Most people live on a lonely island
Lost in the middle of a foggy sea.
Most people long for another island,
One where they know they will like to be.

In 1904, the Dutchman W.O.J. Nieuwenkamp becomes the first foreign artist to visit Bali, arriving on the island with a bicycle which proves useless as the island has few suitable roads [source: Bali tourism guide].

Which has nothing to do with the fictitious island of Bali Ha'i as celebrated in song in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical "South Pacific" which is in fact inspired by James Michener's stories set on the islands of the New Hebrides (later the Republic of Vanuatu) where he was stationed during WWII.

Some mysteries in life just sneak up on you.  One of the underlying premises of this project has been that you can pinpoint birth and death.  I mean, that 1904 is the precise and pivotal point in Time when not only the Past truly ended, but the Present was conceived -- that those elements came into being in 1904 which would shape the very fabric of Today and create the iconic elements of the 20th Century and the Modern post war era for (at least) the next 108 years. (counting from 1904 which puts us at 2012 which is another whole story).

In other words,  I'd always assumed (making an ass out of u and me!) that a seminal work so dear to my heart like South Pacific would reveal itself to be possessed of 1904 associations.  But I was wrong!  I invite anyone else to try, with the sad caveat that I have come up empty-handed.  Oh, I got close -- Leland Heyward, one of the producers, (for whom my old friend Jack once used to work) was born in 1902, as was Richard Rodgers and a whole boat load of other folks who came in around the same time, so close but no cigar.  I suppose I could stretch and say "Peter Pan" premiered in 1904 and Mary Martin got a Tony and an Emmy (for the television version) for her performance in the title role in addition to a Tony she'd already gotten for South Pacific (and then Sound of Music too -- hello, talk about Everything Important!) but -- I know, I know.  Close again, and yet... no deal.

Then as I begin to examine the matter more closely, even deeper mysteries reveal themselves.  Like, when did my parents actually see the Broadway production (before I was born, of course -- the show ran on Broadway from '49 to '54; the film came out in '58).  I mean, they had to have seen it.  I spent countless hours hunched over an old portable record player set up behind my Dad's armchair in a corner of the living room listening to the double 33 rpm boxed set of the original Broadway cast ablum.  But why there?  Was I close to an outlet?  Was I hiding?  "You seen the kid?"  "No, not for hours, and where's that music coming from?"  Do you hide behind a chair and listen to "Some Enchanted Evening" over and over and not raise any eyebrows?  Or was this before they figured out you needed glasses and still thought you might be a little slow?

My feelings when I look at Mary Martin [1913-1990] and Ezio Pinza [1892-1957] in that open locket of a ship's anchor are rich and complicated.  What design team decided blackout-window-shade green and bitter lemon yellow said romantic tropical paradise?  You call that marketing?  And does anyone remember a tiny grainy black-and-white publicity still on the back of the album box of sailors singing to Mary Martin with their shirts off?  

                                            

The romance of islands: years afterward when I would lie in my room with the door locked listening to Simon and Garfunkel sing about being a rock and an island and having poetry to protect me, did some echo of Bloody Mary seducing John Kerr (sigh) with tales of Bali Ha'i come to mind?  Was a fat Polynesian lady calling to me from a foggy island, or was it the blotter acid and I couldn't really sit up?  [RJK should relate]

Does a rock really feel no pain?  I remember wondering, as the ceiling flew away.  Does an island never cry?