Free Tibet

Today I will regale the internet with the tale of how I single-handedly saved a small town of Tibetans from the clutches of the Communist Chinese regime. It is the many incidents such as these which qualify me as the Messiah of the Internet and the Professor of Culture the world over. From time to time, you may expect me to give you a tale of rousing incidents of my triumph over obstacles both human and natural, both great and small.

It all began when I went to the trading post of Zhangmu, the junction of routes between Tibet and Nepal. The year was 1955, and the invasion of Tibet was under full swing. I had been in Nepal for several weeks, attending to matters of business there with my close friend, Roberto Tormenta. We had work to do there, as fully employed agents of the United Nations Organization. It was Roberto who had landed me the job. He worked for the W.H.O. at the time, and I needed a job to occupy my days. W.H.O. was investigating a small outbreak in lower Nepal, as symptoms were closely related to the deadly Influenza strains of Manchuria.

We explored the quarantined areas of the country, but eventually turned up nothing. Roberto assured me that the U.N.O. hadn't really been expecting anything major there anyway, and it was a cushy position awarded to people who were looking for something easy to do. He informed me that once we had recorded all the available data and looked at our leads into all the cases, we would go into Tibet and have a look around. He knew of a wonderful restaurant in Zhangmu and wanted to visit it before we left. So, I agreed to travel with him into the Hindu lands of northern Tibet and try this dessert that he touted so greatly. The dessert was alright (a concotion of goats-milk cheese and chocolates from the cold climes nearby, a strange combination to be sure, but not an entirely unsavoury one), but what I really became interested in was Tibet itself.

Roberto informed me of the Chinese invasion, and how far they had reached. The Dhali Lhama had gone into exile and all manner of terrible things had been occurring in the nation. My heart went out to these beleaguered people, so lonely in their icy mountain tops and so sad. Roberto told me that we couldn't stay long, but I managed to convince him to remain for several weeks while I investigated the situation. Eventually, I wore out our welcome there.

Chinese forces had been pushing north for a goodly time, while I had been assessing what help I could give to the poor people of Tibet. Roberto had stayed with me, out of a sense of loyalty and friendship. Without warning, Chinese tanks rolled one day into Zhangmu. We heard stories in the cafes of Americans being tortured and killed by the communist forces, so we fled without rhyme or reason.

We ran down a long stretch of broken Tibetan road before we could buy two asses of a farmer in the foothills. Our American currency was as good as gold, which was lucky, for many farmers in Tibet will only accept barter. Well, we climbed the mountain passes and tried our damndest to escape from the Chinese Army. At last we were forced to stop, because we had wandered for many days without food or shelter. Water was easy enough to find, as there was snow in abundance, but our lack of preparation in the gourmatory department was beginning to wear on us. I know that I, at least, had hallucinated on at least three separate occasions. I don't know about Roberto - I'm sure he was affected by the loss for he, like I, was not a man inclined to lightness of the foot.

Well, on the third day of travel we were starving like Ethiopes. Luckily Roberto found a sign half-buried in a snowdrift that pointed the way to a town. It was called Mubur, and it was nestled between two high peaks not far away. We stumbled into the little village half dead, and affected badly by frostbite. Roberto nearly lost a finger, but luckily we had arrived in time and the locals knew just how to take care of us. We were fed, clothed, and given shelter by those kind people. They had no idea what was coming to them - and I was too heartbroken to communicate it. On the second day of our stay, Roberto breached the subject with their village elders. When they heard of the Chinese Tanks and soldiers, they determined to simply lay down in the streets and allow the Chinese communist forces to occupy their town, to do what they would. I would hear none of it. Those people had taken me in, and I was not about to allow my friends and allies to be subjugated beneath the heel of the new Chinese Empire.

Now, you see, the village of Mubur was surrounded on three sides by impassible cliffs, and on the fourth by a slope of treacherous snow. Only a narrow path could access the town from below, where it met with the road. I told the Muburians to give me two days, and I would provide for them a defense against the communists. I didn't know exactly what I was going to do, and thus I spent the two days deliberating with a heavy sadness in my heart. On the evening of the second day, knowing the tanks were coming, I sat down in a drift of snow to think. There Roberto Tormenta found me, early the next morning. I had fallen asleep outside in the snow, trying desperately to think of a way to save my poor benighted Tibetans.

He sat as well and we talked until sunrise. Still, we could formulate nothing. Then (it must have been the sun heating the new snow), a shifting began beneath us. The drift began to grumble and complain. He and I rose off of it quickly, fearing it would descend the hillside. It did just that, neatly covering a bit of the path some ways down, as though it had never been there. It was then that brilliance struck me.

I ran throughout the village, beckoning the inhabitants to place snow upon their roofs and all about their walls. While they engaged in this procedure, Roberto and I made sure to dump as much snow as we could (using broken shovels, our hands, and buckets obtained from the villagers) onto the path. Soon, it was obscured almost completely- gone, vanished into the mountainside. The village too had disappeared, becoming instead a group of oddly shaped mounds of snow. We climbed inside one of those little houses, covered floor to ceiling outside with the stuff, and waited.

Our breath was baited, and the whole town was silent; no man woman or child dared to speak as we heard the Chinese tanks rumbling by. Then, when they had receeded into the far distance, we emerged again, triumphant.

Mubur was saved, and Roberto and I were hero's. A few days later, we snuck over the border and took a plane back to the states. Within a week, I had successfully opened up the first Kentucky shale refinery. But that's a different story.