anyone else, he has critics, but I honor him for being one of the first to explain certain things that were previously held secret, or only exposed on a limited basis. I honor him for his work on the microcosmic orbit and the concept of Taoism and for his bringing the Taoist internal arts to the masses of people around the world.
   There was that opportunity, and it would have been a valued, and valuable, experience. However, another choice was to remain for the time being in the city, immersed in the heady flavors of Bangkok, but almost more as an observer than a participant, taking in the motion and the culture and the people. What I ended up doing was spending a lot of time in a restaurant that I loved to eat at. It had great vegetarian food and was also a great place to just sit and observe the people, and get some sense of what their culture was like.
Fortunately for me, I could blend right into the surroundings. I was almost like a fly on the wall. So I observed a lot of things about Thai inner politics, as I watched the body language, the gesticulations and all the ways in which expressive communication was articulated through movement, voice, posture, etc. in Thai culture.
  As I travel the world over, I find it so amazing that, in every culture I go to, I keep  learning that whole process all over again. As well, I have found that in every part of the world you still have your street corner, where you have thugs and those who are going to try to get something for nothing. So that element is still there, mostly going on at night -  that's when the freaks come out. So there's another dichotomy, common to every country you might visit - the social elements that are shared universally, yet each culture and even niches within each culture also having unique ways of communicating and of embodying expressiveness, of giving a social voice to the individual self. 
    So, I had been frequenting this restaurant for quite a few days, enjoying the food and relishing the people, when I made the acquaintance of a Thai woman who became an important resource of information and, in a way, accidental instigator of the events that transpired in Thailand. In our initial encounter, I actually first felt her come up behind me. I didn't even see her, but I sensed her presence. To this day I'm still not sure what that was all about. But I turned around and she asked if she could sit down. And so she sat down and started talking and she was fascinating. I noticed immediately that there was something not of the norm about her. I don't know why she impressed me this way, and that part of it remains a mystery to me. However, Ping, as I found out her name to be, was really nice from the start, open and friendly and informative. She had a lot to say about where to go, and what to do in Thailand. Then, when she had gotten something to eat, saying that she was a vegetarian, we discovered we shared a common ground since although Thai people are Buddhists, a lot of them are not vegetarian. So this was a mutual bond that resulted in a powerful communication between us.
   Later, as she was leaving she told me that she was a Thai lawyer and that she did a lot of work with small rice farmers, trying to get their products over to the United States. She asked me if I knew anything about that and we had a long conversation about it. I told her about my frustration with Bangkok and what was going on, and it was at this point that she gave me two leads - the very two places that actually changed my life.
   The one thing that she said that I had to do was go to this flea market - I had to do that before I left Thailand. But she said the first thing that I should do is go down to this island located at the tip of Thailand. I had no idea where this island was, but she described it as being on the eastern side near Vietnam and Cambodia and three or four hours by boat from the tip of Thailand straight out into the gulf. This was one of the last of a series of islands and was called Quo Mak.
   Well, I was instantly intrigued, and decided that I would like to do this. So I did make the trip to Quo Mak - and had an incredible experience. I had this experience with a snake while I was there, which is a story I'm going to go into in more detail at a later time. But when I got back from the island, which was almost two weeks later, I felt like I was just ready to explore. I wanted to bust out all through northern Thailand, and on up into China. I was ready to cruise. I had, out of the experience on Quo Mak, thought I had just gotten a pearl of wisdom. I felt connected. I felt tuned in and turned on - all of these things - after coming back from the island.
   It was while in this elevated state, in the aftermath of Quo Mak, that one Saturday I finally went out to the market that Ping had so enthusiastically recommended to me. And I can tell you, it was amazing. This was the biggest flea market you'd ever want to see. If you had a thousand dollars you could make ten thousand if you could just get these items back to the United States. But of course the challenge is always shipping - that's like by slow mule. So you rethink the whole thing after you find out how long it takes and how many obstacles you have to go through in order to get these beautiful, beautiful things back to the States. Consequently I only got a few things, but still I was amazed at the ingenuity and