer for fifty miles. Maybe a hundred. He sighed deep, and shivered in the cold. Next came his long-john tops, his polo shirt. Same story.
As he stood there in the faint light it sunk in with vengeance that the only thing he owned that was dry or likely to be dry for weeks was the T-shirt he had slept in. That he was several thousand feet high on a mountain and would climb thousands of feet higher in the next several days, with temperature decreasing as he climbed. And that his companions had no extra clothing to loan him from their few clothes in their daypacks.
Kyle awoke. He glanced at the wet clothes strung round the room, at the passport and travelers checks spread on the desk. "Wow," he muttered. "Damn tough luck."
Ray nodded grimly. "Let's go get some hot food," he proposed.
Thirty minutes later they were sitting in the refectory with AJ and Ralph, Ray shivering in wet pants and socks and his polo shirt.
Ray eagerly shoveled the hot rice gruel into his mouth, feeling only slightly warmed as it went down. The rest of the breakfast consisted of pickled vegetables and hot tea plus a couple of boiled duck eggs from Ray's own stores.
"So what are you going to do?" Ralph asked wide-eyed, as Ray tersely recounted his tale of bad luck.
Ray looked at him with half a duck egg sticking out of his mouth.
"Do?" he mumbled.
"I mean, it'll be cold higher up the mountain. It's cold here," he informed Ray earnestly.
Ray paused. "Ralph," he said with a wry smile. "I ain't on a sacred mountain every day."
"But, but," Ralph spluttered. "You'll freeze to death."
Ray shook his head. "I'll keep moving, and you guys will just keep stuffing duck eggs in me."
Laughs and cheers from the other Two Stooges. AJ reached over and slapped Ray on the back encouragingly, then grimaced and dried his hand on his jeans.
Ralph shrugged, and resumed playing with his pickled vegetables. He uttered his first complaint of the day, about the weirdness of Chinese breakfasts. Quickly followed by another about the temple's lack of shower facilities, not to mention running water.
"But Ralph, if there was running water, there would be no Heavenly Chambermaid bringing buckets of water to our rooms," Kyle pointed out in mock earnestness
"So what?" Ralph countered sourly, continuing to poke at his pickled vegetables.
Kyle and AJ looked hard at Ralph. Not joining in the banter was one thing. Not appreciating the Heavenly Chambermaid was another altogether, roughly equivalent to questioning the cult of the Virgin Mary at a Catholic retreat.
They all finished breakfast, then hurried back to their rooms, stopping at the Marvelous Outhouse with a view. While there, Kyle had occasion to develop a Zen koan, or question to ponder: "What is the sound of one chopstick falling twelve feet into two feet of shit?"
They commiserated over Kyle's loss of the chopstick. The local places where they ate did not serve separate, packaged chopsticks to the customers, of course. Rather, a gourd or bamboo section containing community chopsticks was nailed to a post, and the customers simply picked two from the container. Presumably they were washed before being put back in the container. But still, they had thought it prudent to carry and use their own chopsticks. Kyle, unfortunately, was one chopstick short, now.
By the time they returned to their rooms, the early morning mist had thinned out, so the sky was only cloudy. The Heavenly Chambermaid was coming down the steps as they approached, brightening the day briefly. As they packed in their room, Kyle shook himself out of his appreciation of the Heavenly Chambermaid and looked over to Ray.
"You gonna be all right, Ray?" he asked seriously. Kyle knew from long experience that, being thin with a high metabolic rate, Ray became cold easily, and always wore several layers—dry layers—more than anyone else. Until today.
Ray shrugged. "I think so, friend. So long as I keep moving and shoving duck eggs and tea down."
Ray shook his head, then laughed, with his second wry smile of the morning. He didn't judge his predicament to be life threatening, with the sky clearing up. In gathering resolution to meet the challenge, he felt a rising tide of happiness creeping over himself.
Kyle looked over suspiciously as Ray soon collapsed laughing into the chair before the desk. "Ray?"
Ray hefted his daypack. "In addition to everything else, I now have to carry a daypack weighing about twice as much as it did yesterday."
Kyle nodded. "Wet sand versus dry sand."
"Not only heavier, but the clothing more bulky. I can't fit everything into the daypack now," he observed with a bitter little laugh.
Kyle tossed over a white plastic bag from his daypack. Ray stuffed the extra-bulky clothing articles into it, passed the end of his dragon walking cane through the bag's handles, and hoisted it over his shoulder.
"The game's foot," he quipped, attempting a grin but failing.
Kyle raised his eyebrows, and hefted his daypack with a grunt. They waited fifteen minutes for AJ and Ralph to finish packing, then set up the trail toward the Xi Xiang "Elephant Bathing" temple several thousand feet up the mountain. They were all in in spirits, Ralph excepted, as they began. Ray's white polo shirt almost seemed to be drying a bit—if not sunny, at least it wasn't raining. The Three Stooges put Ralph to good use taking photos of them beginning their serious ascent of the sacred mountain.
The trail was thronged with Chinese of all ages. Young children scampered by them laughing and shoving. Middle-aged folks climbed with a brisk pace, joking constantly. Hardly any of them wore packs of any sort. Presumably they were on just a one- or two-day outing and needed nothing more than a roof and some food. The Three Stooges were the object of many startled stares as they were passed, but mostly the stares were replaced by smiles and friendly jokes. These folks may be pilgrims, but they were none of them grim. One old lady passed them at a rapid clip, as she was being carried up the mountain in a heavy wood chair by four hefty young men. During the day some half dozen such were seen.
As they ascended, more varied shops appeared along the trail. Instead of just tea, soda, and duck eggs, they now offered various types each of dried fungi, bark, roots, stones, dried snakes, leaves, shriveled monkey paws and skulls. Ray chatted with the vendors, and learned that different mixtures of these items were boiled to provide tonic drinks to fortify the pilgrims on their journey. He purchased a monkey skull for his museum back home.
Halfway through the morning showers returned, and then serious rain. Soon they were hiking through the first monsoon downpour of the season. Ray had seen it rain harder only once in his life, also a monsoon, in Vietnam his second day in country, in 1969. His polo shirt, which had nearly dried in the early morning, had become wet with sweat as the climb progressed, so that now everything he wore and owned was sopping wet in the heavy rain. The rain jackets and ponchos of Kyle and AJ and Ralph soon revealed themselves as not remotely adequate for a monsoon. Within a minute of the monsoon's onslaught all of them were soaked, rain running down their daypacks in torrents, shoes filled with water. The others were hoping that unlike Ray, the clothes in their daypacks might stay dry.
Reactions to all this varied. Ralph, of course, increased the vehemence of his complaints. He was thoroughly miserable, and doing his level best to spread his feelings. Kyle could not tolerate Ralph's attitude, and his annoyance soon veered toward anger. In addition, a rash in Kyle's groin worsened as the day progressed, making every stride painful, although only later did they learn of this. Meanwhile, Aj's aching knees worsened, so Ray stayed behind with him while Kyle and Ralph went on ahead, sparks flying between them.
Shortly after noon, AJ and Ray caught up with Kyle and Ralph, who were glaring at each other on the side of the trail. As they came up to them, Ralph held out his hand. "I'll take my bus tickets back now," he snarled. "I can't find any butterflies in all this rain. I'm going somewhere sunny, wherever it may be." He stretched his hand out further and shook it.
"You're leaving?" Ray asked. "Just like that?"
"Give me my bus tickets," Ralph repeated grimly.
"Why, sure," Ray replied. He dug them out of his daypack, and handed them over. "Good luck," he said, though without much enthusiasm.
Ralph turned and was off—going down the mountain.
The Three Stooges shrugged their shoulders, and resumed the march up the trail. For some reason, as AJ and Kyle joined Ray in becoming increasingly and then completely wet in the pelting rain, their spirits rose. Go figure. Perhaps they had lost their last craving, that for warmth and dryness, and so achieved liberation from all worldly concerns. Perhaps they had developed a fever and accompanying dementia. Whatever, by noon they were in unaccountably high spirits, limping (AJ) and ambling (Kyle and Ray) along the trail singing songs and greeting all they encountered with smiles and courteous bows. Never had the world seemed more glorious, colors brighter, air sweeter than today.
With Ralph departed, The Three Stooges were once again—well, three stooges. Simple. Oblivious perhaps. Foolish, perhaps. Stumbling in and out of trouble. The Three Stooges.
Surprisingly, virtually all they passed coming up or down the mountain seemed to agree that the day was glorious. Their Chinese fellow-pilgrims were not the least bit miserable that they could tell. Perhaps the monsoon had not surprised them at all, and their flimsy clear plastic raingear was effective. Evidently the three foreign devils were the only pilgrims on the entire mountain unprepared and soaked.
So the afternoon passed. The rain poured heavily the rest of the day. AJ and Ray stopped often, to rest his knees and purchase more eggs and hot tea for Ray. Kyle was soon ahead of the others on the trail again. They met him at a spot that passed through a troupe of monkeys—finally the Emei Shan monkeys they'd been warmed about! There were some dozen of them, Rhesus macaques, and most stayed in the tree branches and chattered at them as they walked by. A few dropped down and rushed toward various pilgrims, making swiping grabs at pockets and bags. Some of their Chinese colleagues laughingly tossed peanuts at them, quickly pounced upon by the mischievous beggars. It struck The Three Stooges that at four feet tall and nearly a hundred pounds of pure muscle, the beggars could readily become more than mischievous.
By late afternoon The Three Stooges had dragged their way up a particularly long, steep, grueling incline and could dimly make out the Bathing Elephant temple, about halfway up the mountain, looming before them in the heavy rain. They passed into a large room serving as the administrative center. A long, a very long line, of Chinese turned their dark eyes on them as they limped in.
The line began at the little window where one obtained lodging, and snaked around the room and out the open back of the entrance. It seemed to The Three Stooges that every eye was full of the same question. Do the foreign devils claim special privilege and barge to the front of the line? Aren't we just as tired and wet as they are? At the same time, The Three Stooges reflected that everyone else in line had indeed climbed just as far in the same weather as they had. Ray wearily handed his daypack and plastic bag to Kyle, and trudged to the back of the line. Kyle took his daypack off his back and shoved it and Ray's in the corner where he and AJ slumped to the floor, admitting they were exhausted.
As the storm raged outside, a fierce wind ripped through the temple, howling in the open front and screaming out the open back of the room. It cut right through the line of people, cold and insistent. Ray of course was completely soaked, wearing only his ineffective rain jacket. The long line moved at a snail's pace. After a minute he was shivering. Five minutes stretched to ten, ten to twenty, and he was not halfway there. Soon his body was twitching as the shivers escalated. His former high spirits were shattered thirty minutes into the wait, as he got within sight of the window.
Another ten minutes later he finally arrived. He croaked, in wretched Chinese, "Four people. Two rooms." The clerk at the window shoved a receipt through the window, which was caught by the wind and fluttered wildly off the counter. Ray grabbed at it stiffly, missing it by a mile. The person behind him in line snagged it and gave it to him. Turning, he heard the clerk barking something at him. "Wu kuai chyan!" he demanded. Of course. Ray dug into his pockets and shoved five yuan of coins into the window. The clerk nodded gruffly and looked past him to the next in line.
"Where is the room?" Ray asked in stuttering Chinese. The clerk impatiently reeled off directions in rapid tones. Not a single word penetrated Ray's numbed mind. "Please repeat," he asked. The clerk repeated, even more rapidly. Ray shook his head. "I don't understand." The clerk exhaled in anger as the people behind them began to murmur angrily. He glared at Ray for a moment, then turned and angrily barked something at a person behind him in the small room. Brusquely he gestured for Ray to get out of the way. Ray glared suspiciously at him. Again he gestured for him to clear out. A side door opened, and a fellow emerged from it and jerked his head for them to follow.
Ray yelled to Kyle and AJ, and they all stumbled after the fellow, who quickly disappeared out a side door. He led them through a courtyard, up stone steps, across a second courtyard, down a long, low-ceilinged corridor, turned right across a third courtyard, up more steps, along the edge of yet another courtyard, through a moon gate into a very weathered, indeed dilapidated building evidently pressed into service only because of the crush of pilgrims, down a dark interior corridor, around a corner, to—one room. One small room, with two beds.
Ray asked the guide where the other room was. He pointed brusquely to the two beds. Ah. They were to share the beds between the three of them. Ray told him they wished another room. Not possible, he was told. Too many other people. Ray pointed to AJ. Too large. Ray pointed to the three packs. Much too large to fit into the one room. As the guide shrugged and made to leave, Ray detained him. Wasn't there another room they could use? Anything. The man shook his head in disgust, but gestured them to follow him. Three rooms down he unlocked a door and opened it. This room was even smaller than the first, some four feet wide. It had one bed crammed between the walls. He defied them to accept it. Ray stuffed another five yuan of coins into his hand, and he left, shaking his head in disgust.
AJ got the small room with the marginally better mattress, such as it was, due to the throbbing pain in his knees. Ray and Kyle would share the other room. As they inspected their new quarters, all agreed that they were the first filthy accommodations they had seen in nearly two months in China.
They decided to meet in the larger room in an hour for dinner. All but Ray discovered some mainly dry clothing in their daypacks, settled in under the quilts, and in five minutes were finally warm and dry, for the first time in ten hours. Sleep came quickly. Two hours later they gathered in the larger room. Ray slapped his wet, clammy clothes back on. They located an outhouse not far from the rooms, utilized it, and agreed that it held not a candle to The Marvelous Outhouse with a View. Uncertainly they retraced their circuitous path to the main building.
Ray got directions to the refectory. On the way they passed a little shop. Kyle spotted a bottle which appeared to be liquor, which gave forth strong fumes when opened. Happily he purchased it and took a swig to warm his insides. The clerk's eyes bulged wide as he saw Kyle swigging the stuff straight. Kyle gasped and choked, wheezed and coughed, and in a squeaky voice pronounced it just what the doctor ordered. He offered it to the others. AJ and Ray took small, cautious sips, and returned the bottled with stinging eyes to Kyle, who happily took another large swig.
They dashed to the refectory through the still-heavy rain. The huge room was packed and noisy. They ordered the set dinner, and were served plates of fiery chilis fried in oil, with bamboo shoots. They ate until they were genuinely afraid of vomiting, which didn't take much. The food, like their rooms, was the first truly bad stuff they'd encountered in China. Mouths afire, they dashed back to the temple complex, bought several bottles of beer at the little shop, got lost trying to find their rooms, but finally stumbled onto them. They sat in the larger room swilling the beer as they devoured the remaining eggs and peanuts from their packs.
Kyle discovered another use for the strong liquor he had bought. Having confiscated one of the community chopsticks from the refectory, he dipped the new one into the liquor bottle, balanced it on the back of a chair, and put a match to it. The chopstick burst into intense flames briefly, then sputtered out. Kyle repeated the operation several more times, then declared the chopstick disinfected and put it into his pack with his old one—now part of a happy pair.
During one last trip to their new outhouse through the rain, they discovered a quaint feature. Due to its location jutting over a side of the mountain given to updrafts, it was impossible to drop your toilet paper through the hole in the floor when you finished with it. The wind whipped it straight back up and it slapped against your bottom and stubbornly refused to budge. Several attempts at disposing of the paper proved unsuccessful.
After a considerable amount of laughter verging dangerously on hysteria, the Three Stooges sat there in a row, considering what to do. They finally resorted to carrying the used toilet paper outside and letting the updraft take it where it would. At last they hurried back to their rooms through the storm, and snuggled under the quilts, all but Ray reveling in dry clothing.
Outside, in the hallway, their fellow pilgrims played cards and joked noisily late into the night. Many of them slept there. And beyond the hallway, the monsoon raged into the night, as The Three Stooges dreamed of the other temple below them on the mountain, and more congenial days there.
Chapter Seven: Down the Mountain: Monkeys and Flying Chopsticks
They were awakened early in the morning by the noise of pilgrims in the hallway gathering their things and leaving. Kyle staggered to his feet, grabbed his rain coat, and headed for the door outside. Emerging from it, he saw three large and wet monkeys scamper across the courtyard. Interesting. Reaching the outhouse, he peered inside, and to his relief found only humans there. Well, sort of. The other Two Stooges peered up at him.
"No more fried chilis for me, Bro," groaned AJ.
Ray, beside him, weakly agreed.
Some minutes later they all emerged, disposed of their toilet paper, and returned to the residential quarters. They surprise two monkeys pulling on the door latch into the building, looking very miserable and hungry. They frightened the monkeys off with yells, although one of them grabbed Ray's jacket as he opened the door behind Kyle and AJ. Ray jerked the jacket out of its hands and slammed the door shut behind him.
They quickly packed in their separate rooms. The sound of breaking glass came from the corridor, and then the patter of naked feet scampering down the hallway. Screams from the few Chinese still lingering there. Kyle and Ray burst into AJ's room and slammed the door.
"Jesus! Those little bastards are ransacking the rooms!" yelled Kyle.
"We're going to have to fight our way out, Bro," AJ declared to Ray, a light gleaming in his eyes. He hefted his bamboo walking stick.
Ray grabbed his dragon cane and held it toward AJ. "I christen this stick 'Monkey Killer!"
AJ grinned, and held his cane to Ray. "Anthropoid Agony!"
Kyle looked about for a weapon, and settled on his heavy flash attachment. "I'll sacrifice this to the cause," he pledged. "We'll taste monkey blood this morning," he promised the other Stooges, with a manic grin. "Come on!"
They glanced at each other, shouldered their daypacks, clutched their weapons, and opened the door. The hallway was clear. They walked over the broken glass and to the outside door. Another glance among The Three Stooges, then Kyle threw open the door and they charged with a shout into the courtyard, monkey weapons held high.
There they encountered a dozen Chinese soldiers lining the pathway to the main temple complex, busily engaged in scaring away an aggressive troupe of perhaps two dozen monkeys. They (the soldiers, that is) looked around at The Three Stooges, staring at their raised sticks and camera gear. Stupidly The Three Stooges stared back, lowered their monkey weapons, and sheepishly walked through the courtyard between the two lines of soldiers. A few other pilgrims scurried out of the building behind them, and one of the soldiers shut the door and slammed a lock on it. The soldiers closed around them and kept the monkeys at bay.
As the Three Stooges emerged from the front of the temple minutes later, it was raining hard still. They could see perhaps thirty yards, then everything shaded into gray.
"Which direction, Bro?" AJ asked, with a look at Kyle, then Ray.
Kyle shifted under the weight of his daypack. "Won't be much to see at the top of the mountain," he judged. "Probably considerably less than we can see here."
A pause.
"How far to the top, Ray?" asked AJ.
Ray pulled his map out, shading it from the rain with his body. "About as far as we came yesterday."
Another pause. The Three Stooges looked at each other in silence. Clearly they were not having fun.
After yet another pause, Ray looked to AJ. "AJ, is all of a sacred mountain sacred, or just the top?"
AJ considered it, then smiled. "All of it, Bro."
Ray nodded. "So…so we've already done it? Reached the sacred mountain?"
Kyle and AJ looked at each other, then slowly broke into broad grins. "Hey! You've mean we've done it?" asked Kyle.
"I guess!" answered AJ. "We've done it!"
The Three Stooges laughed, and exchanged high fives, beaming, standing in the middle of the heavy rain.
"Well, hell," Kyle burst out. "The Inn of the Heavenly Chambermaid is still on the bloody mountain," he said with a grin. "And besides, I miss the Marvelous Outhouse With a View."
The other Two Stooges nodded in mock seriousness.
"And the weather ain't going to get any better here," Kyle concluded. He turned and took off down the path back. Aj and Ray brought up the rear.
AJ's knees were worse today, going down, than going up. And the stone steps seemed more slippery. AJ and Ray walked through the heavy rain in silence, watching their steps carefully, the high spirits of yesterday returning a bit. Their thoughts centered on the relatively luxurious rooms awaiting them at the Heavenly Chambermaid Inn, on sitting in the corridor and conversing pleasantly. On buckets of hot water. On the Heavenly Chambermaid…
Soon they passed the same troupe of monkeys as yesterday. Their behavior was not much different than yesterday, but today they seemed less like mischievous imps and more like coarse gangsters. As they passed them without incident, all were keenly disappointed not have been able to brain a monkey that day.
AJ's knees were worse than ever by now. He had already twisted an ankle in a near fall, and so it was slow going. Kyle could not brook the pace, and soon was out of sight ahead of them. As they descended the mountain the rain grew less heavy, and in another hour they were under blessedly clear skies—clear! Sunshine was bursting upon them! The Inn of the Heavenly Chambermaid could not be far ahead. Soon they recognized the stream that rushed to the temple below their old rooms.
Another turn in the trail revealed Kyle sitting on a flat rock, writing in his journal, a crowed of Chinese children gathered around him. Kyle never failed to interest children. He stood and joined the other Stooges as they hobbled up to him. AJ announced that now the temple was in sight, he could go no further without a rest while Kyle and Ray went on ahead. As they left, AJ eased himself onto the rock with an immense groan. The children happily again gathered around the auburn-haired giant foreign devil, but several feet further away than for Kyle.
Their hearts were high in the sunshine as Kyle and Ray entered the familiar compound of the Inn of the Heavenly Chambermaid. At the refectory, Ray attempted to explain to the (new) female clerk that they wanted a room and were three of them, but one of them was not here because he had hurt his knees and would join them soon. Since Ray never learned the Chinese for "knee," he talked about "one-half leg" instead. The clerk listened to him for perhaps thirty seconds then cut him off with a raised hand.
"It would be better if you speak English," she suggested in very passable English. Behind Ray, Kyle burst into laughter and collapsed into a fortunately-nearby chair, still laughing.
"Yes. We need a room for three. By the way, is it possible to have lunch now?"
"Lunch is served from twelve to one. Too late," she replied.
"Yes. We apologize for being late. But we had no breakfast. Monkeys up the mountain. We are very hungry."
She stared at Ray for a moment, then left her little cubicle and walked to the kitchen. After a short, animated exchange she walked out, ignoring Ray until she was back in her own cubicle and "official."
"In half an hour?" she asked.
Ray nodded eagerly. "Yes. Yes, thanks so much. Very kind of you."
She nodded back, and suppressed a small smile.
AJ limped in fifteen minutes later. Their room turned out to be AJ and Ralph's former room—whose beds did not leak. Soon they were back in the empty refectory, arranged around a table close to the kitchen, chopsticks in hand, very hungry. The door opened, and a fellow emerged with a large pot of tea, three cups, and two steaming dishes. Shredded pork with onions, and green beans with diced beef. He set them on the table, and before he made it to the kitchen three pairs of chopsticks plunged into the dishes. It was like the feeding frenzy of a school of sharks, pausing only to guzzle cup after cup of the hot tea.
Only minutes later the cook approached with another dish, fried duck eggs topped with granular sugar. More flying chopsticks. The Three Stooges were all smiles as he left, and complimented him extravagantly on the food, which was indeed very tasty. AJ requested bottles of beer. The large bottles. Soon he returned with the beer and two more dishes, thousand-year eggs in soy sauce with pickled loquats, and stir-fried celery with beef slices.
The feeding frenzy resumed, chopsticks darting into the dishes with lightning speed. The Three Stooges were in high spirits. A majority of them were warm and dry, they were stuffing their bellies with incredibly delicious food, they had large bottles of beer to wash down the food, and soon the Heavenly Chambermaid would bring buckets of hot water to their rooms as they sat happily in their old corridor.
This surely was a sacred mountain.
But then! As they were imagining all this happiness to come, the cook emerged yet again, with a dish of sliced pork and cucumber topped by scrambled egg, and a white cabbage soup with pork slices floating in it. He gave each of them small bowls and left a ladle in the soup. They all looked at him in grateful wonder, and thanked him profusely. He nodded curtly, with a hint of pride, and returned to the kitchen.
They were already full to bursting, but courtesy to their host demanded that they do their level best to finish the latest dishes. They grimly set to, and by dint of heroic effort were able to dispose of nearly all the pork, cucumber, and egg, and over half the soup. Somebody had to do it.
Groggy and full to bursting, they sat there in a stupor. Ray ordered another pot of tea, on a tray, with cups. Kyle discovered the bill that the cook had slipped onto the table. Ten yuan for the six dishes, soup, and beer. Four and a half dollars for three of them. A buck and a half for each of them. They left twelve yuan on the table.
Tea tray in hand, The Three Stooges walked slowly back toward their rooms, but followed a side trail to a ridiculously beautiful red-tiled pavilion, perched with a narrow bridge over the now-rushing stream, surging water surrounding the pavilion. Sunshine filtered through the trees overhead and shone on The Three Stooges in the pavilion, and the water glittered as it rushed by.
They sat in silence, sipping their tea, listening to the sound of the rushing water. They were thinking of what would happen day after tomorrow, at the Chengdu airport. AJ would leave to seek Qi Gong masters in Nepal, Kyle to resume being a contractor in Hawaii, and Ray to being a professor in California. Never again, most likely, would The Three Stooges be together.
True. But what a journey it had been!!
Some Short-term Views of the Journey
From AJ, mailed a week later to Ray, from Nepal:
Empire saved from toppling
by notorious Inn of Flying Chopsticks
sacred mountain lullabies
monkey armies of the storm
lost found 3 Stooges run around
From Ye Duzhuang, mailed two months later to Ray:
"It has been my great pleasure to have met you in Peking both personally and professionally. I also enjoyed your lecture on Recent Challenges to Darwin's View of Evolution, which is very informative and well-organized, although some of the viewpoints involved might seem to invite further and continuing discussion and research. Your lecture was well received by the audience and Dr. Zhou Minchen would like to have some copies of your other lecture outlines in the related field of evolutionary studies if you have some such things handy…With all best wishes to you and your family and hope all's well with your research, Sincerely yours, Ye Du-Zhuang."
From Ray, For Kyle and AJ: "The Inn of the Flying Chopsticks"
We clambered down Emei Shan mountain,
The Adventurer, the Rebel, the Professor,
giddy at escaping monkeys at the temple above
after chilly, rain-soaked April days and nights.
The innkeeper had just closed out the mid-day meal,
but our shining faces and the jangle of our yuan coins
persuaded him to return to his battered wok.
Soon heaps of steaming food appeared as if by magic.
How the chopsticks flew around the laden table!
Our hearty laughs ricocheted about the refectory
as mounds of pork, white cabbage, and diced beef disappeared
aided by the guzzling of green tea, crisp and hot.
We drank yet more fragrant tea on the red-tiled gazebo
surrounded on all sides by a rushing stream, silvery-blue in sunlight.
Would we ever again be as happy as here
In the warm sun of the Inn of the Flying Chopsticks?
The Three Stooges after the Sacred Mountain
The Rebel: AJ
AJ resumed his life teaching English in Kyoto, with many trips to Nepal and India as part of the celebrity crowd around the Dalai Lama. Ray and his oldest daughter visited him several years later. They walked The Philosopher's Walk near AJ's rooms, taking an outside table near a picturesque tea house. A large number of the passers-by seemed to know AJ, stopping to banter with him. It was a bit like watching people encounter the Pope. Everyone wanted a piece of AJ. AJ became a regular contributor to the Kyoto literary publication, with many unique, Taoist-flavored poems, ranging from haiku-like to more complex, including the following.
Bright crisp mornings in Kyoto Freedom warmth solitude embrace
Wake up early in the fresh air this deep quietude
Feel the cherry blossoms opening of the heart the touch
Unfolding singing shining light of the night the day
Smile, put the kettle on for tea, sit Seeds growing sprouting green
waters currents flowing caressing
this fertile mulch this dust this crust
on our small hot rock world in vast space
so briefly in skin
we know
we do know
this
this
this
The Wanderer: Kyle
Returning to Hawaii, Kyle regularly took time off from his contractor activities to receive a large share of the permits to escort groups of kayaks into the remote Na Pali Coast on Kaui's inaccessible north coast. The coveted spots in Kyle's trips filled up quickly, always. They rode the surf onto the beach, unloaded a week's worth of supplies, and luxuriated in paradise with hikes and moonlit dinners around the fire. Ray foolishly never seemed to find the time to accept Kyle's standing invitation to join one of these trips.
Kyle also volunteered steadfastly in crawling up and down Kaui's cliffs, often on hands and knees, to eradicate alien plants that were competing with Hawaii's native flora.
And of course Kyle was already famous in Hawaii for his sailing adventures in the Pacific, in which he rescued an expensive yacht off the shore of a remote island in the Marquesas, abandoned by an uncle who discovered there he had cancer and abruptly returned to America. The uncle, of course, asked his intrepid nephew Kyle to sail the sloop (teak, of course, equipped with Comstat satellite linkups and holds full of lobster and champagne) to Tahiti and gave him two teenage nieces as a crew.
The yacht was beset by vicious storms the entire voyage, the nieces were useless, and Kyle went without sleep for ten straight days navigating his storm-pushed perils and reporting his location every night on the Comstat satellite fix. Of course, every person in the southern Pacific was glued to this soap opera on their own radio linkups, and Kyle's perils were the top talk of the whole region, eagerly anticipated by thousands every night.
The climax of the danger occurred one evening when Kyle mapped his position and discovered they were hurtling at breakneck speed in a zero-vision night straight for Marlon Brando's atoll in the South Pacific. They in fact appeared to be right on top of the little island. Kyle prepared to meet his doom, but—no collision. They apparently were blown by the island some 20 feet or so from its reefs.
And he did finally get to Tahiti, and from there back to his home in Hawaii, to resume his intrepid life.
The Professor: Ray
At the University in Chico, California, Ray worked with community leaders to found a science and natural history museum; he was named "The father of the museum." He and his wife Tammy worked with 6 other couples to found Chico's 28-household CoHousing intentional community. Ray and Tammy have retired to the warmth of southern Arizona, and keep busy keeping up with their family.
His 8 published books are described and his biography and many blogs can be found on his website, www.raymondbarnett.com.