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November, 1999, LOS ANGELES - Thanks to "Star Trek," a show with its sight set steadfastly on the future, I have come to appreciate the richness and the complexity of the past. Recently I did two Star Trek events that literally transported me into a deeper appreciation of the vast history of human civilization. One was a Star Trek cruise from Los Angeles down the coast of Mexico, sailing through the Panama Canal and across the Caribbean to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The other was a gigantic Star Trek convention in Berlin, Germany.
A cruise may not immediately seem like a journey into times gone by. It's fun, feasting and frolicking as one sails to exotic ports. And a Star Trek cruise is indeed all that. But this one, arranged by Cruise Trek of Agoura Hills, California, was also like a time machine that took me to three different centuries in our past.
One of our ports of call was a sleepy Guatemalan harbor called Puerto Quetzal. A 90-minute jet plane ride away, hidden deep in the dense jungle growth of centuries, is the ruins of the great Mayan civilization of Tikal. I wanted to visit it. But when we boarded our ship, the S.S. Veendam, in Los Angeles, we discovered that this off-ship tour was sold out! It was such a popular tour that the eager beavers had faxed in their reservation requests early and completely bought up all available seats on the jet to the jungle airport. At the welcome reception on board, actor Cecily Adams made an impassioned plea for more people to request the tour so that another plane might be chartered. I was already on the waiting list.
Happily, there were many others who wanted to view the ruins of Tikal and we got the required number to hire another plane. But this one was not a jet. To be charitable, it was a plane that amply qualified to be in a Guatemalan antique museum. But we aren't in Puerto Quetzal every other weekend and if this was our only way to get to Tikal, so be it. We wanted to experience the great Mayan ruins.
We boarded the old plane, our desire to go to Tikal greater than our confidence in the aged aircraft to get us there. As we climbed to cruising altitude, we wondered if there might be an omen in the music that wafted softly from the sound system. It was the theme from "Titanic." After a two-hour test of our nerves, we landed at the jungle airport a bit frazzled but intact and grateful.
Tikal blew away all apprehensions over that flight. It was astounding. Built some 2,500 years ago, central Tikal covers about 6 miles. We were told that there are over 3,000 structures --- temples, palaces, shrines, plazas both large and small, terraces, residences and ball courts all surrounded by a network of causeways. With our limited time, we would be able to see only the highlights.
Looming up out of the tangle of dense jungle growth, awe inspiring in its majesty, stood the ruins of four temple structures. Their bases were not pyramids but steeply slanted stepped shafts that soared up to a terrace in the sky. Imposingly ensconced on top were the ornately carved stone temples of the Mayan high priests. Climbing to the top was, literally, a breath-taking work out. Many in our group didn't even attempt it. Cecily Adams, fit athlete that she is, made it to the top. The view from that spectacular vantage was as breathtaking as the climb. Below was the great central plaza where the ritual ceremonies were held. Across the way were the other temple structures. And surrounding us all was the jungle that had claimed these awesome edifices when the Mayan nation mysteriously vanished long before the coming of the conquistadores. It boggled the mind to realize that this amazing civilization was built without the use of the wheel.
A delicious native lunch was prepared for us at a jungle compound. We could have roamed among the ruins for the rest of the day. But our guide rushed us on. We had to return to the plane, he told us, so that we could take off by three o'clock in order to land at the Puerto Quetzal landing strip while there still was daylight. The reason for the urgency being that the Puerto Quetzal airstrip had no lights for night landings.
We arrived back at the plane with time to spare. But once we were strapped into our seats, the pilot and co-pilot began inspecting the bottom of the ancient instrument panel with flashlights. Then a parade of people in sweat-stained work clothes began shambling up to the cockpit. They peered and tinkered and whispered cryptically among themselves. After a tense half-hour sitting in the tropical heat of an unventilated old plane, we were asked to return to the terminal building. I've never liked the word "terminal" associated with anything to do with flying, but now it was more unnerving than ever.
Riddled with apprehension, we filed back. Some headed straight for the bar and some good Guatemalan beer. Cecily, I discovered, is a woman with a remarkably low threshold of hysteria. She immediately placed a long distance call to her husband Jim back in Los Angeles and began a tear choked "I've always loved you and always will - forever and ever -- " farewell call. I felt more for the poor, hapless man than for Cecily.
Another suspenseful half hour later, a sweaty man came out to tell us that our plane cannot fly but that three small replacement planes were flying out from Guatemala City to take us back to Puerto Quetzal. If Cecily had an ounce of control left, that announcement blew it away. With panic flashing in her eyes, she began pounding on the glass wall of the waiting room. The terminal manager came out and rushed her into his office where she remained for the rest of our tension filled wait. The rest of us merely sat on pins and needles and waited. We had already lost more than an hour of precious daylight. The beer flowed freely as the Guatemalan sun slowly sank toward the jungle tree line.
It was twilight when the first plane arrived. Immediately, a semblance of a queue formed at the door. Through the plate glass window, we saw Cecily being hustled on board the first plane. The door was opened and people began to be let through, slowly and not too methodically, one after the other. Just three people before me, the first plane reached capacity. I didn't make it on to that plane. In a sense, I was kind of glad. When the passengers of one plane get divided up into three small planes, the risks are tripled. And I had an uneasy premonition about the one carrying Cecily.
The second plane landed just as the first was taxiing away. It was old and smaller but it didn't look as decrepit as the big one that brought us here. We boarded quickly and strapped ourselves in as rapidly as we could. But it was already dark as we began our taxi down the primitive runway. Everyone sat silently. But in the tense stillness, I sensed the one question screaming in everyone's mind. How is this plane going to land on an airstrip that has no lights?
The plane strained and heaved trying to lift itself off the runway. It coughed and gasped. I pulled up on my armrest hoping it would help. Just as the plane reached the end of the cracked concrete strip, it lifted off. It continued pulling and flexing, strenuously trying to avoid the treetops. It shuddered, recovered, then trembled wildly. Finally and thankfully, it reached its allowed flying altitude. The plane continued trembling as it droned into the darkened night sky.
Among the many activities on the cruise ship, I had been taking the yoga exercise class. The idea was to achieve inner peace by bringing one's mind and body into harmony with one's environment. If ever I needed peace and harmony with my surrounding, now was it. I closed my eyes and slowly began breathing in and out. I relaxed my mind and tried to become one with the droning, shivering world surrounding me. All of a sudden, that world turned electric white! Everything became a blinding, shocking, blazing whiteness. Was this it? Is this the way it happens? Was this the end? I was petrified. Then just as shockingly, everything turned back to as it had been. I saw the dark outlines of the passengers' heads ahead of me. The heads turned to each other in startled puzzlement. I realized then, that we had just experienced a silent lightening. Suddenly, it happened again. Another flash. An instantaneous splash of blue-white electricity that was gone as quickly as it came. We were flying through a tropical-lightening storm. A few more silent flashes and we were again flying through the ominously unchanging black sky.
After about an hour, I noticed a sprinkle of lights down in the blackness of the landscape below. Then, I noticed a river of moving lights snaking in the darkness. It looked like a road with automobiles. That must be Guatemala City, I thought. It was supposed to be the biggest city in the country and the capital. But it looked merely like a few dots and a squiggle of light. A few moments later, the landscape returned to black again.
The tension began to intensify as we sensed the plane beginning the descent into the darkness below. How is the pilot going to manage the landing without any lights to guide him? Our imaginations went wild as we girded ourselves for a rough landing. Our breaths held tight as the plane descended lower and lower. It was all blackness below. Then, far off in the distance, we saw something mystifying. We could make out what looked like a double row of lights. What was this? We were told that Puerto Quetzal had no landing lights. As we descended lower, we could surely see two distinct rows of lights beckoning us in the dark. Our pilot headed straight for it. Thank god, they had lights after all, we thought. It wasn't until we were almost about to touch down that we noticed that the lights were, in fact, a row of flickering flames. Standing next to the flaming lights, we saw the silhouettes of men carrying arms. With a hard, bone snapping bump, we touched down. We bounced and jounced down a potholed landing strip between the rows of flaming pots. When we finally came to a stop, we saw that the last part of the row of lights was made up of a line up of trucks and jeeps all parked with their headlights on. The Guatemalan authorities had risen to the challenge in a most creative way. They had improvised a primitive landing system by marshalling the Guatemalan armed forces to light fires in coconut shells lined up in a row together with the headlights of military vehicles. Necessity combined with human ingenuity had brought us back to earth, drained and weary but safe.
And dear Cecily. When we got back to the ship, we learned that the first thing she did when she got back on board was to place an international call to her anxiety-riddled husband back in Los Angeles. Their devotion to each other is genuinely touching. Such a contrast to the frazzled woman seated in front of me on the bus back to the ship. "When I get back to our cabin onboard," she groused, "my husband better not be asleep."
It was a nightmare trip back. But Tikal was worth it. In fact, the flight back seemed to underscore what we had seen at Tikal. The same original thinking and resourcefulness that produced the flaming night landing lights, had raised those amazing architectural splendors of Tikal without the use of the wheel. The power of human creativity and inventiveness is the one constant that defines civilizations through the ages. We would soon be experiencing another example of that from another age and another people --Americans with the Panama Canal.
The French tried for twenty years and failed to build a canal across the Isthmus of Panama connecting the Caribbean with the Pacific. Despite their success with the Suez Canal in Egypt, they could not overcome two great adversaries in Panama -- a devastating tropical disease and an awesome mountain range. The disease decimated whole armies of their workers and the earth from the towering mountainside kept caving down into their excavation.
With characteristic bravado, United States President Teddy Roosevelt took over when the French finally gave up. The first task for the Americans was to overcome the killer disease, which they found to be malaria. When they discovered that the carrier was mosquitoes, a massive eradication program was launched. All bodies of water were either drained or disinfected. Then a new, sanitary village was built to house the workers.
The great challenge then became to conquer the formidable barrier mountain range of the Continental Divide. The solution the engineers came up with was ingenious. Rather than digging a cut into the daunting obstacle, their idea instead was to create a lake rising above the mountain range, then lifting the ships up and over the mountain. The solution was as brilliant as the engineering job would be formidable. First, a lake in the sky had to be constructed. Then, a series of locks had to be built to raise the ships up to the man-made lake. Then another set of locks on the opposite side would lower the ships back down to sea level. It was a mind-boggling project. But the Americans did it. The Panama Canal took ten grueling years to build but in August of 1914, the first ship made the virgin crossing. Since then, over 800,000 ships have gone through the waterway. Our passage in October of 1999 was to be one of the last transits under American administration. At midnight, December 31, 1999, the canal is to be handed over to the Panamanian government. President Jimmy Carter, who signed the treaty in 1977, will represent the U.S. at the ceremony. There was a sense of history for all of us on board the S.S. Veendam as we sailed toward our crossing.
We got up bright and early in the morning and crowded onto the decks and other good vantage points. I found a comfortable seat by a panoramic picture window in the Crow's Nest, the topmost cocktail lounge in the ship. In the pale light of dawn, I could see the metropolitan skyline of Panama City in the distant northeastern horizon. We were munching on a breakfast of Panama rolls and coffee by the time we sailed under the massive steel girders of the Bridge of the Americas guarding the entrance to the canal.
Promptly at 7:30 a.m., we entered the first of a series of locks, this one called Miraflore Locks. The water came churning in with massive force as the ship slowly rose up. I marveled at the colossal power of water. Forty-five minutes later, we were sailing out and onto the first of the stepped lakes, Miraflore Lake. Soon we entered the next series of locks, the Pedro Miguel Locks. These locks raised our vessel up to the top level of the system and a great waterway called the Gaillard Cut. This was the part that was the greatest challenge to the builders of the canal - the cut through the rugged mountain range of the Continental Divide. About 8 miles long, it was carved through rock and shale. It was here that the principal excavation was required and here that those devastating slides occurred during construction.
I stepped outside to the deck and gazed out at the semi jungle landscape on each side of the great waterway. The dense tropical air instantly wrapped around me in a sultry embrace. It was awe inspiring to imagine men just a century ago, struggling against this brutal heat, disease and the savagery of the jungle to carve out this massive system of waterways. I marveled at the sheer ingenuity of the engineers. The Panama Canal is a triumph of human will, creativity and determination. It is as incredible an achievement as that of the Mayans centuries ago.
It was lunchtime when we sailed out onto the huge man-made body of water, Gatun Lake, and I was hungry. We had a few hours to go before we would be entering the downhill set of locks. I decided to go down for lunch. The view of the lake from the air-conditioned comfort of the ship's dining room was superb. As I dined on an exquisite lunch of poached sole with baby asparagus, I couldn't help but appreciate the almost surreal world that we inhabited. Certainly, it would have been science fiction to those who had struggled so valiantly to make this fantastical existence so comfortably real for us. Ah, the wondrous rewards of man's ingenuity.
Promptly at 2 p.m., we entered the Gatun Locks, the system lowering our ship down to sea level on the Caribbean side. By sunset, we were again out on the high seas. Our historic 9-hour transit across the Panama Canal was over. On our way back to Ft. Lauderdale, we enjoyed an all-too-brief stop at the charmingly preserved colonial city, Cartagena in Colombia. Like a dream, our two-week floating Star Trek convention was over. But the rich lessons from the past, experienced on this ocean trek, will remain with me for a long time.
Two days after returning from the cruise, I flew off to another Star Trek event -- this one, a land based convention. It, too, was a rich experience in a city dense with history -- the former, and once again, capital of Germany -- Berlin.
The convention, "Galileo 7-III," was gigantic. Over 2,500 fans gathered from throughout Europe and even a few from the U.S. Berlin was the place to be for Star Trek fans that weekend. The huge attendance, however, seemed to overwhelm the management of the convention. There were program delays, interminable lines and confusion. Yet, bless their hearts, the fans' enthusiasm remained unabated. The applause at each program event was thunderous. They reveled in the joy of sharing a weekend with kindred souls. And the convention raised 30 thousand German marks for charity as well.
But what truly impressed me was the city of Berlin itself. Here was a city, mindful of its history, vigorously building a future of unity. At a point in time when Europe is struggling to join eleven nations in an economic union, and when Germany is heroically working to bring together its two parts brutally separated for decades by a political wall, Berlin was building a world city. To accomplish this, the city had gathered some of the best architects from throughout the world. There were dazzling buildings designed by architects from the United States, Italy, Japan, Holland and, of course, Germany. Berlin was the shining symbol of a people confidant of their destiny and building for the next millenium. I sensed it in the spirit of the people. I felt it in the dynamism of the city. I saw it in the architecture of the new buildings.
The most intriguing building was the Jewish Museum by American architect David Leibeskind. The museum was to open in 2000 but I was privileged to tour the completed but empty building. The shape of the zinc-clad, zigzag structure could be seen as a bolt of lightning, a deconstructed Star of David or a sharp, metallic prison. The windows cut into this structure look like slashes, shards or fragments of shattered glass -- jagged reminders from history. The building is entered from an underground tunnel. The sense one gets on entering the slate paved entrance corridor is one of chilly disorientation. The walls are canted. The floor slightly ramped. Other corridors intersect at sharp angles. Nothing is parallel and regular. There are unexpected spatial voids suggesting the absence of a part of the community that once made up the people of Berlin. The design is at once sobering and stunning. But I couldn't help wondering how the building would work as an exhibition space for a museum. How do you hang things on these canted walls? How do you arrange artifact display cases in these oddly formed galleries? How do you keep the architecture from upstaging the exhibits themselves? My questions on the practicality, however, were overwhelmed by my awe of the virtuosity of the architect. The building alone makes the most unforgettable statement on the history of the Jewish people in Berlin. The new Jewish Museum is an eloquent architectural sculpture.
The most exhilarating new symbol in Berlin, for me, is the restored German parliament building, the Reichstag. The architect is Sir Norman Foster. His British citizenship is as symbolic, it seems to me, as his architectural brilliance is world renown. He took the bold, stony Baroque edifice of the Reichstag with all its turbulent history and sensitively restored the shell. In it, he designed a starkly contemporary legislative chamber and offices. The reminder of the past containing the vigor of a modern nation. His most inspired piece of the design however, is the glass dome that he placed right over the legislative chamber. The transparency of government could not have been more clearly communicated. Even more significantly, he designed a bank of elevators that whisk the public - with no admission charge - up to the roof of the building. The view of Berlin from this rooftop terrace is spectacular. From this terrace, Foster designed a spiral ramp in the dome allowing the people to traverse up to the top of the glass structure. From there, the people, not only of Germany but of the world, can look down directly on the lawmakers at work in the legislative chamber below. It is a potent statement about a people's democracy. As I was walking away from this inspiring building, I looked back again to get another perspective on it. Even from a distance, the Reichstag was alive with movement. There was the constant motion of people going up and down on the ramp in the glass dome over the heads of the politicians. What a powerful symbol for the future of democracy.
The gift of Star Trek's incredible popularity has provided me with these undreamed of opportunities to know this world. These experiences have given me a keen appreciation of the inseparable link between our past and our future. The barbarism of man's inhumanity to man reminds us of our terrible fallibility. The extraordinary achievements of our antecedents, their determination against sometimes awesome adversity, their great organizational competence and their creative genius inspires us to face the many challenges that we confront today. The solid launching pad of our future is the confidence we gain from the glorious attainments from history.
March, 2001, LOS ANGELES - Since 1991, I've been working from time to time with a gifted symphony conductor, David Warble, on a project that has become increasingly fulfilling. He asked me then to provide the narration for a symphonic composition by Johan de Meij inspired by the great Tolkien classic, "The Lord of the Rings." It was an intriguing offer. The trilogy is an epic adventure of imagination. But how can that complex heroic fantasy be summarized in a musical narration? This was, I rationalized to myself, to be in concert with orchestral music. That should help bridge the inevitable gaps in the narration. More out of curiosity, mixed with a dash of actor's audacity, I agreed to do it.
The concert was to be performed with the California Wind Orchestra at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, a dazzling new cultural complex south of Los Angeles. The venue, too, was an attraction. Performing there would be a prestigious addition to my credits.
At the rehearsal, I heard the music for the first time. I was blown away! It was soaring. It was dark. It was rousing and lyrical. Altogether, it was richly complex. At that instant, I realized what an extraordinary privilege it was to be working with Dave Warble on this project. The music embodied the splendor and the intricacies of the classic story. The concert was a great success. Since that presentation, I have been performing with him and the glorious music of Johan de Meij all over the country.
Last month took us to Long Island, New York, to perform with the Long Island Philharmonic at the Tilles Center. This time, Dave, the crafty showman that he is, built the evening around symphonic music that have their source in science fiction. The program opened with Gustav Holst's "The Planets." There was John Williams' music from "Star Wars: Episode One-The Phantom Menace." And, of course, "Star Trek" with the works of four composers, Alexander Courage, Jerry Goldsmith, Jay Chattaway and Dennis McCarthy who contributed to the body of "Star Trek" music. The final number on the program was "The Lord of the Rings." The evening was a sell-out success -- in no small part because of the huge turnout of Star Trek fans. After the performance, I visited with many friends and long-time fans.
Thanks to the concert, I had the opportunity to spend some time in the greatest performing arts center in the nation, Manhattan. As I am addicted to doing in New York City, I lived in the theaters. I was finally able to catch up with "Kiss Me Kate," a show I had attempted to see many times before and been disappointed because no tickets could be had. It was a wonderful production, great fun and well worth the tenacious effort to get the tickets. "Dirty Blonde," with Kathy Najimy was both hilarious and moving. The most surprising was "The Full Monty." In the face of the obviously sexually suggestive title, playwright Terrence McNally had written a moving drama of the devastating impact of unemployment on marriages, on a father-son relationship and on one's sense of self-worth. And the music was terrific. It's the best transposition of a popular movie to the musical stage that I have seen. At the Public Theater downtown, I saw a powerful drama by Jessica Hagedorn titled "Dogeaters." Her inspired metaphor for the tortured recent history of the Philippines was soap opera with all its over-the-top emotions and gravely extravagant morality. This edgy drama was galvanized by razor sharp performances by gifted actors like Alec Mapa, Hill Harper, Mia Katigbak and Jo Jo Gonzales. Every production I saw on this visit was -- each in its own way -- superb.
This Manhattan sojourn also gave me the chance to get together with New York friends. A special treat was having lunch with Pat Suzuki, an actress who I worked with some time ago in New York in a production of "Year of the Dragon." This vivacious singer/actress made her splash on Broadway as the star of the original production of Rogers and Hammerstein's "Flower Drum Song." The Japanese American National Museum will be honoring her with the Lifetime Achievement Award next month so I was able to share our plans for the event with her. But without discussions of awards and honors, lunch with Pat is always an entertainment in itself. These were the delightful bonuses I got from travelling to New York for the concert version of "The Lord of the Rings" -- so, thank you Dave Warble.
I gave myself another bonus last week - a weekend in another lively theater city, San Francisco. I saw a marvelous production by the American Conservatory Theater of the award winning British play, "Goodnight Children Everywhere." When I see an American play in London, I'm always impressed by the British actors' amazing ability to do American accents so credibly. Well, the cast of "Goodnight Children Everywhere" does American actors proud. The British accents of these American players were not only astonishingly convincing but specifically south London and one fine actor, Jesse Pennington, even captured the subtle influence that his character having lived in Alberta, Canada, for five years had on his south London accent. The drama was about the resilience of and the heavy cost to children who were moved out of London during World War II to avoid the Nazi air bombings.
The other play of the weekend had enjoyed great success all over the country, in part, I supposed, because of it eye-catching title -- " The Vagina Monologues." I discovered the title to be an absolutely precise description of an evocative play, a passionate assertion of women's sexual individualism. And it was blessed by a company of marvelous actors; Kathleen Califant, who was superb in the prize winning drama, "Angels in America," Lorri Holt, a fine San Francisco actor, and Jill Eikenberry, whom I loved in the television series, "L.A. Law."
Some of the best bonuses though are serendipitous. Just by chance, I happened across one of the people that make San Francisco such a wonderfully unforgettable town. It happened on a trolley.
Almost equal to my love of theater is my passion for all modes of public transportation. And San Francisco is the quintessential city of public transit. It has subways, buses, ferries, light rail and, of course, the fabled cable cars of song and legend. I love riding them all.
San Francisco just added another reason for me to love it more. They installed a new trolley line along the bayshore from the old Ferry Building to the fisherman's wharf area where the ugly Embarcadero Freeway used to be. The freeway had been torn down after the devastation of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, opening up the beautiful bay to the city. A silver lining can be found even in the awful rubbles of an earthquake. Not only that, but San Francisco, true to its style, placed on the new tracks a system of historic trolley cars. They searched the world over for old trolleys and found them in places like Buenos Aires, Paris and Sydney, Australia. They even bought up the streetcar named Desire from the city of New Orleans. The new trolley route along San Francisco Bay is lined with stately palm trees. A stylish and urbane city has become even more enchanting.
A red trolley came rattling down Market Street. It looked like the kind I used to ride in Los Angeles as a boy. I hopped on and tried to slide my dollar into the fare slot. "My god," the conductor shouted at me. I thought I'd done something wrong. "You're Sulu! Captain Sulu!" he shouted with delight. Immediately, I realized that I had been recognized -- even with my sunglasses on. He stopped me from pushing my dollar in and insisted, "This ride is on me. You've given me some wonderful rides on Star Trek so this one is on me." He absolutely wouldn't allow me to pay my fare. I thanked him and sat down in front near the conductor. From that point on, he regaled not only me, but the entire car with the history of the new trolley system, his love of his job, his passion for San Francisco and his long-time devotion to Star Trek. He told us about his little daughter who he takes with him to the sights around his beautiful city. He had everyone on his car smiling. Then he asked me to sign a piece of paper. I was more than happy to reciprocate for his joyful hospitality. I asked him for his name and he told me it was David Sparks. What a perfect name, I told him, for such a sparkling personality, the sparkplug of the trolley and the spark that lit up the spirits of his passengers.
This city is the captivating city that it is because San Franciscans love San Francisco. And David Sparks is the quintessential San Franciscan. Thank you, David, for a memorable trek in your unforgettable city.
May, 2001, LOS ANGELES - On the first day of April, I boarded American Airlines Flight 140, nonstop from Los Angeles to Paris, France. April in Paris! My spirits soared with the plane as it rose up into the clouds. Where else but Paris, the quintessential city of light and life, to celebrate the beginning of spring.
I landed at Charles De Gaulle Airport in golden sunshine to be told by my Paris friend, Olivier Jalabert, that the sun was a rare and welcome phenomenon. Paris had been inundated by relentless rain throughout the previous month. I revealed to him that this was my southern Californian gift that I brought to Paris in my luggage. He thanked me effusively for my sunny generosity. This was going to be a glorious week.
Seven days in Paris flies by like the sparkle of a transporter. As I write this now, a month away from that dream-like week, the memories seem wrapped in golden haze. I'm still savoring Sunday brunch under a Tiepolo ceiling in the grand dining salon of the Musee Jacquemart Andre. This was the great town mansion that served as Louis Jordan's Paris estate in the classic film, "Gigi." Glowing memories of dining on Duck a'la Orange at the fabled Tour d'Argent with a glorious view of Notre Dame below. Ambling down the Champs Elysee on a Sunday afternoon together with aluminum wrapped Paris marathoners who had just finished the grueling run at the Arc de Triomphe. Strolling across the classic beaux arts bridge, Pont Alexandre, at night when -- precisely at 10 p.m. -- the Eiffel Tower begins to explode in an effervescence of sparkling lights. Glowing, luminous memories.
Some of my best Parisian experiences were serendipitous -- accidental discoveries or chance happenings. On a previous visit, we just happened to be at the basilica of Sacre Coeur, one of the highest points in Paris, on Bastille Day to learn that fireworks would be set off that evening. We laid down on the hillside grass and waited until the darkened sky turned into a Miro painting of exploding, swirling cascades of colored lights. Singularly Parisian serendipity.
On this trip, we saw the River Seine as we had never seen it before. As Olivier had told us, it had been raining heavily in Paris and the Seine had turned into a torrential force of nature. Those charming pedestrian footpaths alongside the river, where old men snooze with their fishing poles and lovers meet under the willow trees, were completely flooded over. The willow trees looked like long-haired maidens in distress clinging on for dear life bobbing against the oncoming assault of the flood. The tourist boats that cruise up and down the Seine had to be temporarily cancelled.
Our last evening in Paris was a convivial dinner hosted by Olivier, who is manager of Album, an intriguing collectibles store on Boulevard Saint Germain. The dinner was in a rustic restaurant called Les Bouchons. Among his guests was Alain Carraze, a witty television talk show host. I visited on his show and had a wonderful time chatting with him about my Star Trek experiences. Alas, it had to be in English. I speak only tourist French, but, fortunately for me, he spoke delightful English. The evening was congenial with good conversation and great food. I think it's impossible not to eat well in Paris. And at Les Bouchons we ate well surrounded by history. The heavy timbered restaurant was in a centuries old, pre-revolutionary structure on a narrow, cobbled street called Rue d' Hotel Colbert right off the Seine.
In exchange for my gift of California sunshine, I came home laden with another collection of glowing memories. Au revoir, Paris and merci boucoup, Olivier.
Almost immediately after returning from Paris -- before I could even shake off my jetlag -- I was on a Japan Air Lines 747 to Osaka, Japan. My mission was the opening of the Japanese American National Museum's traveling exhibit "From Bento to Mixed Plate" at the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka. This was the second venue for the exhibit after its first opening in Japan last November in Okinawa.
I landed at the beautiful Kansai Airport built on a man-made island on Osaka Bay. Kansai is the most well-planned airport that I've had the pleasure of passing through. There is excellent traffic flow, smooth passport control, good signage, efficient taxi, train and other transportation connections, a fine hotel, restaurants galore and all the services a traveler would need. The only problem is that the island is sinking. Apparently, the engineers' calculations were a bit off. The airport is slowly descending back into the waters of the bay. But until that time, Kansai will be my favorite airport.
Japan's National Museum of Ethnology is on the grounds of the 1970 World Expo that was held in Osaka. When I arrived at the old Expo grounds, I immediately recognized the giant theme sculpture and some of the exposition buildings from my visit back in 1970. But there had been many new structures built since the exposition, among them the National Museum of Ethnology. The surrounding areas also had become quite urbanized. I thought of the plans the city of Hannover, Germany, has for the grounds of their World Expo just concluded last year.
The opening ceremony for our traveling exhibit was a big success. We were honored to have the Chancellor of Seijo University, Dr. Nagayo Homma, and a colleague of mine on the Japan-United States Conference on Cultural and Educational Interchange, travel down from Tokyo to join us. The reception that followed was convivial and celebratory. Sake toasts followed one after another. The press was great. The exhibit is well launched in Osaka. Its next stop in Japan is Hiroshima.
April was the perfect time to be in Japan. It is the very peak of cherry blossom season. And right outside my hotel, the Imperial, along the beautiful Ogawa River, is the best place for cherry blossom viewing. Sachie Kubo, of the Japan Excelsior campaign, who lives in Osaka, had called and kindly offered to personally escort me on my cherry blossom viewing. She and other fans had given me a wonderful time in Osaka last November when I was passing through on my way back from Okinawa.
I had imagined Japanese cherry blossom viewing to be a tranquil, contemplative, almost poetic, experience. How wrong I was! Cherry blossom viewing in Osaka was the most raucous, congested, massive aesthetic experience I had ever encountered. It seemed as if the whole nation of Japan had turned out to view the cherry blossoms outside the Imperial Hotel. Once we were swept up in the solid, shoving, mass of humanity, free will was gone. One had to go with the flow. There were policemen with bullhorns urging the crowd to keep moving on. But the cherry blossoms were simply breathtaking. I had never seen such variety, the shades of pale pinks and whites. I had never witnessed blossoms in such abundant density. At times, we seemed to be flowing through a heavenly tunnel of pink white clouds. It was gorgeous, almost surreal and absolutely unforgettable. Sachie-san, domo arigato.
I arrived back in Los Angeles to be greeted by a script for a new television series titled "Chronicle." The series is about a New York tabloid newspaper and its crew of journalists that cover paraphenomenal events. My guest starring role in the episode titled, "Here There Be Dragons," scheduled to air this summer on the Sci Fi Channel, was that of a Chinese immigrant father whose daughter, it is suspected, might be involved with a dragon inhabiting the sewers of Chinatown. The drama is played with straight-faced seriousness. I thought it might be fun. But I was baffled by the location. It was to be filmed in San Diego, California! A New York story on location in palmy, balmy San Diego? Now, that is paraphenomenal. I phoned my agent to find out why but he couldn't explain this mystery of Hollywood either. Oh well, I thought. After all the jetting about I'd been doing this month, a quick relaxing train ride down the coast to San Diego would be much preferable to another long cross country sit on a plane to New York.
Arriving in San Diego, I was picked up at the Santa Fe Train Depot and taken directly to what the driver called, "the studio" for my wardrobe fitting. There the mystery was cleared up. "Chronicle" is produced by Stu Segall, an entrepreneur who had indeed developed a studio complex in San Diego consisting of six soundstages with all the necessary support facilities. The series was keeping film activities humming at his facility. For exterior shots, sections of downtown San Diego, with clever camouflaging of palm trees, was passing for dense, gritty New York City. How fitting for a show dealing with paraphenomena.
The week in San Diego was the perfect antidote to a month of globe girding air flights - back in make-up and in front of the cameras. The regulars on "Chronicle," Chad Willett, Rena Sofer and Reno Wilson are bright, talented and personable young performers and it was a pleasure working with them.
The weekend there was pure tonic. I went to the award winning regional theater, the Globe Theater, and enjoyed a wonderful production of "Dinner with Friends." Taking the title to heart, I had dinner with friends - Sam and Lydia Irvine at their son Ken's fabulous restaurant, Chez Loma in a charming Victorian house on Coronado Island.
The month began in Paris dining on extraordinary French cuisine with friends and concluded with superb California cuisine with friends on Coronado Island. April was a magnificent global banquet table with friends.
June, 2001, LOS ANGELES - What an undreamed of invitation -- the Kentucky Derby! I had been to Kentucky many times before. My niece, Akemi Takei, the broadcast journalist in the family, had worked at a television station in Lexington. So I had visited her when she was there. And, of course, there had been many Star Trek conventions in Kentucky. I like the lush and gracious landscape and the warm hospitality of the people of Kentucky. But I'd never expected to actually be at the legendary Kentucky Derby at fabled Churchill Downs. This was fantastic!
Before departing L.A., on my way to the airport, I swung around to Twentieth Century Fox studios. I was squeezing in a quick voice-dubbing gig on another episode of "The Simpsons." It didn't take much time. I was off to the airport and Louisville, Kentucky, in about an hour.
On the flight, seated in the row just behind me, I recognized actor Bill Brochtrup from "NYPD Blue." In conversation with him, we discovered that we were guests of the same host, Michael Berry of the Kentucky Derby Festival. We would both be riding in the Kentucky Derby Festival's Pegasus Parade and going to the same Derby festivities. This was going to be great fun.
Immediately upon arrival, we were swept up into a whirlwind of activities - lunches, dinners, parties galore, and, on the Thursday before the Derby, the Pegasus Parade. The parade's Grand Marshal was none other than the second man to walk on the moon, astronaut Buzz Aldrin. I had met Buzz and his lovely wife Lois before -- at a charity fund-raising event at Paramount Studios. Our paths seem to have a way of crossing in the most interesting ways, in fiction as well as in fact.
In the parade, our vehicles were, unlike the futuristic crafts with which Buzz and I are associated, handsome treasures from the past. Buzz's car was an elegantly restored antique that I couldn't identify and mine was a classic red Corvette. The crowd was wildly enthusiastic and I shouted myself hoarse. That night, we recovered over dinner at Jicama Grill, a trendy restaurant that serves delectably exotic Latin American cuisine.
Kentucky Derby day was sunny and hot. But the dress, we were told, was sports coat and tie. As we boarded the air-conditioned luxury bus that was to transport us to Churchill Downs, I couldn't help but be taken by the elegantly dressed women who, almost without exception, wore enormous confections of feathers, flowers, silk or gossamer on their heads. The practicality of a large hat on a sun-scorched day was contradicted by the preposterous creations that almost covered their faces like some fantastical umbrella balanced over their heads. But as the bus approached Churchill Downs, I noticed that the mass of people surging toward the grandstand carrying their picnic baskets and aluminum lawn chairs, wore tank tops, halters and practical wide brimmed straw hats. There was clearly a two-tier dress code.
Indeed, when the bus parked, we were escorted directly to a bank of elevators that swiftly lifted us up to the sixth-floor clubhouse. It was air-conditioned, well provisioned with a beautiful buffet and a panoramic glass window that provided a spectacular view of the sun drenched racetrack below. In this cool and luxuriously coddled setting, the colossal hats seemed even more wacky. Friends greeting the behatted women couldn't reach them under those massive canopies - all they could do was blow friendly air kisses toward the faces hidden under the huge hats.
They told me that you have to have a strategy in the betting process. I had never bet on horses before. I knew nothing about racehorses. What was I to do? The Kentucky Derby itself was the eighth race of the afternoon. I decided to prepare by observing the betting process during the first race. People were talking about the lineage of each horse, their track records, how they looked in their warm up runs the morning before. They might as well have been speaking in Swahili. I knew then that I was on my own. I would have to depend on sheer luck. Nevertheless, I would try to craft a strategy.
I decided to dive in on the second race. I studied the list of horses on my program. The third horse on the list was named Lake Pontchartrain. It reminded me of the delicious Blackened Red Fish from Lake Pontchartrain that I enjoyed when I was in New Orleans. Aha! I had a connection with that horse. This strategy should be as good as any. I bet $2 on Lake Pontchartrain to win. The race began and the horses were off and running. They were all bunched together. I couldn't make out which horse was Lake Pontchartrain. A batch of horses came thundering in with one nosing out all the others. I couldn't tell which one that was. We all waited for the scoreboard to show the final result. At last, the board lit up with the name of the winner. It said Lake Pontchartrain! I had won on my first try! Astoundingly, my $2 bet won me $32!!! Lady Luck was definitely with this beginner horseplayer.
But she is a fickle lady. She left me for others for the next five races. My $32 was reduced to $22. Now the big one was on us - the Kentucky Derby. I studied my program. There it was - the twelfth horse - seductively beckoning out to me. Startac! This was such an obviously clear message. Could anything be closer to Star Trek? But there also was another horse with the word star in its name -- Balto Star. Not as close as Startac, but it still had the word star in it. And if you dropped the B from Balto, you would have alto, which in Spanish means "high." Star Trek soars high. This too could be telling me something a bit more subtly. I decided to bet $10 on both Startac and Balto Star.
The gates opened and horses were off and running. The announcer's booming voice narrated the race. "Balto Star is second," he intoned. The crowd and I cheered. "Come on Balto Star," I shouted. Thank goodness I covered my bet with two horses, I thought. But after the second bend, Balto Star began to fall behind. "Come on Balto Star! You can do it!" I urged. But that horse continued to fall back. Then the booming voice announced, "Startac is passing Balto Star." My gosh, I still have a chance! "Go Startac," I yelled. But Startac wouldn't move ahead. It continued to maintain its place in the pack. "Go Startac. Go," I pleaded. Suddenly, out from nowhere - literally from the back of the pack - came an incredible horse. It galloped past every one of the others and was thundering toward the finish all by itself. "Monarchos is ahead by four lengths," the announcer's voice bellowed excitedly. It was an awesome sight to see. A magnificent animal moving with powerful grace dashed across the finish line. "Monarchos has won the Kentucky Derby," the ecstatic voice announced. It was later declared that Monarchos' time, 1:59.97 minutes, was the second fastest in the Kentucky Derby's 127-year history. The fastest was Secretariat with l:59.4 minutes in 1973. This was an awe-inspiring experience - but I was poorer by $20. Startac came in tenth and Balto Star was fourteenth. My $32 winning from the second race was reduced now to $2 - the very amount I first bet on Lake Pontchartrain. At least I broke even. Thank you Michael Berry and all the wonderful people of Kentucky for an unforgettable - and not too costly - experience.
Two days after returning to Los Angeles, I dove into another major event - this one, a binational conference called the Japan-United States Conference on Cultural and Educational Interchange at the Japanese American National Museum. As well as serving as the Chairman of the Board of the Museum, I am a member of the Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission, a non-governmental federal agency. So I was doubly invested in this conference. It turned out a great success. Our panelists from throughout the U.S and senior officials from the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Education, distinguished leaders from academia, business and culture were in accord that this conference in Los Angeles was one of the best ever held in its forty-year history.
I had another quick voiceover gig before flying off again. This one was the popular "Jackie Chan" Saturday morning animated series. I was the voice of a wise and benign Buddhist priest. Jackie Chan was voiced by a versatile young actor named James Tse. Then, I was off to Atlanta, Georgia, for Vulcon, another Star Trek convention.
The lucky bonus with this trip was that my good friend, gifted writer Peter David, was getting married to his love, Kathleen, a stage manager, puppeteer, editor and all around renaissance woman, in Atlanta on the same weekend as the convention. What blessed serendipity! I arranged with Joe Motes, the organizer of the convention, so that I could manage both the wedding and the convention. He was most cooperative.
Peter and Kathleen were married in a charming chapel on the picturesque campus of Emory University. It was a lovely ceremony. But it was the reception that really captured the spirit of the couple. The venue was a converted former warehouse now called the Shakespeare Tavern. It is a theater patterned after the old Globe Theater of Elizabethan London. So eminently appropriate. Both Peter and Kathleen are theatrical people - she literally and Peter in every sense of the word. His personality, if anything, is colorfully theatrical. His bountiful talent is of the theater as well as literature. Indeed, he even looks like he could play Shakespeare's Falstaff. To top off the theatricality of the reception, the best man at the wedding also became the master of the revels of the reception. He was none other than literary lion, incendiary raconteur and volcanically outspoken convention speaker - Harlan Ellison. He was touching in his fondness of the couple; he was hilarious with anecdotes about their relationship; he was ribald with his jokes; he was inexhaustible and never-ending. Finally, Peter broke in. Peter too is an expert raconteur. The afternoon became a bountiful banquet table of words, words, words as well as good food. Among the guests was Bill Mumy, who you might remember as young Will Robinson in the television series, "Lost In Space." We laughed, we ate and we drank - much too much. It was a fantastical wedding reception - as it should be for Peter and Kathleen. May this marriage live long and prosper.