As I make my way down the dirt road, an old woman wrapped in a longyi beelines straight towards me.  She is not moving fast, or with particular urgency-- in Buddhist Myanmar everyone moves at a constant, calm, pace-- but her wrinkled eyes are locked on me, her bare feet pointed in my direction. ...

I pour the gold powder into a plastic Krewe de Vieux cup, following immediately with the mixing elixir, a slimy clear fluid that floats to the top like lard.  “Make sure you don’t do anything stupid with this stuff,” the shop attendant dressed as a wizard warned me a week ago....

On the treadmill, I am going nowhere.  My breath comes out in short gasps, my sneakers roaring in deafening thwacks as the conveyor belt circles round.  In front of me, a show about a horseback rider with cancer flickers silently on the TV.  I take a breath and keep on going.