The three packaged gods hit my cold bedroom floor like tombstones. I dropped the rest of my luggage, which smelled of jet fuel, nearby. No one was waiting for me this time. Juan Li was in Europe teaching T'ai chi. There was a short, terse letter from Donna. "Please don't write or call. It's too painful for me."

Six years had stretched out into eternity. "I'll be dead from old age before this project is finished," I thought. South Africa and Brazil are so far away. Maybe I could do one trip in the winter, another in the spring. South Africa wouldn't be easy with all the trouble there. But then, nothing had been easy. Why should this be any different?

For the next month, as the winter holidays approached, I felt as if the stone gods were tied to my arms and legs. I went dully through my assignments taking uninspired pictures, wondering if the power I had felt so strongly in New York -- and which had propelled me to Iceland, Berlin, the Baltic Sea, Puerto Rico and finally to Japan for what I had thought was surely my final act -- would ever return.

Yet unlike the winter that Donna and I returned from Japan, the world was a friendly place: there were no car accidents, no death threats, illness. Instead the phone rang constantly with prospects for work, and unlikely people offered words of encouragement.

At a Christmas party I ran into Don George, the editor who had published my first Shinto article several years before. He was now the San Francisco Examiner's travel editor, and suggested that I, "Call Varig, the Brazilian airline. Use my name. Tell them you're writing a travel story." George couldn't help with South Africa, which was an off-limits story to most travel publications because of the international boycott.

Then one day my landlord stopped by. I told him about my dilemma, the problem of organizing two major sojourns below the equator. He suggested doing both at once. "Have you ever looked at a map to see how close Rio is to South Africa?"


As my plans shaped up, I wrote Kazz to tell him the good news. I would travel by Varig to Rio, then catch a flight to Johannesburg. I would first place a god in South Africa, then, on my way back, I would place two gods in South America. Varig discounted me a three week unlimited plane pass so I could fly to the Amazon as well as to Iguasuc Falls on the border with Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil -- the other South American spot where I had decided to place a god. Kazz wrote back saying to be especially careful, that the teacher had warned him that these were powerful places. He reminded me of the special chants I had learned at Iwakiyama and not to forget to take the replica of the sword with me. He wished me good luck, and said that the group would conduct a special ceremony to protect me.


The trip began on the 28th of February, 1988, the first day of the Chinese New Year. (It was the year of the Dragon, the same legendary animal under which both Kazz and I were born.) In my excitement about the trip I imagined a dramatic ending to the project after I placed the gods at the Cape of Good Hope, Iguasuc Falls and in the Amazon river. I would be arrested as a danger to the state by a South African goon squad:

"No, no, don't take him away," a voice would cry from a crowd that had gathered to give me a hero's welcome. "He was only doing it for our good. For the world. Don't punish him!"

Finally, after a world-wide outcry I would be released. "No, not the Nobel Peace Prize!" I'd say humbly. "I really don't deserve it. But my Japanese teacher, it was his idea."

Or maybe I'd be captured by a wild Amazon tribe. I would impress them with a few tricks I had learned from the teacher, and they would revere me as their wizard. Then I would be saved by a group of California ecologists who happened to be on a safari to protect the rain forests or something.

Or, or perhaps a romantic ending: I'd meet a beautiful woman who'd think that placing Shinto gods was heroic, that I was a warrior fighting for peace. She wouldn't question my motives. She wouldn't argue with me. She would support me (she would be rich, of course). I wasn't clear what would happen after I met her, after we fell in love. Maybe the ending should take place at an airport, like the final scene in Casablanca? A kiss? Goodbye? Hello? Should I go or should I stay?

It was all good fantasy. In real life, the closure I craved would come -- but not as I expected.


For a few moments, at the Johannesburg airport, I thought one of my fantasies had materialized. She was standing alone, reading a map. She had long dark hair, pulled gracefully back, and she was wearing red framed glasses. Even with travel-worn clothes she looked urbane and sophisticated. When the downtown bus pulled up she got on first, so I followed and sat next to her. She was French but spoke English. We had been on the same plane from Rio, it turned out. I asked if I might look at her guide book. I told her it was impossible to find a guide book on South Africa in the States.

Her name was Pascale and -- so much for the romantic fantasy -- she was married. She was a medical doctor, from Paris, but lived with her husband, a surgeon, and their child in Tahiti. They were tired of Tahiti, but didn't want to move back to France.

"In France, we are stuck. If we want to switch fields in medicine, even if we go back to school, we are not allowed. If we moved here, we could."

"But why South Africa?" I asked incredulously. "This country is a mess."

"You can't believe everything you read," answered Pascale. "I want to see for myself."

At dinner that night we learned that our itineraries were nearly identical. We agreed to share the cost and driving of a rental car and explore the country together.


Over the next three weeks we drove over three thousand miles, possible largely because of good roads and Pascale's passion for fast driving. We started in Johannesburg and crossed the Transvaal to Krueger National Park, then through the independent country of Swaziland and along the Indian Ocean coast past Durban and Port Elizabeth before ending our travels in Cape Town.

I saw incredible wealth, clean modern cities, and the most developed highway system in all of Africa. It was not only human wealth: the countryside burst with fertility and power.

And yet I always reminded myself that we traveled the white man's road, a privileged road which led mostly to white homes and farms. We saw the other roads from a distance. They were small, narrow and full of potholes, poorly maintained. These were the roads that led to the other Africa, to the townships and to the homelands. I only knew about these areas from books, magazines and film. I would have liked to explore and attempt to understand that part of Africa, but it would have to wait for another trip.

Pascale and I traveled well together, and I appreciated her insight and companionship. But when we discussed politics we invariably argued.

I'd recite my book knowledge and point out the huge inequities that existed between the whites who, with their 18% of the population, had confined the blacks to 13% of the land. She replied that the rest of Africa lived in dismal poverty and disease.

"You are so critical of the whites," Pascale would say. "Give them a chance! At least they haven't done what your country did to the Indians."

We argued about the international boycott: I said it was necessary to force South Africa into realizing the immorality of the apartheid system, and she argued that putting the economy into a tailspin mostly hurt the poor, a position backed up by nearly all the non-whites we spoke with.

"You Americans are so self-righteous, so quick to judge. What do you know about this country?

She had a point. I was finding South Africa as difficult to understand as Japan. During our stay in Johannesburg we met a man named Adrian Turgel, a white man in his early 30's. Adrian spoke nearly perfect Zulu, and had been arrested several times for his advocacy of black property rights. He immediately corrected me when I called the situation in South Africa a problem between blacks and whites.

"No, no , he said impatiently. "It is about tribalism."

He said that among blacks, there were the Zulu-speaking tribes, the Xhosa-speaking tribes, the Tswana-speaking tribes and the Swazi-speaking tribes -- to name just a few -- who often feuded with each other. Even within the European community, there were tribal differences: The people of English descent touted distinctly different political and culture views than the Afrikaaners, the South Africans of Dutch descent. The Afrikaaners owned and tilled the land. The English were the traders, the coastal people who favored a more liberal polices toward blacks.

But I didn't need books or history lessons to tell me about the prevalence of fear. The fear wasn't only among the blacks and "colored" who daily faced oppression and violence, but also among the fortified and privileged whites. It hung over the country like a dense smog, inescapable. One day I went to an Afrikaaner bank to cash a traveler's check, and before I opened my bag or mouth the teller addressed me in English.

"Why?" I asked.

"You look so relaxed, you have to be a foreigner," she answered.

At one point we were driving through a township near Durban when suddenly, as we turned a corner, we encountered a huge yellow tank full of soldiers, a "Yellow People Eater", as they were not-so-fondly called.

Another time we picked up a black hitchhiker who told us she worked as a common clerk despite her college degree. "I'm actually colored, " she told us, "but why should people ask me whether I'm Indian or black or whatever? I'm HUMAN!"

"Poor South Africa," I said to Pascale after we dropped the woman off. "We can safely drink the water. Big deal."

"If you die from bad water it's a big deal," she said.


Just after Krueger Park I told Pascale about the Shinto project. Telling stories is like giving away something precious, and I hoped that she'd appreciate what I was giving her. Instead she listened without comment, and her indifference made my words seem empty. "She thinks I'm a crazy Californian," I thought. "I better shut up."

But later, when I brought up my love life, I realized that she had been listening. I told her about Donna, about our difficulties, and about our eventual split, which I suspected was partially caused by my commitment to the Shinto project.

"You choose this project -- putting simple stones around the world -- over her?" she asked incredulously. "This is what you think? There was something else, no? She was ugly? Stupid? You didn't like her?"

"It's more complicated than that. She wanted to live in New York."

"That doesn't matter. You can make things work if you want," Pascale said quickly. "Didn't she help you?"

"Yes," I said reluctantly. "She was very helpful."

"Did she believe this, this peace project would actually work?"

"I'm not sure. But, you know, I never asked her directly what she thought of the project. I know she saw it as a kind of huge art project, a performance piece."

"She knew you had to do it alone, right?"

"Well, yes, actually she did say that she understood that it was my project. That's why she didn't want to interfere."

"The hero. I know men like you. They are out to save the world. You think you have to do this, to prove yourself. I wouldn't have been so patient."

"She wasn't all that patient."

"Do you really think being a hero makes that much difference to a woman?"

"You don't understand."

"Yes, I don't understand," she said. "But you don't either. You haven't figured out where Donna -- or any woman -- belongs in your life."

"Maybe. But this story isn't about Donna and me."

"Of course it is. All stories are about love. What else is there?"

"Now you sound like her! But how can I talk about women, or even have a relationship, when I can't even get over my own fears?"

I was quiet a long time. I finally said, "Donna and I were like brother and sister. She helped me express my internal world through art. She polished me. I think I helped her too: I helped her to New York where I'm sure she'll be discovered. She'll be a famous artist.

"We were good for each other, really," I said. "But I think we pushed it about as far as we could. I wasn't ready to be with a woman in another way."

"Then maybe that should be your next project," she said. "Women. It would be more interesting and you might learn something really useful."


After nearly three weeks in South Africa I still carried the Shinto god. It wasn't for lack of choice: there was the fantastic beauty of the Transvaal and Krueger Park, and the dramatic Indian Ocean coast. Of course, I could always point to some tangible reason for not placing the god: lack of water, simple privacy, or convenience. But mostly I just felt: not now. Relax. Have faith.

By the time we arrived in Durban, on the southern coast, I was tired and irritable. It didn't help when I saw a white woman yank her three-year-old from a freshwater pool at a playground near the beach. The child was playing with two black children her age and the mother had a fit. The child reached sadly back to her playmates. It was a pitiful sight, worse even than the signs on the beach designating "whites only" areas. "Why the hell can't they get it together," I thought. "Stupid people! They have so much, why don't they just share?" Pascale, who witnessed the scene, was also shocked.

The next day, at a hotel restaurant in Port Elizabeth, we met a South African doctor and his wife, who was from Namibia. He was an expatriate now, living in Canada, who had just returned to South Africa for a short vacation. I told him about the incident. He looked embarrassed and shrugged.

He told us that he had left his native country for three reasons: he didn't want to serve in the army; he could make more money in Canada; and apartheid. In that order.

"South Africa will become black eventually," he said. "It's inevitable. But it will take an act of God, a miracle, divine intervention to make it a peaceful transition."

Pascale listened to him carefully. Like me, she hadn't found what she was looking for. The bland towns bored her. The food was uninspired. She was getting fed up with the people. How could she live and work in this environment? What would she tell her husband?

"Isn't there any place in South Africa one can get a decent meal? Go to a concert? An opera?" she asked.

"You haven't been to Cape Town?" the doctor asked.

I said no, it was our last destination. We'd probably be there tomorrow.

"It's different," he said, "You'll see."


We returned to our separate rooms. A refrigerator motor kicked in and I turned on the television to drown out the noise. Dallas, the American soap, was playing and I turned the TV off. I stuffed plugs into my ears. Before I fell into an anxious sleep I wondered what I would do if Cape Town wasn't right. Where would I place the god? I couldn't stay in South Africa forever...


When the nightmare began I was at the top of the stairs leading out of the bomb shelter, rather than inside. The violent noise, which usually came from behind the escape hatch, now came from behind the door, which I slammed shut after running up the stairs. I was terrified as usual. But this time I looked around me and saw Kazz and the teacher dressed in white robs. As they waved swords above their heads, they chanted.

I turned back to the door and cried the words, Amaterasu-omikami, repeating the strange Japanese incantation to the sun goddess over and over. I reached for the doorknob. Suddenly the door flung open. An evil stench slammed into me. Then something horrible, without form, gripped me. I struggled and turned back to Kazz and the teacher, but they had disappeared. I was alone.

"Go away! Go away!" I screamed. Never had I been so close to the creature who had guarded the door. I felt nauseous and overwhelmed. The more I struggled, the more I became entwined with the creature. I reached for the doorknob and grabbed it for support.

I don't know where the voices came from. Surely they were my own. They were soft and tender and not at all filled with terror. I was suddenly aware of my heart beating furiously. For the first time since Kazz and the teacher disappeared I felt the presence of others -- powerful others, who, like the evil one, were formless. I had the vague feeling that these were the great savants of the world: Buddha, Mohammed, Confucius, and Christ, the great teachers who preached the universal lesson of love. They were all talking to me. Now it was Christ's voice I heard.

"You!" I cried.

"Who did you expect?" The voice answered calmly.

"Help me!"

"Let go. Relax. Open your heart. Now!"

I began to pray. It was a very simple prayer. It wasn't for me; it was for the people of South Africa, so full of fear and hate.

Then I took a deep breath, and as I released the air I imagined myself pliant like a willow tree. All the while the evil swept past me in spasms, buffeting me with unimaginable forces. This went on for a long time, but I kept breathing deeper and deeper, imagining that my heart was opening wider and wider until it encompassed the very evil itself. Then I let go of my grip on the doorknob, and suddenly I was on the other side feeling porous and floating happily above the stairs. There was no sign of the beast or the door.

When I awoke I was clutching the tiny sword Kazz had given me for protection. I turned to my side and placed it carefully on the dresser, and fell back into an easy sleep.


The next morning I was relieved when Pascale offered to drive. I pushed my seat back, so exhausted from my night of revelation that I hardly noticed the fantastic speeds she was hitting. I stared at the green hills, then at the well-tended vineyards that bordered the road. Far away, lightning struck a mountain range. Huge bolts shattered the air and I watched the show with amazement.

After a while I dozed.


"Cape Town!" cried Pascal, slapping my leg. "It's beautiful."

The sky cleared, except for one small cloud which spouted a rainbow that dropped to a cluster of elegant buildings. Pascale stopped the car so I could snap a picture. Table Mountain rose dramatically 3,500 feet above the town, its sheer cliffs wet from the rains. Wisps of fog swirled around the summit.

As we drove to the center we both felt an immediate change. This town was unlike anything we had seen in the rest of South Africa. If Johannesburg felt like Los Angeles, with its impersonal highrises and suburbs sprawling out from no apparent center, Cape Town was like San Francisco. The streets were crooked and narrow, the buildings old, dating all the way back to 1652 when the city was founded by Dutch traders. The air was sweet and fresh from the two oceans that engulfed the Cape. I felt at home.

We found a lovely old hotel near the spacious legislative complex. The clerk was friendly and relaxed. That night we dined on ostrich steaks and fresh salad, and agreed it was the best food we'd eaten in three weeks. As we strolled the city after dinner we saw people of different races walking hand in hand. I went to sleep confident that I had found a place for the god.

(Of course not all was well in Cape Town: the next day I was on my way to attend a student demonstration when a hitchhiker warned me that it might get nasty. "The police shoot to kill," she said. Just outside the campus, I was turned back by a group of stern "colored" soldiers carrying convincing machine guns. They said it would be better if I left.)


I envisioned that when the time came for me to place the god, I would go alone. I couldn't imagine Pascale would be interested. But when I told her my plans, she wanted to come along.

"At first, I was sure you didn't know what you were doing," she said. "But you are so persistent."

"You thought it was stupid."

"It might be. It might not. Now I am not sure."


Together we drove along the north shore of the Cape. We stopped at a supermarket that could have been transplanted from the United States and bought a roasted chicken, bread and wine, and picnicked on a huge bolder overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. We watched seals play carelessly in the combers. Near the car a baboon arrogantly strolled in search of a tourist handout. We gave it a banana and drove on.

At the Cape of Good Hope there were hordes of German and British tourists posing on the ledge overlooking the Indian and Atlantic oceans. It was foggy with intermittent blue.

I found a ledge about 100-200 meters up and watched the two seas join together between puffs of wind and fog. Pascale placed herself on a ledge above me and snapped pictures as I steadied myself in preparation for tossing the god.

"Careful," she yelled down at me. "Don't get so close to the ledge."

There was no need for worry. I wasn't going to slip or jump. There would be no such dramatic ending to this story. The finale -- and this would take me years to fully understand -- had already occurred. It was that moment in my nightmare when I finally had the power to face my worst fears and open the escape hatch door. The Sword of Heaven -- the Shinto peace project -- had both pushed me toward the door and given me the means to open it; the receptiveness of my heart had ultimately protected and saved me from the evil.

And what did I find on the other side of the door?

Love? God? Call it what you will; for me it simply translated into peace of mind and the end of a crippling nightmare.


The god left my hand and flew through the air. It splashed just off the rocky beach, into the crashing surf.

Pascale cried for me to hurry --she was flying back to Johannesburg, while I planned to return to Brazil and place my last two Shinto gods. I stared across the two oceans for a long time before scrambling up the cliff.

Epilogue