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    marye
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    If you're a Deadhead in Asia, here's your new clubhouse... Welcome, and make yourselves at home!

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  • TigerLilly
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    Enjoy Gonzo!
    Is about the coolest way to celebrate a birthday that I ever heard!! Have a great one, and best wishes for a happy and healthy next year of your life!********************************** By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity -- another man's I mean. Mark Twain
  • Anonymous (not verified)
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    Well, will be celebrating my birthday in Nepal this evening...
    ...here in Kathmandu. After being in the country since 2/16 just gradually devolving my western accelerated lifestyle, I feel like I've adjusted to the slower and more family oriented way of life.Tonight will be a feast of Napali food with a beautiful banquet of cake, ice cream and fresh flowers and fruits, along with the conversation of close and beloved family.
  • Anonymous (not verified)
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    Yesterday was the Hindu holiday of Holi in Nepal
    Which is one of the most bizarre I have ever seen anywhere in the world. Children to 20somethings fill water balloons and chuck them at unsuspecting people from rooftops. Smart people who like to stay dry stay inside and the more frolicsome roam the streets taking their chances with super-soakers (the Chinese rip-off model, of course). Still, it is part of the crazy custom and color of foreign countries that we have this vast variety of experience -- it must be a blast if you have little kids and don't happen to be wearing a threee piece suit to work! So tomorrow is the big day for me, off to Tibet. Not a grand adventure by any means but a week where the skies are a bluer blue than imaginable and the sun beats down like a hammer from the god's right hand. I haven't spoken much about the religion of Tibet but it is a highly esoteric form of hybrid Buddhist tantra with certain flavors of Bon and the remnants of an ancient kingdom of Zhangzhung (to the North & West of the country's old boundry). This is the place where powerful, learned men command the gods and not the other way around. Sadly, karma is karma. If the Tibetans made it go around, the Chinese sure do come around! And there is no god that can get in the was of fated karma!
  • Anonymous (not verified)
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    Yesterday was the Hindu holiday of Holi in Nepal
    Which is one of the most bizarre I have ever seen anywhere in the world. Children to 20somethings fill water balloons and chuck them at unsuspecting people from rooftops. Smart people who like to stay dry stay inside and the more frolicsome roam the streets taking their chances with super-soakers (the Chinese rip-off model, of course). Still, it is part of the crazy custom and color of foreign countries that we have this vast variety of experience -- it must be a blast if you have little kids and don't happen to be wearing a threee piece suit to work! So tomorrow is the big day for me, off to Tibet. Not a grand adventure by any means but a week where the skies are a bluer blue than imaginable and the sun beats down like a hammer from the god's right hand. I haven't spoken much about the religion of Tibet but it is a highly esoteric form of hybrid Buddhist tantra with certain flavors of Bon and the remnants of an ancient kingdom of Zhangzhung (to the North & West of the country's old boundry). This is the place where powerful, learned men command the gods and not the other way around. Sadly, karma is karma. If the Tibetans made it go around, the Chinese sure do come around! And there is no god that can get in the was of fated karma!
  • eltortugatranquilo
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    Congratulations....
    So glad to read that you got your papers Lamagonzo.The last four sentences of your most recent post are pure gold.All the best for the rest of your quest....
  • Anonymous (not verified)
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    Got my Visa for Tibet...
    ...While the Chinese don't make it hard, they do make it very expensive -- $200 for the privilege of entering a country thaty has been rapped. While I'm happy that after many years I am finally go to be able to visit the famed "Land of Snows" in a few days, it is still with a heavy heart that I'll be taking a most critical look at what changes the Chinese have wrought on the Tibetan plateau. In many ways the Tibetans exemplified what a country could do if the population followed a unified course aimed at the further evolution of the human mind, as opposed to the further development of all disciplines aimed toward the goal of material wealth and comfort. In many ways it will be sad but I'm taking it as a challenge to see how the Tibetans maintain their thousands of years old culture while still having to live up to the rigors of the mind-numbing drubbing of the human psyche through political indoctrination. The ultimate irony is that the Chinese feel they are giving a helping hand up to a backward cousin trapped into a feudal condition. Unfortunately the Chinese are the like rich uncle who has everything but peace of mind.
  • Alaskahead
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    Lamagonzo, you have friends of like minds
    Water on the Mountain. In preparation for overcoming an obstacle, perseverance furthurs. In the midst of the greatest obstructions, friends come.
  • marye
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    be careful out there gonzo...
    come home safe after fine adventures.
  • Anonymous (not verified)
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    Have hooked up with old, evil friends...
    ...it may be a while before anything intelligible is uttered from these lips. The Chinese may have a problem with my Tibetan visa because I used to be a monk in the Dalai Lama's Gelugpa order for 12 years.
  • Anonymous (not verified)
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    A unique Asian city...
    Kathmandu is a city like no other in Asia. It is very hard to describe without it's own unique flavor, it's own eau de humanity. It is essentially as mix of Mongolian hordes that swept West and left a lot of genetic stock scattered around in different pools gene pools populates by Genghis Khan The Mongolians are overwhelmingly Buddhst, usually of the Nyingmapa, Kagyupa and Gelugpa sects. The other predominant religion is, of course, the Hindus, who are rather a sad and pathetic rag-tag lot, struggling to keep up thier main temples. There is also an old, animistic/shamanistic tradition called the Bon-{os which can be said to account for up to no more than 10 percent of the population composingb this aministic religion. The rest is split 60% Buddhist and 30% Hindu. Yesterday, Monday, there was a general strike because the Hindus wanted to go back to having an exclusively Hindu holiday calender, non of which make any sense but they were still ab able to pull off a mass general strike and shut down the city for a day, all for the cause of being an excvlusiveley Hindu state. That, along wuth the rolling blackouts, makes life much slower and sedate. It is this relaxed state of bering depressurized from the West that I find most interesting.
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If you're a Deadhead in Asia, here's your new clubhouse... Welcome, and make yourselves at home!
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Is a mood where you feel plucked from one reality to another and both are simultaneous and real.
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17 years 4 months
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Has been a wonderful travel log! really really brilliant! ********************************** By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity -- another man's I mean. Mark Twain
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14 years 6 months
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anyone out there? I currently live in Qingdao....probably moving south to Fujian province later this summer. regards, will
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16 years 1 month
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Motivated deadhead down here in Okinawa, Japan. Blessed being here, seen so many good bands, all kinds of different styles and players. Having said that, I'm missing the states and the summer festies, wishing I could be back now. Oh well... I never am to far from the dead with the net, archive or sugarmegs or podcasts like deadpod or through the years... Would love to find a dead cover band out here, would be some crazy dream come true... What makes the grass grow?...
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14 years 2 months
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Hi All, From Pi here, the country probably rings a bell to you guys, coz of the news that had spread around the world, and literally about 'dead' people, may they Rest in Peace. And hopefully no one will condemn people from my country because it's not our fault, and it could really happen to anyone anytime and anywhere. Peace to all.
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The Chinese people are not to blame for what their unelected leaders are doing/did in Tibet. It can happen to anyone, anywhere. It may even be happening to people in the US right now. Dead people rock in China, Korea, Japan!!
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16 years 7 months
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May the Creator be with all. Smiley dave not so smiley with so many hurting. Do For Other's You Will Feel Better. Guaranteed!!!!
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15 years 3 months
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Hey now, how is everyone doing during this wonderful holiday season. tela Tela jewel of Wilsons fowl domain. Lullaby the breezes whisper… Shanghai China
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15 years 3 months
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hey bro have been here for sometime, Shanghai is my base. i always love the title "deadheads in china?" as i tend to write this pretty often. not too many so i hope our paths cross.
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...With the Kathmandu Blues again! It's been real folks. Really feeling my age at 51. I think I really tweaked my kneecap doing a 30 day Tibetan-style Buddhist retreat. Hurt like hell and the only pain meds "over" the counter are tramadol abd codeine and under the counter?? You don't want to know -- Jerry's favorite. Guess I'll stick it out and home to the family for Chhristmas and the regular Doc for real advice and the legal shit! Ouchhhh, hurts like hell. .
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14 years 3 months
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your in where katmandhu seriously and chasing the coedine dragon,any temple ball about if so pm me seriously its good to hear from you take care
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take care and heal up!
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17 years 5 months
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nice to see you back in these parts...
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Made it home today through the fiasco at Heathrow. Somebody seriously has my back - waliked in and out with standby-tickets and go on! Unbelievable! So was the trip. I said "No" at the seriously correct time or would still be there chasing the dragon (and everybody knows tHAT is nowhere)... saw it happening o a lot o other good heads in the tourist trap called Thamel. The hash was unworldly if you just poked around but I even did very little of that. My knee is seriously fucked up and looks like operation time. Well, the wear-&-tear was os of good use. I feel like I could die today and be dead without fear and then be reborn to follow most of this same path. Hey, it's better than money, I can take it with me!! Want to take the time &pleasure to wish all my friends out there a pleasanrt holiday, Please enjoy and cherish what you have in your life ! Lobten
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13 years 10 months
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Konnichiwa y'all!! I have been sitting here in Japan for almost 3 years without any heads to hang with. Is anyone out there living near Nagoya, Japan who wants to get together occasionally to shoot the shit? Hippydave in Japan
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Hey Cats, I've up and made the move outta Europe, and on to Thailand. So if any of ya' all happen to live here these days, or are just passing through, do send me a message. I'll be keeping a look out here on dead.net in the Asia forum. Cheers..!! :D ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Are you kind?"
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Hey Now,Just arrived in Seoul 3 wks ago to work but been here before a couple times. I miss my jam friends back in Canada and while I have lots of friends here I dont have anyone to jam with, especially meandering-song-linking style we all know n Love. So I'm lookin to meet some people who'd like to get together and make some music. I'm never concerned with ability but rather spirit and a desire to make interactive music,,,well, thats what we're all about in'it? : ) I'd also like to meet ppl who dont play but would like to hang out n maybe catch shows. All is good : ) Please either respond to me here or at celticlhadie@yahoo.ca
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14 years
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watch the show on iTunes 40th anniversary special (free) between midnight tonight and August 1
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17 years 5 months
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I saw that on the big screen back in the day. HIghly recommended!
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Haven't seen any Koreans posting here. I was in Korea 3x but never did the club scene. If no one helps you out here, assuming you speak Korean, get on the internet and start looking or if in Seoul get out to the bigger colleges and U's and have a look around, ask around. Seoul is huge. Don't tell me that town ain't got no heart! ~ Just got to play your part! ~
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15 years 3 months
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hey friends how as everyone been! jodester where in thailand are you? Today was a wonderful day and i am so happy to be listening to the dead right now and just feeling at peace.
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I'm in Bangkok these days bro. Got a Dead cover band started up here. Things are going well. Decided it was time to bust out of the European scene for a change. I'll be knocking around in Asia for quite a while I reckon. I think u said u are based in China if I remember correctly, or? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Are you kind?"
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More like Venice these days with the floods.
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17 years 1 month
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Greetings from HK! Jodester - I get to BKK now and again. Tell me more about your band. I do my own Dead and Jerry routine with musicians in Beijing mainly. Recently played with Melvin in SF. Guitar, bass, vocals and some keys. Happy to fill in if there's a need in Thailand. And let me know if you ever come to hk or Beijing. Joesimone@me.com Ps : though about playing the Phuket blues festival in the spring?
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jodester, cool let me know when you are playing, i have a place down on koh chang island and i am through BKK often. Yes in Shanghai but these days spending more time in South Florida. I have tickets to DSO in Fort Lauderdale in March, i have not seen them since 99 or 2000, looking forward to hearing some GD.
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Happy New Year to you all!!!!! Looking forward to a new year as last year completely drained me, the good and the bad,(I had a hard run.) I still believe there is more positivity out there than negativity. I believe that there is more ying than yang, but somehow the ying and the yang always equal out to be about 50/50. I have lost more friends this year, but as you grow older this becomes a common occurrence. Unfortunately i am only 36 and my former circle of friends knew, and still know how to run it hard. I have learned more and covered more ground this year , but the year of the rabbit will not have run its course until mid January. I will miss my fellow soldiers of the night who have fallen in 2011 and in the former. Me I am still on the road and heading for another joint and have a cocktail in hand and the music is most likely too loud. Have been spending some time back in the States in south Florida on the water, any heads in the Fort Lauderdale area? Strange being back in the States after being away for so long, I was in Myanmar for the last week and I had a similar feeling, but there is no place like home. Happy New Year!!!
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I live in India now - HI to everyone !! Lets create a topic - deadheads underwater, about divers - what do you think guys ?Visit my blog -http://best-diving.org and you will understand what i am talking about !!!
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14 years 10 months
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Well, I'm here. Singaporeans are a delightful people, but it is hot! How hot? Damn Hot! & humid too. Can't imagine there are deadheads here but in the strangest of places -- I know down under and \I ain\t far from there...
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14 years 11 months
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If you've been here before you know this is a beautifully landscaped city near the equator. The people are very jolly and the easily laughing sort. Singapore is extremely neat and orderly. But not in the German sense. You don't even jaywalk here. Litter or spitting on the sidewalk results in a few lashes with the cane fine. I ain't kidding. We're talking draconian!. Well, it's nice to see a place you've never been before.
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14 years 10 months
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Ka-ka-ka-ka-Kathmandu! ...as the old song goes. It's monsoon, the mood is grim in this city of the concrete jungle (Jungle!) family to see, things to do. I would especially appreciate ANY deadheads here in the Valley to PM me. Lots of temples to see!
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we'll be glad to hear your reports from the field. And the summit.
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You know me, I'll give a bit of travelogue to anybody who cares to read a serial. In this here concrete jungle called Kathmandu the Hindus rule the Mongolians. The Mongolians have been making a revolution since around 1990. They got rid of the King and monarchy in 2006 and Maoists (Maoists! Can you believe it?) came to power a few years after. The mainline democrat and republican establishment Hindu parties and the government bureaucracy (composed of 90% Hindus) went into total noncooperation. The mood is grim here. The old Maoist government was finally toppled by changing the Constitution, which hasn't even been written yet. The Chief Supreme Court Justice now runs an interim government until new elections can be held, which a large minority don't see as fair. The US and other European countries, of course, want elections. Including the Carter Centre who wants to monitor them for fairness. Fairness? In a place where most of the people are illiterate and there are hardly any roads in most of the country. People can't even register to vote. This morning I woke up in a room where a young man had left his country to pursue his engineering degree. His parents had to get him out because he was part of the revolution. Next to a picture of him on the wall was a screened drawing of Che Guevara. Che! Goodnight Che! Good morning Che! The Mongolian Nepali descent people here are like niggers in America. They will not stop until they have equal rights, resources and representation. And I don't blame them.
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Strange trip it's been! The Tibetans are tense at their main place in the Kathmandu Valley (Never mind being tense in Tibet). It seems as if there is a plan afoot to wipe them out of Nepal, though they still throw some weight because of capital infusion from Westerners (Buddhists, tourists mostly) who visit them. There are now surveillance cameras at the Boudhanath Stupa. They don't want anymore self-immolations by Tibetans. We should thank Snowden for cluing us in. Besides the Utah NSA facility there is one in Britain, 5 in Australia and 1 in New Zealand. This is the corporate Anglos getting ready to "contain" China, along with the rest of us. WAKE UP EVERYBODY!
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14 years 10 months
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It is hot, and then it rain, and then there are rainbows. In an endless pattern as old as the earth itself and now being changed by global warming. Namste, all!
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14 years 10 months
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If yu've been to Asia then you know this story: A poor person wants to do some menial service for you like shine your shoes for what amounts to a few cents. They speak English more or less and invite you to their home. Their home is down an alleyway and across a street and down another twisting road through a rice paddy until you reach a slum of such unbelievable proportion it makes you want to break down and cry right then and there. The whole slum is built from plastic and sticks laid out in squares like a former UN refugee camp. But these people have been living there for years. Of course, you had to be courageous enough to believe nobody was going to waylay you. But all you encountered were smiling people greeting you warmly in the middle of this squalor. So you pull what amounts to ten dollars out of your pocket and give it to the guy and his family and you cry for humanity all the way back to your air-conditioned hotel. His wife smiles tears of gratitude as she holds their baby. Life is too real some times...
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At the holiest shrine for Buddhists in Nepal, the Boudha Stupa in the Boudha district of Nepal, another Tibetan has self-immolated. Deadheads who are not Buddhists might recognize the Seeva foundation's symbol of the eyes. These eyes are actually representations of the Buddha's eyes that are painted on this famous monument of the Buddha's enlightenment in the 4 directions of the dome-shaped monument (with a square top) to the Buddha's enlightenment. At this famous World Heritage Site on August 6th, the following was reported in The Himalayan Times: "A 38-year old monk called Karma Ngedon Gyatso died after setting himself on fire at the Boudha stupa in Kathmandu, Nepal, yesterday (August 6). Karma Ngedon Gyatso, who was unable to walk due to a severe disability, had arrived in exile from Tibet in October, 2011. Tibetans who knew him describe him as deeply religious. It is the second fatal self-immolation by a Tibetan monk in Kathmandu this year after Drupchen Tsering set himself on fire in February, also at the Boudha stupa. Although I was there in Boudha at the time I was busy moving from my hotel to my relative's home a few miles away. Many of my relatives own shops selling religious paintings around the stupa and I usually do my kora (circumambulation of the stupa) every morning around this time. The Government of Nepal had announced a few days earlier that is had finished setting up surveillance cameras in the area aftere the first Tibetan self-immolation at the stupa. From what I could see two cameras were visible that only covered the main internal entrance to the monument. I'm sure that will change. The Nepali government is under tremendous pressure from the Chinese Government (who have ruled over and subjugated the Tibetan people since about 1950, driving the Dalai Lama into exile in 1959). It is not too strong a statement to say the Chinese are trying to assimilate the Tibetan culture and failing that will finish the job with genocide. The afternoon of the fifth I found a Free Tibet sticker in my suitcase and stuck it in a window in one of the monasteries that form the circle surrounding the ancient monument. I came back a few hours later with some tape to make sure it stuck there. Somebody had already taken it down. The Boudha monument has become a focal point for Freet Tibet demonstrations in Nepal. The shopkeepers want to keep it a tourist area and World Heritage Site so they can continue to profit from the many tourists who visit every year. The Nepali government wants to keep the aid roiling in from the Chinese who don't like Free Tibet demonstrations, never mind control the Nepali government to such a degree they don't even allow the The Dalai Lama to visit. Well, it was a sad end to a beautiful visit and I yet again am reminded of places in this world where people will do anything to flee authoritarian governments where the oppression is unimaginable. Unimaginable means that the people are willing to self-immolate in protest because they have no other method to reach the rest of the world with their message. This pathos is too much to bear. Will it end when there are no Tibetans left as a separate ethnic identity?
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Greetings from Okayama, Japan! I have some land in the countryside of Okayama prefecture on which I have built a small stage, have a generator and can host large groups for camping and live music. Hope t o hear from some other heads in Japan! contact me at reddsoxx@mac.com
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Actually I was there for about six weeks in 1990 and got the most incredible acupuncture treatments for my lower back. But other than that I found the place to be a loony bin. S$500 fines for not flushing (who doesn't!?) a public toilet. And the speech by Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew when I was there in which he said,''We as Singaporeans have to take this idea of having fun very seriously.'' Yowza! That's when I knew it was time to move on. Much happier here in Japan!
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Sad to say that Yukotopia, a great bar and venue in Tokyo where I once had the pleasure of playing one night, has just closed down as of April 1st. Sorry to see you go, Yuko! 頑張ってね!
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Dear All, Walk me out in the morning dew my honey..... Just want to say hello to everyone, I have not been on here in some time. I am back in Shanghai for a couple of weeks and then heading back to South Florida. Just want to say hello and wish everyone positive emotions and lovely memories.... Lets keep on making memories my brothers and sisters!!!
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Great to see you! I hope you can stream the shows where you are...
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At the holiest shrine for Buddhists in Nepal, the Boudha Stupa in the Boudha district of Nepal, another Tibetan has self-immolated. Deadheads who are not Buddhists might recognize the Seeva foundation's symbol of the eyes.