Saving Fish from Drowning - Heal Burma

AMY TAN
pets from home movies taken by tourists who had left Burma early
and were arriving in waves at the Bangkok airport. In the States, net­
work staffers had uncovered additional morsels of viewer interest.
One of the missing was an heiress, they reported, the daughter of the
PVC-pipe king. A photo was shown of Wendy Brookhyser, taken
years before at a debutante ball. Roxanne was seen accepting an
award, looking smart and shiny-faced with perspiration. There was
a still of Marlena and an eight-year-old Esmé hugging at Disney­
land, next to a waving Mickey Mouse. Heidi was caught sitting on a
friend’s porch steps, eating an ice cream bar. Even an old clip from
The Fido Files constituted “fast-breaking news.”
Throughout the day, more scraps of news poured in. There was ev­
idence, GNN reported, that one member had once been arrested for
possession of marijuana. This was Moff, who had indeed been
busted some twenty-two years prior, and was charged with a mis­
demeanor, fined, and given probation. On GNN, he was shown
standing against a wall of bamboo, wearing his standard-issue safari
hat, shorts, and wraparound shades. In this context, he looked like a
drug runner proudly displaying his wares. This news item abutted
another segment, cobbled together by a resourceful GNN producer,
on Burma’s Golden Triangle and its colorful history as “the heroin
capital of the world.” While the piece did not explicitly say that Moff
had any ties to the heroin growers, the juxtaposition implied one.
I saw it all on Heinrich’s television. He had hooked it up to a satel­
lite dish newly purchased on the black market, which replaced the
one that had disappeared recently. I must confess, I found it un peu
amusant that my friends were subject to bad reporting and unflat­
tering photos, just as I had been when the newspapers reported my
mysterious death.
The worst of the news hounds, in my opinion, was Philip Gutman
of Free to Speak International. That megalomaniac contacted GNN
and dangled bait in front of them, and they bit. With a flapping,
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