Chapter 36

Ashbulldromedhar, the village elder, nearly fainted when he heard Doug refuse to let him pay an exorbitant price for the fire starters. "Ashbull, are you unwell? You look stricken!"

"Doug, how can you say that I should not pay too much for the fire starters that we cannot obtain from any other source?"

"That's an easy question to answer. I want you to know that we are honest traders who do not take advantage of other people. We want to be long-time friends, not somebody who is tolerated just because he is needed. We need you as much as you need us, and you will learn how much we value our friends as we get to know each other better."

Doug and Ashbull talked for a while about the mechanics of getting the tea delivered in a form that can used to take them on a long ocean voyage. Suddenly, Ashbull's wife stormed into the meeting room and demanded, "Husband, do whatever is necessary to get us as many of those wonderful tampons as you can. We must have them, get that through your thick head, right now!"

Doug said, "I take it that you have found how helpful those tampons can be. How many women are in your village? I need to know so that I will have some idea of how many to bring in this first shipment."

They discussed the tampon requirements, and Doug said, "OK, We will have that many here within six weeks. I am sorry that we can't promise to have them here any sooner than that. We will try to deliver enough for three months' supply each trip. We will want tea leaves in exchange, for now, but we hope to find other things that we can use. I know that we have many other things that you people will want. I would like to show them to you if you will allow my people to come to your village to bring the samples we have with us."

Ashbull and his wife were practically jumping up and down in anticipation of the other marvels that Doug would show them. Doug used his portable radio to tell the men waiting at the motor launch to bring the other samples into the village.

The metal pots and pans were a giant hit, almost as big as the tampons! The men were impressed with the metal farm machinery and the metal hand tools. The locals were already scurrying around trying to come up with appropriate exchange items. Oranges! Kumquats! Now that was more like it; Doug was the one practically jumping up and down.

The tea was great, but the citrus fruit was even better. Doug was tempted to ask for a one-for-one exchange of citrus fruit for tampons, but he wasn't sure that he could bring that one off. What the hell, he was going to try! It took a lot of those little oranges to make a glass of orange juice, so he figured that he was justified.

By the next day, Ashbull and Doug had worked out an agreement to make his village a major port of call for import/export shipping from West, as the western hemisphere was now called. Doug was concerned enough about the security of the port that he assigned Venus #5 and Mars #5 to guard the port until a permanently assigned guard could be established. Ashbull assured Doug that he would have gathered a sizable quantity of tea and citrus fruit within three weeks.

Doug pointed out to Ashbull that his town needed a name to make communication easier. Ashbull agreed to naming the town, but he had no suggestion for a name. Doug, on a whim, asked Ashbull if he would accept the name of Calcutta, and Ashbull had no objections, since the name had no meaning in any language he knew of. Therefore, Calcutta became the name of the port.

Doug radioed for a cargo ship and airship/airplane combination to be sent over as soon as possible. He included a cargo list for the ship, which was very heavy on tampons, but also had fire starters and all kinds of metal ware.

Doug was spending a lot more time at each town than he had expected to, so he changed his plans. He gave up on trying to cover the whole southern coast of Asia, and decided to press inland to see as much of India as he had time for. Of course, time was no problem for Doug, but time was important for everyone else. He had already accomplished his main goals for this trip: finding tea and citrus fruit, and making alliances with the people of Asia.

They reorganized a bit and set out to the west with four airships and their airplanes. The Monsoon was late this year, so the expedition was able to make some headway with their exploration. There were few people in India, except where there was plenty of water, such as along rivers and around lakes. The land was densely covered with plant growth and the leaves formed a canopy that effectively hid the ground from the air.

The wind finally arrived and began to be too strong for the airships to make much progress against it. They rapidly hit the point of diminishing returns as far a ground covered, so they returned to Calcutta to rejoin the ships. The ship from San Diego had arrived and had been loaded with almost an overflowing load of fruit and tea. It sailed for San Diego just as the Monsoon winds got strong, so it had a real push to head for home.

There was no chance of Doug's expedition doing much exploration of India during the Monsoon season, so they decided to sail for the southern Philippines to find a site for an airplane base. The entire expedition left, since there was no need for anyone to remain at Calcutta. They had a strong push from the wind and had a quick voyage to their first destination.

Here, the winds were mild enough that the airplanes could still function, so they were used to scout for a good sea port which also make a good air port. They chose a place close to what would have become Zamboanga City in a future never to be. They marked a place for the facility, both sea and air, and spent a lot of time exploring the vicinity to make sure that there were no hostile locals they needed to contend with. They did find some "natives," but they were not likely to cause trouble. A few people were left with a radio station while the rest of the fleet sailed to Hawaii to establish the other air search station.

They landed at the beach near Pearl Harbor. Doug knew that he wouldn't find a better location for his port and air base than along here. It wasn't the southern most island in the group, but Pearl Harbor was just too good a harbor to pass up. The island was still unpopulated, so they did not have locals to worry about. They quickly cut a field large enough for planes to land, and Doug called for the weather scouts to come on out. The four planes showed up a few days later, and they set up in earnest. The winds were still too strong for a safe flight to Zamboanga, so they spent the time practicing flying out of Pearl Harbor.

Finally, word came from Zamboanga that the winds were dying down, so it was safe for the planes to make their second jump over water. Doug wanted to know what it was like to fly for that long over water, so he went along on the trip. The ships from the expedition left to meet him when they arrived in Zamboanga a couple of weeks later.

Doug was annoyed to discover that the sailing ships were just not going to compete successfully against the Monsoon winds. They were going to have to redesign their ships if they were going to have year-round commerce.

Doug led the expedition back to India to talk to Shinal and Ashbull about switching from barter to a cash economy. He spent a week in each town explaining the advantages of money and it was not too hard to sell the idea. Both towns were shipping items that were seasonal, but they wanted to import items that they needed at all times. Again, it was the tampons that were the final selling point, because both men knew what hell they would catch from the women if they ran out of tampons. Furthermore, they were beginning to trade inland, selling the items they were importing from West and buying produce of various kinds. Doug, through the Central Bank, loaned them the money they needed to operate until they could work with their own money.