Travelin Z - The Asian Zlympics

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A couple of zany days before I left Asia, after just about 10 months long journey here, I wrote this travel update.
It is fiction - tightly based on reality, the way i see it, and impressions from my travels.

THE ASIAN ZYLIMPICS.

These ancient games date back to February 23rd 2005. Coincidentally, the day I started this journey in Bangkok and learned to consider a perpetual layer of sweat part of my UV protection.

OPEN CEREMONY
After a short meditation session with the Dali Lama (I had to help him relax before the grand opening, and guided him through some simple breathing exercises), I was honored with an invitation to light the Zylimpic incense, ahead of representing groups of monks, and nuns to the cheering sounds of the chanting crowds.
Open ceremony followed, with the usual parade of participants in their prospective national garments carrying their national flags. Not very exiting, but sales tickets. The Laotians were late, and filed the first complaint to the Zylimpic Committee, blaming the late start on cheap Chinese alarm clocks in the Zylimpic Village bungalows.

AGGRESSIVE DRIVING COMPETITIONS
It was clear to me, and the Zylimpic Committee, that it will be a total waste of time and effort to write any rules for these competitions, and fruitless to bother with enforcing them. By definition, we established, the true competitors will consider any traffic rules a mere suggestion, and under the mandatory "must-ignore" mantra.
The Gold was given to the Mongolian driver who didn't slow down after mauling the officials table, and managed to extract extra points from the last words of the Croatian referee, while the latter was taken to the hospital in full body restraints. Some rumor had it, that the Croatian might have been just cursing profoundly, and the translation was faulty due to his accent and the oxygen mask.
The Chines, Vietnamese, and Cambodian drivers were last seen hauling ass on the wrong side of different freeways in different directions with excessive number of petrified passengers.

THE EQUESTRIANS GAMES
The Mongols managed to collect all medals in this category, some because they really ride well, and some because they stole them. A couple of riders from India tried to enter the camel races riding dromedaries, and where disqualified instantaneously. First, because i was in India in 2001 and this doesn't qualify them to enter now, and second because unlike the famous Philip Morris brand, i know how many humps does a camel have.

STREET VENDOR COOKING
I like this one. Points were awarded to excellent cuisine, street hygiene, presentation and variety. Tough competitors had to push their cooking carts and stalls in between narrow spectators rows and cook. Thai hawkers won the Gold and the Silver. Dali handed them the Bronze as well, after morning prayers, because he liked the brown rice they donated into his bowl. When and if i will write my memoirs, I might profess favoritism towards the Thai cooks - but at this stage it did not result in self disqualification from chairing the Committee.

SUPPRESSIVE REGIMES BOUT
This was a touchy one. No shit.
China was ahead with human rights violations points and hard control of the press, and at some point considered sending of the infamous tanks from Tienanmen square division. Myanmar held true with Aung San Suu Kyi image on the team's flag and some forced labor camps. Vietnam insisted on points for past "correction camps" for the south Vietnamese, and that brought a delegation of retired Camer Rouge fighters claiming extra points for exceptional brutality against one owns people. The nostalgic Mongols mentioned Ganges Khan but were turned down even though the Zylimpic spirit is about participation and not just winning.
One western super power (name to remain a secret at this stage) did what they always do, and sent in advisers for a group-bear-hug backed by empty promises and overloaded B-52s.
The international community, (whatever that means) irritated by the inappropriate imagery broadcasted on evening news during dinner time, decided to send in the U.N.
Multinational-white-uniformed-peace-keeping-troops will be mobilized once the U.N. finds the missing allocated funds.
Talks are held in Geneva, at the moment, and the Swiss are happy to collect $200,000,000,000 every time a delegation of participating competitors passes "GO".

MARATHON SLEEPING CHALLENGE
The previous years winners, and the favorites in this year event as well - the Laotians, disappointed the loving spectators when they failed to show up. We speculated that they were resting before the competition, but we are not sure.

TEAM SPORTS EVENTS
**Colonial architecture - Myanmar 2:1 Cambodia
**Number of passengers shoved into a vehicle - Myanmar 3:2 Cambodia
**Smiles per minutes - Tie game Thailand 4:4 Myanmar
**Arts And Craft - A disastrous event - way too much crap was entered to be judged in this century. No medals were awarded.

HASSLING TOURISTS
I lost a lot of sleep planning this event. What i ended up with is a fair (did you expect anything different?) and simple event.
Groups of unsuspected tourists were diverted to the stadium parking lot, and dropped there, believing they are at the entrance to the "Forbidden Stadium". Street peddlers were given an equal amount of time in which they had to sale postcards, badly crafted knickknacks, offer rides in dubious vehicles, and lure the tourists into shops and hotels belonging to "relatives". In the "free style" event, they had to extract hard international currency in any possible method - excluding theft - while usage of begging children was permitted and even encouraged if they missed some limbs.
The Cambodian Nags managed to take the Gold just a few points head of the Myanmar Noodges. The pestering bunch from Vietnam bugged me so much that i disqualified them - just to prove my point. So much for me being fair, but they did push my limit. That confirmed what my dear friend Charlotte unfolded to me, one day, that actually I have a splendid temper - just very short.

SWIMMING
The swimming events went, unconventionally, pretty smoothly. The Vietnamese beauty, a crowed pleasing 18 years old, was wearing fashionable but cumbersome jeans and long sleeve shirt, and almost drowned . An American middle aged G.I. on leave from his deployment in South Korea, jumped into the Zylimpic pool and saved her. I found out that consequentially he stopped his mail-order-bride shopping, and is currently applying for Green Card on the swimmer behalf. The way i see it - even without a medal it is a win-win situation.

ROAD BUILDING
In this event a stretch of land was designated to the competitors. They had a week to build a road, of equal length from one famous temple to a reputable monastery in the mountains - and then two extra weeks to find any possible way to slow a moving convoy of old cars, Took-Tooks, oxen carts, motorcycles, buses and large old trucks as they travel the road.
The Cambodians, the inventors of the pot hole, gave the Mongols a great run ( pun intended) for their money, but an old monk from Myanmar managed to etherealize two rivers across his road, and snatched the Gold after he assembled the worst ferry crossing known to men.

FAKE NAME BRANDING
Since i am concern with losing advertisers, i will not report on this event. Just to pacify the music industry - all Cd's, sold at the Zylimpic stadium were legal copies ( wink wink) and all the software we sold, wrapped in REAL Gucci bags, was copyright free. Sort of. The competitors did endorsed Nike uniforms and running shoes, but i am not at liberty to tell you how much we payed for it in Bangkok's night bazaar. sorry.

TRAPPING TOURISTS
China's led the first set with the Forbidden City devastating serve, but Myanmar countered skillfully with the Royal Palace in Mandalay. The Chinese threw in the Panda Resort, and the boat ride down the Yangtze river, but Myanmar held strongly with the-most-boring-river-ride-known-to-men from Mandalay to Bagan. Laos sat this event out.
Cambodia offered their beach resorts of Sianookville, for a meek 6.7 but the Vietnamese managed to extract a 7.3. Somehow. Bribery suspected.
The Mongols didn't understand the event at all since they only have three people in the government tourist office - two of which were drunk and the third - on sabbatical taking cooking classes in Siberia.

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