Rama 3 – The Garden of Rama by Clarke, Arthur C.

Her childhood had been difficult, but her family had managed to survive just above the poverty line. During Nai’s final year at the university, however, disaster had struck. First her father had had a debilitating stroke. Then her mother, whose business sense was nonexistent, had ignored the recommendations of family and friends and had tried to manage the small family craft shop on her own. Within a year the family had lost everything and Nai was forced not only to use her personal savings to provide food and clothing for her family, but also to abandon her

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dream of doing literary translation work for one of the big publishing houses in Bangkok.

Nai taught school during the week and was a tourist guide on the weekend. On the Saturday before the ISA interview, Nai was conducting a tour in Chiang Mai, thirty kilometers from her home. In her group were several Japanese, one of whom was a handsome, articulate young man in his early thirties who spoke practically unaccented English. His name was Kenji Watanabe. He paid very close attention to everything Nai said, always asked intelligent questions, and was extremely polite.

Near the end of the tour of the Buddhist holy places in the Chiang Mai area, the group rode the cable car up the mountain Doi Suthep to visit the famous Buddhist temple on its summit. Most of the tourists were exhausted from the day’s activities, but not Kenji Watanabe. First the man insisted on climbing the long dragon stairway, like a Buddhist pilgrim, rather than riding the funicular from the cable car exit to the top. Then he asked question after question while Nai was explaining the wonderful story of the founding of the temple. Finally, when they had descended and Nai was sitting by herself, having tea in the lovely restaurant at the foot of the mountain, Kenji left the other tourists in the souvenir shops and approached her table.

“Kaw tode krap,” he said in excellent Thai, astonishing Miss Buatong. “May I sit down? I have a few more questions.”

“Khun pode pasa thai dai mai ka?” Nai asked, still shocked.

“Pohm kao jai pasa thai dai nitnoy,” he answered, indicating that he understood a little Thai. “How about you? Anata wa nihon go hanashimasu ka?”

Nai shook her head. “Nihon go hanashimasen.” She smiled. “Only English, French, and Thai. Although I can sometimes understand simple Japanese if it is spoken very slowly.”

“I was fascinated,” Kenji said in English, after sitting down opposite Nai, “by the murals depicting the founding of the temple on Doi Suthep. It is a wonderful legend— a blend of history and mysticism—but as a historian, I’m

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curious about two things. First, couldn’t this venerable monk from Sri Lanka have known, from some religious sources outside of the kingdom of Lan-na, that there was a relic of the Buddha in that nearby abandoned pagoda? It seems unlikely to me that he would have risked his reputation otherwise. Second, it seems too perfect, too much like life imitating art, for that white elephant carrying the relic to have climbed Doi Suthep by chance and then to have expired just when he reached the peak. Are there any non-Buddhist historical sources from the fifteenth century that corroborate the story?”

Nai stared at the eager Mr. Watanabe for several seconds before replying. “Sir,” she said with a wan smile, “in my two years of conducting tours of the Buddhist sites of mis region, I have never had anybody ask me either one of those questions. I certainly do not know the answers myself, but if you are interested, I can give you the name of a professor at Chiang Mai University who is extremely well versed in the Buddhist history of the kingdom of Lan-na. He is an expert on the entire time period, beginning with King Mengrai—”

Their conversation was interrupted by an announcement that the cable car was now ready to accommodate passengers for the trip back to the city. Nai rose from her seat and excused herself. Kenji rejoined the rest of the group. As Nai watched him from afar, she kept recalling the intensity in his eyes. They were incredible, she was thinking. / have never seen eyes so clear and so full of curiosity.

She saw those eyes again the following Monday afternoon, when she went to the Dusit Thani Hotel in Chiang Mai for her ISA interview. She was astonished to see Kenji sitting behind a desk with the official ISA emblem on his shirt. Nai was initially flustered. “I had not looked at your documents before Saturday,” Kenji said as an apology. “I promise. If I had known you were one of the applicants, I would have taken a different tour.”

The interview eventually went smoothly. Kenji was extremely complimentary, both about Nai’s outstanding academic record and her volunteer work with the orphanages in Lamphun and Chiang Mai. Nai was honest in admitting

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that she had not always had “an overpowering desire” to travel in space, but since she was basically “adventurous by nature” and this ISA position would also allow her to take care of her family obligations, she had applied for the assignment on Mars.

Toward the end of the interview there was a pause in the conversation. “Is that all?” Nai asked pleasantly, rising from her chair.

“One more thing, perhaps,” Kenji Watanabe said, suddenly awkward. “That is, if you’re any good at interpreting dreams.”

Nai smiled and sat back down. “Go on,” she said.

Kenji took a deep breath. “Saturday night I dreamed I was in the jungle, somewhere near the foot of Doi Suthep—I knew where I was because I could see the golden chedi at the top of my dream screen. I was rushing through the trees, trying to find my way, when I encountered a huge python sitting on a broad branch beside my head.

” ‘Where are you going?’ the python asked me. Tm looking for my girlfriend,’ I answered.

” ‘She’s at the top of the mountain,’ the python said.

“I broke free of the jungle, into the sunlight, and looked at the summit of Doi Suthep. My childhood sweetheart Keiko Murosawa was standing there waving down at me. I turned around and glanced back at the python.

” ‘Look again,’ it said.

“When I looked up the mountain the second time the woman’s face had changed. It was no longer Keiko—it was you who was now waving to me from the top of Doi Suthep.”

Kenji was silent for several seconds. “I have never had such an unusual or vivid dream. I thought perhaps—”

Nai had had goose bumps on her arms while Kenji was telling the story. She had known the ending—that she, Nai Buatong, would be the woman waving from the top of the mountain—before he had finished. Nai leaned forward in her chair. “Mr. Watanabe,” she said slowly, “I hope that what I am going to say does not offend you in any way. . . .”

Nai was quiet for several seconds. “We have a famous Thai proverb,” she said at length, her eyes avoiding his,

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“that says when a snake talks to you in a dream, you have found the man or woman mat you will marry.”

Six weeks later I received the notice, Nai remembered. She was still sitting in the courtyard beside Queen Chama-tevi’s temple in Lamphun. The package of ISA materials came three days afterward. Along with the flowers from Kenji.

Kenji himself had appeared in Lamphun the following weekend. “I’m sorry I didn’t call or anything,” he had apologized, “but it just didn’t make sense to pursue the relationship unless you also were going to Mars.”

He had proposed on Sunday afternoon and Nai had quickly accepted. They had been married in Kyoto three months later. The Watanabes had graciously paid for Nai’s two sisters and three of her other Thai friends to travel to Japan for the wedding. Her mother could not come, unfortunately, for there was nobody else to look after Nai’s father.

Nai took a deep bream. Her review of the recent changes in her life was now over. She was ready to begin her meditation. Thirty minutes later she was quite serene, happy and expectant about the unknown life in front of her. The sun had risen and there were other people on the temple grounds. She walked slowly around the perimeter, trying to savor her last moments in her home village.

Inside the main viharn, after an offering and the burning of incense at the altar, Nai carefully studied every panel of the paintings on the walls she had seen so many times before. The pictures told the life story of Queen Chama-tevi, her one and only heroine ever since childhood. In the seventh century the many tribes in the Lamphun area had had different cultures and had often been at war with each other. All they had in common at that particular epoch was a legend, a myth that said a young queen would arrive from the south, “borne by huge elephants,” and would unite all the diverse tribes into the Haripunchai kingdom.