Saving Fish from Drowning - Heal Burma

AMY TAN
equately prepared for the trip. “You got thrown into this at the last
minute,” Dwight said. They recognized that they all needed one an­
other. They did not know whom they might need in an emergency or
for comfort if matters really became dire.
The ember-red logs threw a nervous dance of light on their faces.
In the early days of their plight, they had spoken urgently of ways to
get out of No Name Place. As their unscheduled stay lengthened,
they anguished over the possible ways to be saved. During the malar­
ial scare, they bargained with God and the tribal powers that be.
And when all were on the potholed path to recovery, they learned
that the boatman had lost his mind and now had delusions that Ru­
pert was a god. Would they go insane as well?
They ruminated over what their families and friends back home
might be doing to find them. Surely they must have contacted the
U.S. Embassy in Myanmar. A search party of American planes was
probably doing aerial scans right this minute. My friends did not
know that the Myanmar military government limited where the Em­
bassy staff could go searching. And thus, the search was going on
only at tourist destinations that the junta wished to showcase, and
where Harry Bailley, consummate television star with a mellifluous
and persuasive voice, could give his poignant updates.
The mood that night was grimmer than usual. Earlier that
evening, Esmé, in a burst of frustration, cried out: “Are we going to
die out here?” Only a child could have voiced that taboo question.
Marlena reassured her, but the question hung in the smoky air. They
sat quietly, knowing that another exotic illness or a dwindling supply
of food could place them on the brink of extinction. Would they in­
deed die? Each of them imagined the news of their demise.
Wyatt remembered that his mother, who had had breast cancer,
pleaded that he stop going on his thrillingly dangerous adventures.
“You risk not just yourself but my heart,” she had said, “and if any­
thing bad happens, it will be a hundred times worse than my cancer
366