Let's Go Mad

by Rob Binkley

  “Yeah. I want to rent her a place to live,” I said.

  “You’re homeless yourself,” he laughed. “Maybe you should move in together. She would be a very appreciative lover.”

  “Will you shut up? I’m serious.”

  I knew it was impossible to rent Gita a home, but I truly felt for this woman and admired her. She moved me to the point of epiphany, or satori, or whatever you want to call it.

  “No, seriously,” Brian said, “that was a very selfless act. See, you’re growing your dharma. I can appreciate that.”

  I turned to Brian. “What do we really have to complain about in this world, man? Gita’s soul is still full of joy after everything life has dealt her. What the hell is our problem?”

  Brian was getting it. “This is a lesson for both of us. We are blessed—we don’t have any real problems.”

  “Never forget how this feels. What we’re feeling is truth, Brian. Truth!”

  “If you say so, my ‘dharma bum,’” Brian smiled and put his arm around me. “Maybe we were fated to be here after all … Now let’s go get some bhangers.”

  The next day, it was time to leave Gita behind. I went to her spot but she was gone. On the bus out of town something occurred to me. “I may never find my baby king cobra,” I said to Brian, “but I think we learned something about life here.”

  “You would’ve been bitten on your balls and died a painful death over the Pacific if you had found what you thought you were looking for,” he said.

  “Bitten by a stewardess, right?” I shot back.

  “Keep dreamin’, brother,” he said.

  Our next stop was Jodhpur where we spent the day with this crazy rickshaw wallah who used his horn incessantly while peddling us around town. He asked us where we wanted to go and we said, “Anywhere.” So he took us on a ride in which we visited another palace and yet another intimidating-looking fort, this one overlooking the city. “They’re all beginning to look the same,” I said to Brian, who was sleeping in the rickshaw.

  It was clearly time for us to go. India had been exotically fantastic (and freakishly challenging), but the adventure was wearing us down. My weight had gone from 185 to 145. “Jesus, I lost forty pounds,” I said while weighing myself on a livestock scale at an outdoor market.

  “You look like you’ve been vacationing in a POW camp,” Brian said. “You should eat more. Here, have some chocolate. It’s from my emergency stash.” He threw me a square of hash.

  During our ride back to our hotel, I asked Brian, “So, have you thought about our future?”

  “Yep. I’m not ready to stop dreaming yet. I’m no quitter. What country should we invade next?”

  “There are many stops on the road to spiritual enlightenment, but I have an idea.” I pointed to a map in the Book. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

  Brian looked at the page and smiled. “You know the answer to that question.”

  We decided if we were ever going to find our bliss on this trip before returning to Western civilization, we may as well look for it at the top of the world. “I can’t think of a better place to find our Utopia than the epicenter of Buddhist nirvana,” I said.

  Brian started smiling that Zen smile again, “I like the way you think.”

  We had our rickshaw wallah drive us to the travel office, where we booked an airline ticket to Mumbai for the next morning. The following day we were going to Tibet.

  Brian and I were dreaming of becoming Buddhist monks when we walked out of the travel office. “In Nepal, we will look into the eyes of God,” I said to Brian. “Utopia awaits … this could be the place.”

  He said, “It has to be.”

  The next morning, we caught a rickety-looking Indian Airlines flight (which looked like the aeronautical equivalent of a flying rickshaw) to Mumbai. It was a tense flight but we made it without crashing.

  We got a ride to our hotel. Our first impression was awe. We were overwhelmed by the sheer size of the big Indian city. It was madder and bigger than anything we had seen so far. We took it all in—the street people, the cars, the congestion, the crazy pollution—even the garbage. “Severe poverty plus grand architecture,” I said. “The sweet and the sour, all in one.”

  The largest city in India and eighth largest in the world, for centuries Mumbai was renamed Bombay by the English imperialists, but as soon as the Brits left the natives changed the name back. “Don’t call this place Bombay, it’s like calling America ‘The Colonies,’” I said to Brian, who nodded while looking out at the city going by.

  We got a room at the Hotel Prosser’s and spent our only night in Mumbai checking out the bar scene. We hadn’t seen many bars in India so our tolerance was at an all-time low. It didn’t take us long to get blooming drunk at this place called Café Mondegar, where we conquered their specialty drink called the “Royal Challenge.” Or maybe it conquered us.

  With our bellies full of liquor, we walked around the Colaba area, where Brian noticed these guys chewing some tobacco. He said it “looked interesting” so he asked if one of the guys would make him up a chew. The guy obliged with a smile.

  Brian thanked him and we walked away. But after ten seconds of chewing, he got dizzy and started swaying, “This is stronger than any beer I’ve ever had,” he said, before throwing up the chew and the Royal Challenge in the middle of the street (without breaking stride).

  We could hear the tobacco guys laughing at Brian for being a novice, but he was a good sport about it. “Thank you for almost killing me, sir—thank you!” he said as he waved back at them. When I heard him say, “almost killing me,” a cold chill came down my spine.

  I realized I had made a horrible mistake.

  “Oh shit!” I ran off down the street like a madman. Brian just stood there looking at me in his puddle of puke, then he began running after me, screaming, “What have you done!? What have you done!?”

  We both sprinted past the ‘“Gateway to India,’” which looked just like a miniature Arc de Triumph, across the Colaba district and all the way back to Café Mondegar where I ran into the bar like an insane lunatic screaming. In my drunkenness, I had left my pack with all our passports, money, and tickets in the bar.

  Luckily, my pack was still sitting right where I left it. Pheewwwww! “Oh my God. I think I’m gonna throw up!” All the patrons who were drinking their Royal Challenges laughed at me, then applauded as I raised my pack above my head like I had just won the Cricket World Cup.

  When I staggered out of the bar with my pack around my shoulder, Brian was standing outside wheezing for air and shaking his head, “You almost ruined us, dude.”

  “I know! But it’s all here—even Barbie! Thank you, Vishnu! Thank you God, thank you for everything!”

  “You were born with a lucky horseshoe up your ass.”

  We decided to quit while we were ahead and went back to Hotel Prosser’s to get some sleep before our flight the next evening.

  Our last afternoon in Mumbai, we took Barbie to see an American movie. Everyone thought we were insane for having a doll sitting on the armrest between us but we were giddy as school children to see anything from Hollywood; it had been months since we had any connection with our homeland. The movie was a ridiculously unrealistic tale about a large predatory snake, but we loved it.

  After the movie, while Brian packed back at the hotel, I walked over to the Gateway to India to try and buy a baby cobra one last time. I knew if I actually found one I would have to head home immediately since I didn’t want to backpack around Tibet with a baby cobra in my pack. But all the cobras the snake charmers were selling were too big, so we jumped on our flight to Nepal.

  On the plane to Kathmandu, we reflected on our time in India. I told Brian I thought it was worth slogging through all the garbage and corpses to meet beautiful angels like Gita and learn something about life that we could never learn back in California. Brian philosophized, “That’s the way of the universe, man … Nirvana is like a fleeting o
rgasm—gotta catch it when you can. Reality is the other shit you have to slog through to find the real truth.”

  “Real truth?” I asked.

  “The eternal samsara of the universe: birth, suffering, death, rebirth. That’s life.”

  “So you’re saying life is not supposed to be one big orgasm? If I weren’t a more mature man, this could be depressing news.”

  “Smile, brother … here,” Brian handed me the airplane menu from the seat. “Have a bhang lassi … I saw the pilot order two before we took off.”

  8

  A High Nepalese Adventure

  I AWOKE TO TURBULENCE AND THE SOUND of a ticking clock. There was no bomb on the plane; it was coming from inside my head. Time, which had been our most valuable commodity, was slowly slipping away. I could feel it. I was running out of a dream I didn’t want to end.

  Ever since Cambodia, Brian and I were finally on some kind of sideways path to enlightenment, but still, the “R-word” was unavoidable. So far nothing tangible or earthbound had been resolved on this trip. Nothing had come from “all this running,” as Brian had put it back at the Bangladesh airport. And the reality was, we were nine months into our journey and our future was still hanging in the balance. I didn’t want to admit it, but the uncertainty of it all was making me sick.

  The crazy dream that started this whole trip was to escape the vapid clutches of America and become “Beat” like Jack Kerouac on a global level. Now, after kicking around the world for nearly a year, my worst nightmare was ending up “beaten” like Kerouac’s muse Neal Cassidy, who died at fifty chasing a train in Mexico that had long passed him by—penniless, destitute, and forgotten. I wanted more out of life than just adventure. I wanted to accomplish something lasting, something real, something true. The problem was I didn’t know what that something was. Not yet.

  With life more uncertain than ever, what better time for an agnostic kid from Cupertino to go “knock-knock-knocking on heaven’s door” and gaze into the eyes of whatever God is? Right after that thought crossed my mind, Brian stirred from his sleep-mask slumber and mumbled, “What if we find God and I have nothing to say?”

  He was listening to my thoughts again.

  I thought for a minute. “The scarier question is … what if he has nothing to say?”

  “Not sure the Almighty One speaks English.”

  I tried to lighten the mood. “A wise man once said, ‘If a fool looks directly into the eyes of God, it will burn his eyes.’” I pretended to give Brian an eye poke like one of the Three Stooges. “So, no pressure.”

  He pulled off his sleep mask, “I need to go to confession.”

  “I have a confession for you. I feel like I’m having a semi-panic attack right now. I feel the Sword of Damocles dangling over me,” I said.

  “Relax. With great privilege comes great responsibility. You knew that going in.”

  “I know, it’s just … I’m the one that feels lost now.”

  “So the tables are turned, eh? Now you’re feeling it. My advice is to remember our mantra: Live—”

  “—the question, yeah I know.”

  Just then the captain came on and told us to look out the window at the Himalayas. Hypnotized by the stunning view, I admitted to Brian that I “couldn’t stop thinking about my songbird.”

  “Elena?”

  “Hell no. She couldn’t sing—Gita.”

  I thought he was going to laugh but he didn’t. “It may sound insane, but I’ve been thinking about that beautiful bus angel that held my hand on the way to Angeles.”

  “The hooker with a heart of gold.”

  “The go-go girl with the heart of—”

  “Right. Why are we even talking about women—we should be thinking about ourselves.”

  “Because that’s what we do. Women and happiness are intertwined.”

  “We are inferior creatures. What a fine pair we’d be, returning home with two foreign wives: mine a noseless Indian beggar and yours an underaged Filipino hooker.”

  “Go-go girl. That would be beautiful … a double wedding—think it’d stick?”

  “Husbands never stick around for long. It’s our primal nature to pollenate many flowers.”

  Brian laughed. “What a gross reduction of the human spirit!”

  “Love is a false reality. It never lasts.”

  “Such a nihilist … Think you’ll ever marry?”

  “You asking me to marry you?”

  “A woman, dude,” Brian sighed. “I’d like to give myself to someone completely one day. Is it crazy if I went back to the PI to track her down?”

  “Yes. You’d never find her, trust me.”

  Brian thought for a while, “Maybe the only reason we like these girls is because we don’t know them.”

  “I talked to Gita through a translator.”

  “But if we got to know them, we’d probably be totally turned off.”

  “Who’s trying to burst whose bubble here?”

  “They’re just dream girls. They’re whoever we want them to be. That’s why we like them … They’re pure.”

  “Your girl was definitely not pure. And I would never marry Gita. I just hope she has a good life.”

  “Maybe we don’t want women to talk? Maybe we should marry mutes?”

  “Hot mutes.”

  Brian thought for a moment. “This conversation proves we have a long way to go until we reach any sort of enlightenment.”

  “That is why we’re headed … there.” I pointed out the window to the majestic view as we flew over Mt. Everest. “Our Yoda awaits.”

  Brian said, “You know the only thing better than flying over the world’s highest peak is doing it absurdly high.”

  “You still have some?” I asked. Brian pulled some hash out of his pack and showed it to me. “Ate some before my nap.”

  “Share. It’ll help stop my panic attacks and propel me onward and upward during our high Nepalese adventure.”

  We toasted our plastic water cups. “To a life-altering experience.”

  After flying high over the Himalayans, we landed in Kathmandu on an even higher plane of consciousness.

  “Nepal is home to eight of the ten highest peaks in the world,” I said to Brian while we exited the plane. He just looked at me smiling like a Cheshire cat. “We’re way higher than that, man … way higher.”

  We were in no condition to handle the utter chaos at the airport. We should have been used to this by now, but we weren’t. There seemed to be five thousand touts outside the customs area. When we walked into the cold mountain air, they all attacked us; their weapon of choice was verbal assault. “Taxi here! Taxi here!”

  They were running the typical scams, claiming we’d get free rides as long as we used their guesthouse. In the madness, we found a savior coincidentally named Darma. He was a short, fit Nepalese guy who was touting but wasn’t trying to screw us. He offered us a “free ride,” which we quickly took to get out of the scrum.

  A short ride later we arrived at the Dolpo Guest House where Darma negotiated for us. He got us a two-bedroom with a balcony overlooking the mountains for eight dollars. We were probably getting screwed, but we figured we couldn’t negotiate much lower and Darma deserved a cut. I mean, he even scored us more hash.

  Darma arranged it so within an hour of landing we were happily smoking Nepalese hash on our balcony overlooking the high Himalayas. “Dude. If we found tropical utopia in the Philippines, this is mountain utopia.” Brian said, taking in the view.

  I felt I was higher than any man should be, yet as high as all men should. “My panic attack is long gone.”

  “Most excellent. The Himalayas do quench the thirst of the eyes, don’t they?” Brian said, then put down the chillum and slumped into his lounge chair. “I’m sufficiently blitzed. Let’s ramble.”

  It took us two more hours to get out of those deck chairs.

  We eventually ventured out of the Dolpo Guest House and walked around Kathmandu in the l
ate afternoon. The town had a very peaceful atmosphere, the opposite of chaotic India.

  “We’ve landed in a Buddhist village that’s been frozen in time,” Brian said.

  “This is total ‘before Christ’ architecture.”

  By now, we were really stoned, too stoned to do anything other than stumble around, which was too bad because if you’re into extreme vacations with a seriously spiritual bent, Kathmandu is the perfect home base for all types of excursions like rafting, hiking, and jungle safaris. We were planning on doing them all once we sobered up. But today we explored the narrow cobblestone streets and alleys of Thamel, Kathmandu’s busy tourist center, to check out all the artsy, artisan stores and cool little shops. Vendors were walking around touting anything and everything. It was probably because of all the hash we’d ingested, but there seemed to be amazing merchants everywhere. We stopped to take in all the hawkers selling knives, swords, clothes, and jewelry. Brian couldn’t stop smiling. “This is, by far, the best bazaar in the world.”

  “Heaven’s marketplace,” I said.

  Brian spent the next hour talking to a bead guy about the energy of his beaded yak-leather necklace. “The 108 beads represent 108 manifestations before Buddha’s enlightenment,” the bead guy said, while adding a matured sandalwood bead to Brian’s necklace that “represents the heartbeat of the Buddha.”

  Brian stopped to buy a Coke and gave it to the bead guy. “You’re so American,” I said, walking away.

  Brian said, “I know, right? He reminded me of what I read last night from Wu Li, ‘The textures of a rose petal … or a grain of wood.’”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I love it,” I replied.

  “I’ve made a simple observation about myself,” he said. “Not that I can comprehend vast amounts of knowledge at once or that I dream in Technicolor, which I already knew … but that I’m fascinated by the old and the rotted, the used and the worn-out. I have a soft spot for relics of the past, Rob.”