Oriental Kings

[Vietnamese Emperor Hàm Nghi in Algeria, circa 1930s]

Xi in Europe made me think of Oriental kings on that continent. Very few have come. Chinese potentates were notorious for not traveling. In their Forbidden Cities, they received all the groveling and coochies they needed, so why go anywhere? There’s nothing but repulsive barbarians beyond the Middle Kingdom.

The first yellow king to visit white countries was Batu Khan, of course. Arriving with a huge entourage, he enjoyed Hungary and Poland’s ambivalent hospitality. Going in the other direction, his cousin Kublai became, after lots of messy tussling, China’s emperor. Don’t you just love The Vapors’ “Turning Japanese”? Kublai tried hard to be Chinese. A polymath, Liu Bingzhong, then a scholar, Zhao Bi, were hired to help him. With determination, Kublai became more refined, fatter and softer, as is shown in his most famous portrait, by the Nepalese artist, Araniko (1245-1306).

Circa 1246, an Italian, Bohemian and Pole reached Karakorum, Mongolia. 1264 saw the arrival of Niccolò and Maffeo Polo to Dadu, now Beijing. Unknown whites have undoubtedly reached both before them.

Around 1296, a 42-year-old Marco Polo told another prisoner, Rustichello da Pisa, about his father and uncle’s reception by Kublai Khan:

When Messer Niccolò and Messer Maffeo arrived at the court, the Great Khan received them courteously and held lavish revels and festivities in their honour. He was thoroughly delighted that they had come. He asked them many questions: first as to the emperors, how they maintained authority and justice in their lands, went to battle and acted in every way; and then about the other kings, princes and other nobles.

Rustichello da Pisa had written Roman de Roi Artus, a French variation, elaboration, improvement or mistranslation of an Old French book owned by Edward I. Longshanks was in Italy on his way to Tunis. This lengthy king is remembered for establishing Parliament, strangling Wales, smashing Scotland, killing Simon de Montfort and expelling all Jews from the British Isles. With its population nearing four million, too many trees were already felled to make way for new villages.

Sitting in Vung Tau, I don’t understand how Rustichello could get his greasy hands on a volume owned by the great Edward I? On YouTube, there’s a clip of this greaser rather smugly declaring himself a Pisano and short story writer. “Il mio mestiere è scrivere.” You look more like some pickpocket from Poggibonsi.

The quoted passage is of an incident from 32 years earlier that Polo didn’t even witness. Plus, it’s written by someone proven to be, at times, fanciful. With Frances Wood’s Did Marco Polo Go to China? (1995), many now believe Polo is no grand explorer but history’s biggest liar! Snuffing out this nonsense, Nigel Cliff calmly points out:

Recent analyses of Chinese sources have revealed that the immense wealth of information he provides is in the main strikingly accurate—outmatching the sum total of surviving accounts by other travellers. […] He is the only visitor to explain how banknotes were manufactured from the bark of mulberry trees and to describe their appearance and denominations, and he accurately records the places where ‘paper money’ circulated and where it did not. The number of times the curfew bell rang in Beijing, the number of strokes dealt as punishment for crimes […]

Doubted from the beginning, Marco Polo simply unnerved the West. Cliff:

What really seems to have shocked Marco’s audience was his detailed depiction of entire civilizations that were completely unknown to them. This was a world where express messengers sped letters by foot, horse and dog-sled across thousands of miles in a matter of days, and where banknotes were legal tender when paper was barely known in the West; where palaces were built on the scale of cities, cities boasted thousands of bridges and pleasure lakes plied by boats carrying workers on dinner cruises, and rivers had been tamed and linked by canals that throbbed with commerce. To accept Marco’s descriptions as even half true was to entertain the deeply troubling notion that Western Christendom, by contrast, was hopelessly backward.

The last five centuries haven’t just eased Western anxiety, but made Occidentals supremely confident. Most came to believe their superiority was permanent. With the rest of the world adopting their clothing, using their inventions, aping their culture and speaking laughable English, this conviction appears unassailable. Occidentals who travel to the East tend to attract whores and hustlers, so they return to Birmingham, Boise or Perth only with amusing or infuriating accounts of devious child-sized inferiors. “Love you long time!” they recount to grinning buddies.

To think one has nothing to learn from others is, at the very least, dangerous. Pride is even a deadly sin in the West. As it sinks, pride parades proliferate. They’re proud to be crossdressers and queers.

Polo passed through Vietnam as it prepared for war with his soon-to-be boss, Kublai Khan. Three Mongol invasions failed to conquer this nation. Vietnam’s biggest hero against them was Trần Hưng Đạo. In Vung Tau, the tallest statue is of Jesus, at 104 feet. Trần Hưng Đạo claims the second tallest, at 33 feet. From his pedestal, the general can glower at sexpat bars Bearded Clam, Cucumber, Banana and Sugar. Of course, those inside couldn’t care less who this guy was.

Polo never entered the Angkor Empire, then already in decline.

In China, Marco was just bowled over, “Great Khan is the most powerful man, whether measured in subjects, lands or treasure, who exists in the world or ever did exist from the time of our first father Adam down to the present moment […] His frame is beautifully fleshed out, and all his limbs are admirably formed. His face is white and red like a rose; the eyes are black and beautiful, the nose shapely and well set.” Polo said all this years after being employed by the Mongol. There was no reason for him to kiss ass.

In the 19th century, all Oriental nations except Japan and Thailand were swallowed up by whites. The first Vietnamese emperor to reach Europe, then, came in defeat. Exiled to Algeria after a failed uprising, Hàm Nghi (1871-1944) didn’t just travel all over France, but bought the Château de Losse in the Dordogne. In Paris, he frequented Rodin’s studio and became friends with the poet Judith Gautier and painter Georges Rochegrosse. His French wife, Marcelle Laloë, was a judge’s daughter. Though forced to live outside Vietnam for 55 years, Hàm Nghi never stopped wearing Vietnamese clothing.

Hàm Nghi wasn’t the first Viet royal to marry a foreigner. In the 17th century, Lê Thần Tông (1607-1662) had six wives who were Vietnamese, Thai, Hmong, Chinese, Lao and Dutch. The world was brought to him. As John Donne said to the sun, “This bed thy center is, these walls, thy sphere.” History is endlessly fascinating and instructive, though not via Hollywood, America’s primary professor.

In 1897, King Chulalongkorn of Siam visited Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Norway, England, Belgium, Germany, Holland, France and Spain. Traveling with a large entourage that included 11 of his 33 sons, it was no bargain Europe Taster Tour, but Rama V could certainly afford it. Having been fêted by royalties at each stop, Rama V returned home satisfied.

To make sure he wasn’t seen as some savage monarch, Rama V and his sons were entirely dressed in Western clothing. A photo of them in Eton, England is a bit ridiculous, I must say, but no one beats the current king, Vajiralongkorn, with his crop top, low-rise jeans and fake tattoos. Thailand’s westernization has reached its apex! Now, I’ve done it. My next landing at Suvarnabhumi Airport will be my last. You won’t hear from me again.

There’s one photo of Rama V that’s adored by Thais. Shirtless and in a sarong, the king is cooking his own meal with a wok. He’s one of us! Who cares if it’s also staged.

[Thai King Chulalongkorn with 11 of his 33 sons in Eton, England, 1897]

[King Chulalongkorn cooking with a wok in Bangkok, circa 1890s]

[Thai Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn at a German airport in 2016]

[marriage of Hàm Nghi and Marcelle Laloë in Algiers, 1904]