Archive - December 6, 2022

Illustration by Anson Chan Do you personally know anybody who has been infected with covid-19? In most parts of the world, the question is absurd—it makes more sense to ask, “Do you know anybody who has not been infected?” But, recently, on a survey that I sent to former students in China, this was one of my questions. I taught these students from 1996 to 1998, when I served as a Peace Corps volunteer in southwestern China, and since then we’ve stayed in close touch. For nearly a decade, I’ve sent them annual surveys, and this year I was curious to know more about their pandemic experiences. Of forty respondents, none had been infected. Nobody had had a case in his or her household, and there were also no infections among close relatives—parents, spouses, children, or siblings. Only six personally knew anybody who had tested positive for covid. For three of these respondents, the . . .

The Winter Line: A Memoir and Observation of Asia by Ken Winkler (India 1964-66) Author House 304 pages March 2010 $4.99 (Kindle); $15.49 (Paperback); Imagine a book born from the tendrils of a cloudy monsoon afternoon on a sheer drop overlooking the northern plains of India. Ken Winkler watched the “winter line” develop below him from the Kumaon Himalaya and knew that the book of his life was presenting itself. The author has spent over 40 years writing and studying about, traveling to or working in Asia, or listening to teachers, lamas, soldiers and travelers present their versions of what they saw. Not everything was as it appeared, and many of his experiences reflected a direct spiritual lesson. All of this started on a bird farm in San Diego—or was it from the stories of a smooth-talking Irishman, or an Oxford Don, or a collection of Buddhist masters passing through? . . .