But First, Some News
Last month, two of my photographs were featured at the exhibitions Blue and Abandoned in the Glasgow Gallery of Photography. Both spaces were simple and clean, near the university, and full of beautiful work. Top right: posing with my girl and photograph of an ice cave formation at Blue. Bottom right: posing with my photo of Hore Abbey at Abandoned. These and other images are available on my website.
No. 18 No Blessings for You!!
If you’re American, it’s the season of Thanksgiving once again. On the fourth Thursday of every November, our nation celebrates the harvest feast of 1621 between the Pilgrims and members of the Nauset tribe of the Wampanoag people.
At the time, the two groups established a mutually beneficial alliance. The Pilgrims learned how to survive in their newly adopted country. The Nauset gained an ally with powerful weapons against attack from other indigenous people.
Their treaty survived until 1675 when differing views on life, land and nature caused a rift and bloody war. It came down, as it almost always does in human history, to the availability of resources.
What does that have to do with all of the Buddhist monks I’ve encountered in my travels, pictured below?
Absolutely nothing, except that the season of bounty and blessings reminded me of an encounter in Australia. I was engaged in some hardcore tourist gawping when a Buddhist monk approached me. He thrust a card into my hand. Normally I don’t take flyers, but I accepted out of respect for the life of poverty, love, and humility practiced by Buddhist monks.
The card had a lovely blessing on it in English, wishing me peace, health, and happiness. That was so nice! I thought. I smiled and gave a little bow over the card in thanks.
The monk waited. I waited back. He put out a hand. I looked at it. He looked at me. I looked at his hand. Quick-witted, savvy traveler that I am, it dawned on me that he was seeking a donation.
I patted my pockets. It’s my habit not to get local money if possible. All payments go on the credit card, for points, to avoid exchange fees, and not to get stuck with leftover money when we leave the country. True to form, my pockets were empty of currency, Australian or US. I looked at the monk apologetically and explained at some length that I had no money to give him.
He made a disgusted sound and snatched the card back out of my hand, then spun on his heel and stalked off (bottom right monk photo). I was so surprised by his actions and demeanor that I started to laugh. My first thought was of Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi:
Only it was “No blessings for you!”
He was not, of course, a true monk. The New York Times wrote an article about fake monks in New York City who worked together to target tourists. The article notes that “Each second a visitor was willing to talk to one of the robed men was equal to 50 miles away from New York City that the person probably lived.” In other words, native New Yorkers weren’t suckers like visitors to the city.
Here’s the totally non-scientific New York Times formula written out:
I wondered just how accurate that formula was, and decided to use myself as a test case.
Was I as suckery as those sucker-tourists in NY?
Where did I fall on the sucker scale exactly?
First, the distance of my home to the monk in Australia was about 10,300 miles. Divided by 50, looks like this:
According to the New York Times, an average tourist-sucker who lived a distance of over ten thousand miles from the city would have spent over three minutes talking to that fake monk.
How much time did I spend with my fake Australian monk? I’d estimate the whole exchange took thirty seconds tops. That’s definitive proof that I am not as suckery as other suckers. Here’s a visual aid to assess where I do fall along the scale:
Sucker Scale
So why do I land so far across the sucker scale when I shaved three minutes off the New York Times predicted interaction time? Because let’s face it. If I’d had the money on me, I was totally giving some to the fake monk. It was his impatience, not my savvy, that ended the exchange.
And that, my friends, was quite a blessing.
Links Roundup:
Here are some articles I’ve enjoyed this month:
Here are the Worlds 10 Oldest Jokes, from 4000 BC to 400 AD (Number 10 is one I might still quip if I had the courage!)
120,000 people per year Google whether or not Sweden and Switzerland are different countries. Sweden’s tired of it. Their tourist board made this video to distinguish the two.
The American Museum of Natural History produced an animated video that shows 300,000 years of human history in four minutes. It’s fascinating.
National Geographic gives some tips on how to get AI to make your travel plans for you.
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The sucker scale... love it.