To Live And Die In Paradise Pt.4

Here, within sight of the beach and the hundreds of cheering onlookers it felt as if it might all unravel at the very end. The final hurdle of getting through the last line of breakers and on up to the sandbar seems impossible.

Suddenly there is a yell from behind me. From beyond the waves, thrown from some unseen savior, a battered green soccer ball sails through the air landing with a soft –plunk– nearby. With a mouthful of seawater my prayers of thanks are said silently only to myself.

Jamming the ball into his chest he clings to it – able to float easier over the waves, freeing me up to catch what is left of my breath. The adrenaline has been pumping full flood for almost half an hour – my heart is beating out of my chest, and the taste of blood and salt is heavy in my mouth.

A moment passes and we make the final press. Assisted now by the ball he is able to ride the final wave awkwardly onto the sandbar. Two Khmer are there fully clothed. Hollow eyed, I choke out a ‘thank you’ for the ball, and we begin to drag him in by each arm.

The world is spinning, and as the adrenaline begins to shut down I feel sick. The waves have done me in far worse than any carnival ride, but I can begin to see the crowd that has gathered. They stare at me blankly as we come ashore. I have nothing left and stare blankly back, feeling like a shipwrecked castaway who never imagined he would ever again see land.

I am vaguely reminded of a scene from The Odyssey.  A weary Odysseus is told by the ghost of Tiresias to remove an oar from his ship and walk inland, and to keep walking until the point where his oar is mistaken for a winnowing shovel – there he will have reached a place where no man had been troubled by the sea.

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People rush in to help with the final few meters and from out of the crowd bursts two screaming women in large floral sunhats. From the wailing over the boy, now barely conscious, I gathered they were family. And as I collapsed on the ground the last thing I remember thinking was thinking that their delicate, overly sunscreened faces almost resembled Kabuki artists were it not for the streaks of so many tears.

---

The next thing I realize I am being rubbed vigorously by what feels like a hundred hands. I’ve seen this remedy before – the Cambodian version of CPR. They are well intentioned but I want none of it. Despite my grunts of protest every inch of my body has been assigned a caregiver, each vigorously pulling and stretching the blood through my body in what might be the world’s most unsettling massage.

I make the motion for water and a large bottle is brought and I drink greedily. I am a liter in when my stomach revolts. The mix of seawater, freshwater, and that morning’s garlic eggs, comes spewing out of my nose and mouth. To their credit, my masseuses barely flinch, and instantly resume their concerted squeezing.

I wave off the crowd that has gathered with a caveman grunt and flop onto my side and close my eyes, never more happy to feel the crunch of sand beneath me.

A hundred voices are speaking over me in a dozen languages, yet the only ones that cut through are the anguished sobs of the mother and sister. They kneel in the sand next to me, their tears streaming their faces yet again. There are no words, just a deep gutteral wail, and despite being covered in my own sick they both embrace me awkwardly in the sand.

“It’s OK.” I manage to croak out.

“I am OK”.

“You must come with us. To Hospital.” She finally sputters.

She is obviously foreign, at this point I correctly guess Korean, because no one in their right mind would recommend going to a local Cambodian hospital.

“I am OK. Thanks. Take the boy. I have to go.”

No longer wishing to be the vomit covered center of attention I rose gently on unsteady feet and started towards my bike. The crowd parted and I gingerly coaxed my aching body towards home. On getting to the road, I paused to put the key in the ignition and was instantly overwhelmed with nausea again, vomiting right off the side of the bike.

The elderly gentleman who had given me water had shadowed me to the street, and, on seeing me be sick, offered to drive me home. Sandy, bloodied, and miserable I rode home with a busload of Koreans in tow to find Cassie, shocked by my strange arrival, standing at the entrance to our home.

Dismounting my bike I wobbled straight to her and gave her a big, salty sick kiss on the cheek, hugged her tight then walked into the shower, turned it on, laid down and went to sleep.

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Tossing and turning on the cold tile I could not shake the images – the look of abject terror in that young man’s face.

Cassie found me on the floor, and with my head in her lap she washed the mountain of sand out of my hair, rocking me gently as I shook uncontrollably from the last of the adrenaline leaving my body.

It’s that look that has kept me up nights. That look of standing on the edge of life and death and feeling the literal tide turning against you. It’s shock. It’s disbelief. The natural order exists for a reason – the sky is blue, water is wet, and children grow up to be adults. When confronted by the painful realities, the understanding that the universe owes you nothing other than what you’re willing to fight to keep, the natural reaction seems to be simply shock.

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After a fitful nights sleep we were awoken by the shrill screech of our landlady.

“They here! They here!”

Cassie, as usual, beat me out of bed, and just as I was standing to pull on my shorts she drew the curtain to the front sliding door. The timing of it could not have been worse, and as I stood naked to pull my shorts up I suddenly faced dozens of Korean missionaries staring back at me through the glass.

Bleary eyed and shocked by the mass that had gathered so quickly on my tiny porch I was rather at a loss of what to say.

Cameras flashed in my face, people spoke excitedly in Korean – then it began to rain. From the crowd stepped the older white-haired man who had first spoken with me when I emerged from the sea.

He extended his hand with the same warm smile.

“My name is Gabriel. We are leading this Korean missionary group while they are in Cambodia.”

“You saved their son.” He said, gesturing to the two women bowing profusely from beneath their sunhats.

“They wanted to thank you before they left.”

With that the crowds parted and the boy was pushed forward, head down.

He was bigger than I remembered. Smiling sheepishly he extended me a large gift bag then retreated back to the safety of the crowd standing in the now pouring rain.

“It is Red Ginseng tea from Ko-reea. It will give you back your pow-wah. You use up all your pow-wah.” Said Gabriel.

“You put it in water. You know…hot water.”

I thanked them for the tea which was then followed by a round of bowing, then pictures, then more bowing, and as suddenly as they had appeared the entire company marched back off through the rain to their waiting coach.

Nearing the gate, Gabriel turned on his heels like he had forgotten something. Trekking half way back through the garden he stopped and yelled, “The water, make sure it is hot water!”

And with a big smile, he waved once more and was gone.

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One week later and the nightmares have stopped. Sleep and ginseng tea has returned my pow-wah, and more than once I have had my story told back to me by someone else like a Phil Collins song.

I would find later that our landlady, who just that day had angrily threatened eviction, would change her mind completely on hearing the story from the assembled group of Khmer and Koreans that had accompanied me home.

“You are the best maaahn” She would later yell from her clothesline as I recuperated gingerly on my porch.

The physical marks on my neck and back have faded, and eventually the bad memories will slip beneath the waves entirely. I have gifted the tea to a friend opening a tea shop nearby. He says he will call it ‘life-saving ginseng tea’, free to all who need more pow-wah.

I will however hold on to the note that came with it. It is the only part of this experience I wish to remember aside from the face of a smiling young man at the start of a long and fruitful life.

To Nick,

 

Hello, it’s me, Rae Hyun (this is my name).

You saved my life.

I thought I was dying.

But, suddenly you come and saved my life.

Thank you so much.

 

If I come back to Cambodia I will go to your guesthouse to meet you.

 

I hope you to become Christian.

I hope you to meet Jesus.

 

God Bless You.

Rae Hyun