Travels Here and There: Stories from the Heart

By Larry Welch

Travels Here and There possesses stories from the heart about places far and near. Included in this volume readers are entertained by Larry Welchs recollections of travel to Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Malawi, Michigan, Nepal, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Ukraine, Vietnam, and Zambia. The final chapter is a personal story that involved a short journey from home to a hospital in Thailand and what transpired. Embedded with the stories are descriptions of geography, history, urban planning, and details on what went into making people famous or infamous as the case might be. Larry likes heroes and that shows through in his descriptions of what made some people great. Strolling through castles, fortresses, markets, museums, palaces, parks, Roman ruins, or dining on street food and riding buses or trains, will leave readers hungry for more and even give them a better appreciation for their own travels. In Innocents Abroad, Mark Twain wrote, Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all ones lifetime. Amen, Mr. Twain!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Aug 13, 2018
• ISBN: 9781490789972

Larry Welch

An American living in Thailand, Larry Welch is a writer and photographer who spends about half his time traveling to new places. He considers that to be his higher education in learning more about the puzzle pieces that comprise world history, culture and life-styles. This is his eighth book about travel experiences and a biography on the life of his then 8-year old daughter, Mary. Larry is a product of the American Midwest, had a long career with the U.S. Navy and a short six year career as an English teacher in Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam and Nepal. He has a lifetime record of voluntarism and reaching out to the less fortunate. A passionate reader, Larry has had the pleasure of being a book lover from the time of his first baby book long ago.

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TRAVELS HERE AND THERE

STORIES FROM THE HEART

By Larry Welch

©

Copyright 2018 Larry Welch.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

ISBN: 978-1-4907-8995-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4907-8996-5 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4907-8997-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018952764

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Trafford rev. 08/09/2018

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Other Books by Larry Welch

Mary Virginia,

A Father’s Story (2003)

Quotations for Positive People and

Those Who Would Like to be (2008)

The Human Spirit,

Stories from the Heart (2009)

A Happy Journey,

Stories from the Heart (2011)

School Days in Thailand,

Stories from the Heart (2012)

School Days in Vietnam,

Stories from the Heart (2015)

School Days in Myanmar,

Stories from the Heart (2017)

For the

many new friends and strangers who

have given me a helping hand in lands far and wide.

About the Author

L arry Welch is a resident of Thailand. Since 2002, he has lived in Singapore, Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam and back to Thailand. During these wanderings he has worked for the U.S. Navy and was an English teacher and school administrator. Now fully retired, he travels about 50 percent of the time as his advanced education in global culture, history and lifes tyle.

A writer and photographer, this is his eighth book and he has posted thousands of photographs on Facebook and the photographic website, ViewBug. More recently, he has been a volunteer teacher with students in rural schools of Thailand and Nepal.

A veteran of only six years of teaching, it is his belief that it’s impossible to have a bad day which surrounded by the good-natured humanity that children bring to their classrooms.

In 1995 and again in 1999, he was selected as Toastmaster of the Year for the District of Columbia, Northern Virginia and Southern Maryland. In 1996, he became the first recipient of the National Race for the Cure Volunteer of the Year Award; and he was presented the 1997 Jill Ireland Award for voluntarism by The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation in Dallas, Texas.

In 1998 and again in 2002, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service presented him with a Department of the Navy Meritorious Civilian Service Award for his leadership in community service and contributions to the agency mission. Toastmasters International has also recognized him as their Club President of the Year and Division Governor of the Year. In 2009, he received a Model Teacher Award from the Pathum Thani, Thailand Provincial Minister of Education, and in 2012, he was presented the Best Teacher Award by Horizon International School at Yangon, Myanmar.

He has been a devoted volunteer in community service for Martha’s Table in Washington, DC, The Salvation Army Red Kettle Program in Virginia, Michigan, and Singapore; INOVA Fairfax Hospital; Leukemia Society of America; The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation; Heart to Heart Service in Singapore; and primary schools in Nepal and Thailand.

An avid reader and learner, in 1995, he earned a Bachelor of Science degree (management) from University College, University of Maryland, after attending night school for nine years. In 1984, he retired from the Navy as a Lieutenant (Limited Duty-Cryptology), before a second retirement from the U.S. Navy as a civilian security specialist in Singapore.

An inquisitive and energetic traveler, Larry has lived, worked, or traveled to nearly 60 countries.

For 19 years he authored the electronic newsletter, On the Run…, which reflected a street-smart philosophy of the places he visited and people he met—along with ideas on how we can be our best.

He is author of Mary Virginia, A Father’s Story; Quotations for Positive People, And Those Who Would Like to Be; The Human Spirit, Stories from the Heart; A Happy Journey, Stories from the Heart; School Days in Thailand, Stories from the Heart; and Schools Days in Myanmar; Stories from the Heart.

Larry can be reached by e-mail at [e-mail] or [e-mail]. To see a sampling of his photography, go to ViewBug.com/member/LarryWelch.

Prologue

T he 16 stories in this book represent five months of travel over the past few years. It was a joyful experience to discover Eastern Europe and start visiting the Balkan States in addition to a few adventures in Southeast Asia and Africa. I’ve made the effort to recollect my experiences for friends and family, but at the same time I am learning what a joy it is to relive my days of wonder in visiting new places. When reading my past books, I have to smile with the thought that it is amazing what a life I have lived in learning from travel to nearly 60 countries. Many of the interesting details would have been lost to me except for the time I took to remember them by organizing my impressions through wri ting.

Barely graduating from the toddler class, I have been a traveler walking through the world in which I was living. Often times my travels took me outside the world in which my grandmother thought I should be exploring. She brought me back to reality with a switching. They were painful, but not discouraging. I never got it through my head that there were limits to explorations. Later in life, my parents bought me a Western Flyer bicycle, I was 10 and we lived in a rural setting. The thrill of riding a bicycle for the first time and many times thereafter cannot be overestimated. It is a simple means of transportation, comfortable, and easily controlled. I loved that first bike, which carried me in my exploration of neighborhood wood lots, old barns, streams, and dusty dirt roads. My small world was growing and I kept growing and moving with the aid of a motorbike, old cars, trains, ships, and eventually supersonic aircraft.

In my early teens I discovered my grandparent’s collection of National Geographic magazines. The graphic pictures of lands far away made a strong impression that served to open my world to books, which described culture, history and travel by painting word pictures. My boyhood imagination was hopelessly lost to the huge world that started just beyond the horizon. At age 14, I tried to join the Navy. The recruiter easily saw through my ruse and wrote me a note thanking me for my interest but suggesting I would have to wait until I was 17 and had permission of my parents.

Bernice Beeker, my grandmother’s youngest sister was born with wanderlust and an inspiration to a young boy looking out at the world. As they say, she didn’t let any grass grow under her feet. Aunt Bernice had been into the outer world through her continuing car trips around the United States. She loved seeing new places, taking photographs and telling her travel stories upon return back to the family. In retrospect, I see her life much as my own in making choices that led me to a better understanding of culture and history through the sights I’ve seen.

High school graduation at age 17 came, my parents signed permission for me to ship out with the Navy. It was a frightening yet exhilarating feeling to enter the large world of wonder. I travelled in the Far East, for the first time I saw oceans, palm trees, sandy beaches, beautiful brown-skinned girls, Buddhist temples, heard new music, and ate strange, but delicious foods. My head was spinning as the boy I had been steadily progressed to manhood. Those exotic pictures in National Geographic were no longer flat images on a glossy page, but something excitedly real.

Thanks to this foundation developed in my youth and the jump start provided by service in the U.S. Navy, I was well on my way to a life not quite the same as everyone else. As the years passed, I took a second career with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, which allowed me to conveniently expand my travels. Settling in Thailand, my next career, short lived as it was to six years, was as an English teacher in Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam and Nepal. That kind of personal interface with foreign children, their parents and my fellow teachers was an education worth millions, but for me it was free.

After work as a teacher, I devoted myself to more travel to new countries, places that I had read about but never had a chance to visit. I was especially intrigued with Eastern Europe and what had been the Iron Curtain created by the Soviet Union to keep people out. With disintegration of the Soviet empire in 1989 enslaved people were free and I wanted to learn more about them and their countries. Most of the stories in this book focus on Eastern Europe, a locale that deserves to be on the world’s center stage for regaining the lost momentum they suffered under communism. But there are more stories about Asia, Africa, my home state of Michigan, and a final chapter on a personal experience from a different perspective.

I have a goal for you the reader. My objective is that you will find my stories and research to be of the inspiring quality that will cause you to travel, travel and travel more!

Contents

About the Author

Prologue

Nepal

Cradle of the Himalayas

Ukraine

Easter in Kiev

Michigan

Water Wonderland

Hungary

Budapest

Return to Nepal

Pokhara and Lumbini

Germany

Hallo Deutschland

Czech Republic

Prague

Vietnam

Bamboo and Lotus

Malawi

The Warm Heart of Africa

Zambia

The Land of Livingstone

Poland

Warsaw

Krakow

Austria

The World’s Most Livable City

Romania

Buna

Bulgaria

Sofia

Serbia

Belgrade

Thailand

Long Journey, Short Distance

Nepal

A Few Remarkable Notes

Geography: Nepal is a landlocked country bordering India, Tibet and China. Most famous for being the home of Himalayan Mountains with 8 of the 10 highest peaks in the world, including the highest, Mount Everest at 29,028 feet. The largest city is Kathmandu with a population of about a million souls; 85 percent of Nepal’s people live in the countryside.

Religion: Although Buddha was born in Nepal 25 centuries ago, the major religion is Hindu with 81 percent of the population being devout believers. Fifteen percent are Buddhists.

Demography: Nepal’s population is 30 million people with a life expectancy of 66 years. Educationally, 70 percent of Nepal’s children start school but only 7 percent reach the 10th school year.

Economics: The country is a desperately poor country ranking 205 of 228 countries and territories in the world. In the area of corruption, it ranks in the bottom third of all countries. It isn’t the worse, but the current situation and prospects for the future aren’t favorable for a progressive society. Tourism is the top industry in Nepal with about 800,000 visitors annually.

Medical Care: Health care is dismal, with not enough hospital beds, medicines, and staff. Patients pay 70 percent of their health care out-of-pocket; families accompany their patient to the hospital and provide round the clock care and feeding because of staff shortages.

Recent set-backs: In 1996, the Maoists, a communist-party splinter group, declared a people’s war. The result was ten years of insurgency with the destruction of infrastructure and loss of 13,000 lives. In 2001, what became known as the Royal Massacre occurred when ten members of Nepal’s royal family, including the king and queen, were gunned down by a deranged, drunken crown prince.

Cradle of the Himalayas

A rriving at Kathmandu’s international airport, the first Nepali word I heard was namaste, the traditional greeting for hello and goodbye. It was the start of not only an adventure in linguistics but also a feast on Nepalese culture, food, sights, people, and nature. I couldn’t have asked for a more enjoyable and interesting experi ence.

For several years I had been yearning to make my first visit to Nepal but had lost control of my time through a combination of personal commitments to other pursuits and obligations. Finally, after relocating back to Thailand from Vietnam a few months earlier I could meet the future with greater clarity. Within months I had found my way clear for a three week stay in this strange land in South Asia.

With about 800,000 visitors annually, each tourist who visits Nepal supports an estimated 10 or 11 Nepalese, a figure easy to believe when encountering touts at the airport. If you haven’t travelled much you might not understand the term tout. These are men and women who aggressively pursue financial gain by providing a good or service. Taxi drivers are often touts by not only promoting the use of their cab, but then scamming you into using a hotel of their choice rather than one you may have your heart set on. Of course, using the taxi driver’s hotel means he receives a kick-back. They will use many stratagems including lying to convince you that their hotel is the best in town at the lowest cost. The strategy that most foreigners use is to ignore those kinds of people keeping in mind that they are among the poorest in the world. Besides operating taxis, some touts have clothing, jewelry and souvenir shops, change money, and will try to ingratiate themselves to be a tour guide.

All this busyness seems like a pain in the neck and certainly sometimes it is, but that is part of the passing scene in being a traveler in many parts of the world. The poorer the country, the more numerous the touts.

I eventually arrived without reservations at the Blue Horizon Hotel, a no-star establishment. It was low season because of monsoon rains—there were plenty of clean rooms with hot water, cable TV, and air conditioning—all amenities powered by electricity. I didn’t know it until a few hours later but Nepal has energy problems. Eighty-eight percent of the people don’t have access to electricity while the twelve percent who do suffer long outages that amount to about 12 hours a day. To compensate, hotels and restaurants install diesel generators to power lights and hot water tanks. It is a good test of patience and flexibility to learn living without all of life’s conveniences.

At Blue Horizon I arranged a car and driver for two days to get me to the local sights and used a few more days to take walking tours, jog, exercise, read books about Nepal and generally get my bearing. My initial impressions: Nepali people in Kathmandu are friendly and honest, America is a popular country, and English widely spoken; food is nourishing and not too spicy, and there was a vegetarian cuisine; streets and sidewalks are shambles, many streets aren’t paved, and sidewalks crumbling masses of concrete. Kathmandu is an old city, streets in the older neighborhoods are extremely narrow with just enough space for two small cars to pass side-by-side which doesn’t leave room for the numerous motorcycles and pedestrians—visualize people and vehicle congestion. And most importantly, the exotic nature of Nepal captured my imagination. It was a country unlike any that I had encountered.

On my second day, the drive, Jasu, and I travelled to a Hindu temple, Pashupatinath and two Buddhist stupa’s Bodhnath and Swayambhunath. Nepal is an old country, buildings and institutions are hundreds of years old, which makes them important to humanity. In recognition, these locations have been designated World Heritage Sites by the United Nations, which provides protection and preservation along with attracting international tourists.

At my first Hindu temple, Pashupatinath, I wisely hired an English-speaking guide who gave me an hour’s worth of information for $10. After paying a $5 entrance fee for foreigners, I learned that the series of temples that comprise Pashupatinath are devoted to life and death. The complex is the most important Hindu temple in Nepal and dedicated to the worship of Shiva as a Lord of Beasts. Non-Hindus were not allowed into the temples, but there was plenty to see and learn around the edges. The temple stands on the banks of the Bagmati River where an average of 60 people a day are cremated (men take three hours to burn while women are a little longer at five hours). As part of this process the temple provides dormitories for out-of-town relatives to reside near their loved ones during prayer rituals and time of cremation.

I had never seen anything like this and was appropriately awed. Crossing the river on a footbridge we found ourselves on the east bank with dozens of small Shiva shrines. These were one-room temples used as lodging by wandering sadhus, each of the temples contained a central Shiva lingam.

Sadhus are holy men, bearded, often wearing minimal clothing with painted bodies. They sometimes have dreadlocks, use marijuana, and live in forests, caves, and temples. Some keep company with ghosts by living in cemeteries. Sadhus were a common sight not only at Pashupatinath Temple but also on the streets of the cities and towns that I visited. They are referred to as baba, meaning father or grandfather, are highly respected and make their way on donations from the public. They love foreigners to take their photograph and then hold out their hand for a donation. I knew that in advance so it came as no surprise when it happened. In fact, I didn’t mind making a donation, but thought I might as well get a photograph.

With an emphasis on life, part of the temple complex is devoted to fertility with Shiva lingams that young couples come to pray for fertility. The meaning of the lingams is creation.

The main temple was constructed in 1696, but the site has been used for Hindu and Buddhist worship far longer. Adjacent to the temple are a series of caves used as shelters by sadhus since medieval times. The last place I visited at the complex was a former temple complex that now serves as a social welfare center for about 300 destitute old people. Because of poverty, Nepal is a country that uses up people faster than in most places of the world. That showed on the wrinkled faces of the residents who had blank stares and downcast eyes.

After listening to my tour guide explain to me why he should be paid more than our agreed upon $10, driver Jasu and I were off to two Buddhist stupas. The first of these was Bodhnath, also a World Heritage Site, which has Asia’s largest stupa and several Tibetan monasteries. It is a busy place with thousands of pilgrims strolling clockwise around the stupa spinning prayer wheels; hundreds of foreign tourists taking courses on Buddhist teachings, practices and meditation; Tibetan monks in maroon robes and shaved heads wandering the streets; and shops selling yak butter, prayer flags, Tibetan drums and horns, and prayer beads.

The first stupa on the site was built in 600 AD by a king who was seeking penance for accidentally killing his father. Unfortunately, that first stupa was destroyed by Mughal invaders in the 14th century making the current one of more recent construction. It came to be an important staging post on the trade route between Lhasa, Tibet, and Kathmandu. Tibetan traders prayed here for a safe journey before driving their yaks on the high passes of the Himalayas.

Nepal and Tibet share a border and there are plenty of Tibetans in Nepal, most are refugees, or the sons and daughters of refugees. The exodus to leave Tibet started in 1950 when China invaded causing the Dalai Lama to seek safe haven in India while most of his followers took the short route to Nepal. The reason for the Chinese invasion was based on a belief that Tibet was really a province of China and not a sovereign country. Although Tibet appealed to Great Britain and the United States for assistance, they were both preoccupied with the start of a shooting war in Korea. China’s invasion of Tibet is another sad commentary on the strong taking advantage of the weak.

This might be a good spot to pause a moment to reflect on the fact that the two religions: Hinduism and Buddhism use temples interchangeably. It is a comfortable fit as Hinduism predated Buddhism with rulers of Northern India supporting the newer beliefs in Buddhism because of its similarity to Hinduism. For example, both religions use yoga, meditation and mantra as fundamental practices along with prayer beads, hand expressions in prayer, and Buddha is often portrayed with a tikka mark on his forehead in the fashion of Hinduism.

Bodhnath is a Buddhist temple with a popular following among Tibetan refugees and foreign visitors who find the atmosphere inspiring. The temple is surrounded by neat shops specializing in art, yoga, cooking lessons, and antiques. There were small restaurants, cafes, and guest houses. Adding to the colorful temple area were thousands of pigeons and monkeys who easily evaded barking dogs.

Stupas were originally built to safeguard holy relics of Buddha or an historically significant monk. The Bodhnath is said to contain a piece of bone from the skeleton of Siddhartha Gautama, the historical Buddha. Around the base of the stupa are 108 Buddha images and a ring of prayer wheels.

Just as shopkeepers sell religious memorabilia at Buddhist temples in Myanmar and Thailand, the identical situation presented itself in Nepal at both Hindu and Buddhist shrines. Among the incense sticks, flowers, and prayer beads were amulets with the third eye and shopkeepers, many of them Tibetan, anxious to sell merchandise. None of it was terribly expensive and I bought a few of the amulets to give as keepsakes to special friends that I met on my journey through Nepal.

The third and final tour of the day was at Swayambhunath, where visitors find a wide range of monuments, shrines and stupas; however, the main stupa is of crowning glory to Nepali architecture. It is a perfectly proportioned monument with a whitewashed gleam. From the spiral, four faces of the Buddha stare out across the Kathmandu Valley with symbolism for the third eye, a Hindu and Buddhist symbol for enlightenment, intuition or eye of knowledge.

The dome is said to represent earth, while the beehive-like structure at the top is for the 13 stages that humans must pass through to achieve nirvana. The base of the stupa is ringed by prayer wheels— pilgrims circle the large pagoda in a clockwise fashion while spinning each of the prayer wheels as they pass. Along with the prayer wheels are butter cups that are lit at night.

Above the stupa and in the surrounding area are thousands of colorful prayer flags contained mantras that are said to be carried to heaven by the winds. Prayer flags, whether set against the drab grey skies on a rainy day or contrasted with a bright blue and bright sun, are a common feature of the Nepali landscape. The sky on this day was dark with rain, there were plenty of monkeys around, but they were quietly sheltered under the eaves of the small temples and shrines that surrounded the stupa.

During my visit to Swayambhunath rain was sometimes heavy with a dampening of my enthusiasm to hang around but nonetheless I was impressed with the belief that Swayambhunath was, indeed, a special place. With umbrella in hand, Jasu and I walked down a steep stair to pass dozens of vendors who all claimed to have something special that I would like if I would just take a look. I didn’t!

By this time, I was soaked from rain, my camera lens was foggy and quite frankly, I was ready for a nap. Jasu was more than happy to call it a day as we headed back to the Blue Horizon Hotel in mid-afternoon for lunch and that dreamed about sleep.

During the next three days I exercised in my room and dodged pedestrians and cars while jogging on city streets, travelled with Jasu to visit the hills north of Kathmandu and then to the ancient city of Bhaktapur; on other days I walked to the royal palace complex at Durbar Square, trekked through old neighborhoods with narrow streets, and spent several hours at the Garden of Dreams, which was near my hotel.

On our trip to the hills, Jasu and I rode 20 miles on rough roads that grew steeper and narrower as we travelled up to 6,000 feet from the floor of Kathmandu valley. It took 90-minutes, traffic was slow in the city because of congestion and bad road surfaces, in the mountains the road had a hard surface, but the curves and narrow roads caused the few cars and trucks to move slowly. Our quest was to reach Nararkot, a popular small town made famous because of its views of the Himalaya Mountains. To qualify that statement, I should explain that such panoramic views are extremely rare in the rainy season because of low lying clouds. I didn’t expect much, but at least it wasn’t raining and there were patches of blue sky.

Reaching the summit, we parked and took a short steep climb to an observation tower that was well populated by teenagers and families with small children. My arrival was met by all eyes on the only foreigner in the crowd. One of the blessings of traveling in the rainy season is that most foreigners don’t want the hassle of rain, mud, wet cameras and clothes, lost visibility and carrying an umbrella. But besides not seeing a large gathering of foreigners, I don’t like seeing Big Sun, which carries its own set of inconveniences.

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