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My Kind of Town Don Chapman |
Home team advantage
>> Blaisdell Arena
From what used to be the home-team locker room when UH played basketball at the Blaisdell, they could hear the cheers and chanting of the crowd outside for the Dalai Lama as he departed in his limo.
"Frankie ... sorry," said Joe Kharma, brother of the second Lama Jey Tsong Khapa. It was still new, seeing his kid brother for the first time in 16 years and here he was, a living Buddha. "Can I just call you Jey?"
"OK, but only in private."
"Jey, you gotta listen to my friend. This is for real."
"Your holiness, you must not get into that limousine," Kamasami Khan said. "Te-Wu is waiting. They have orders to remove you."
"But why?"
"Because of who you are. You terrify the Chinese government even more than the Dalai Lama -- they plan to rig the selection process for the next Dalai Lama and make that position irrelevant. But you, well, it was Lama Jey Tsong Khapa who started a 500-year renaissance that turned Tibet into a government of peaceful Buddhists -- until the Chinese invaded in 1949. It was your student who became the first Dalai Lama. It was the third Dalai Lama who tamed my ancestors, the Khans of Mongolia. The Communists fear you have the power to make history repeat itself, to tame them."
"I do. That's why I've come back."
"And that's why they want you removed. Assassination, kidnapping, whichever comes first, by any means necessary."
"And you know this because your organization ..."
"The Free Tibet Warrior Society, yes, we've infiltrated Te-Wu."
"This is a first, is it not? And a very dangerous service?"
"Yes, twice. And we must be moving or we'll raise suspicion. Please, your holiness, into the restroom and change into the clothes the attendant will present you."
So it was that moments later the second Lama Jey Tsong Khapa, reincarnate of one of the most beloved holy men in 1,400 years of Tibetan Buddhist history, walked out of the restroom in a blond surfer boy wig topped with a Quiksilver cap, and wearing a black Kailua Boys T-shirt, baggy jeans and Nike T-Macs.
He was followed by the one who had been the attendant, a member of the Free Tibet Warrior Society, dressed now in the lama's saffron and crimson robes.
He was a dead-ringer for the young lama, had everything going for him but the glowing head.
When the second limo pulled into the night and drove through the lines of chanting monks and well-wishers, Te-Wu went into motion and followed.
The real lama walked out the main entrance and into a strange new world, where the first words he heard were, "Eh, nice shoes, brah."
See the Columnists section for some past articles.
Don Chapman is editor of MidWeek. His serialized novel runs daily in the Star-Bulletin. He can be e-mailed at dchapman@midweek.com
