Chump Ted returns to Buddhist roots




Bagan, Burma

So about six weeks ago, I reported that I had found a potential buyer for my business. The two women produced a good product, seemed to have the means and were workers. We agreed that they would rent out my kitchen to try their hand at providing meal service for two sororities. At that time, while they were chatting in the kitchen and I was killing time in my office, I wrote a short blog of my time as a cook on Finucane Island ~1982  a Western Australia mining camp.Well, over the weeks I started to notice more catering jobs under the name of their new catering business. They were essentially starting a new business without the painful expense of putting in their own kitchen and signing a lease somewhere. Instead of taking the entrepreneurial  jump, they were using all of my accumulated gear, picking up tips from me and my employee for very little money. The rent money was generous and supportive because I thought they were preparing to take over my business. A little evasion here, a little slick trick there and voila Chump Ted. How did I let that happen?
 

Back in my office today, their chatting really grates on my nerves, where it once was the sound of new blood and my escape plan. Now I realize that it is going to be a struggle right up to the end. Take several Buddhist deep breaths, remember that all this/everything is an illusion, and let it go?



Chef Ted going with the Buddhist flow, Rangoon, Burma ~1982

Although I didn't know it at the time that I was backpacking in Burma, I was immersed in a scene that was as Buddhist as it was going to get for someone from Richmond, Virginia ~1982. I was solitarily surrounded by the 9th century Kingdom of Pagan, Burma (now Bagan, Myanmar). Starting at the 9th century, over 10,000 temples, pagodas, monasteries, sitting Buddhas, reclining Buddhas, smiling Buddhas, etc. were constructed on the Mandalay plains alone. In was eerie as well as enlightening to be wandering around as the only tourist in these long since deserted and decaying edifices in their varying degrees of disrepair. Somedays, I would just sit with say a 800 year old giant Buddha and let it flow. Probably has kept me from stabbing someone in the neck who mistook Chef Ted for Chump Ted.