Word: assad
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...amateur fascination with such questions might never have been satisfied if two years ago he had not met Nick Burningham, a maritime-heritage consultant who specializes in replicas of early Southeast Asian ships. Beale commissioned Burningham to create a design based upon the sculpture at Borobudur and then hired Assad Abdullah, an Indonesian with 30 years experience as a shipwright, to build the vessel...
...Burningham has built several replica ships, but the Borobudur, he says, was "my greatest challenge, the most speculative reconstruction I've ever worked on." In addition to the handful of ship carvings at Borobudur and a few vaguely analogous shipwrecks, he was also guided by Assad's instincts and experience. Burningham built a model based upon historical estimates of load and the limits of materials available at the time, then gave it to Assad to construct on the Indonesian island of Pagerungan Kecil. "He not only built from the model," says Burningham, "he also interpreted...
...ship was constructed from seven kinds of hardwood native to Indonesia and joined entirely by pegs, which Assad calls "tree nails." Burningham declares himself "just about satisfied" with the results. "Stability is adequate, not excellent, and the maximum speed is about 7 1/2 knots. She has a terrific motion and doesn't pitch or roll." The ship that he and Assad built is a funny-looking duck, with masts like narrow pointed ladders, canted sails and stout bamboo outriggers. The ship's captain, Alan Campbell, a Scotsman now living in Tasmania, recalls his first impression: "Some ships, when you first...
...Modifications in the design continued even a few days before the launch. Assad's team used traditional caulking, the sere bark of the paper tree, but it proved leaky, so they switched to standard marine waterproofing. Modern navigation and communications technology, such as the satellite-based global-positioning system, or GPS, have been installed with no apologies. Ports are cut in the ship's sides so that it can be propelled with paddles if there's no wind. The toilet, at least, can't be surpassed for authenticity: a meter-square box attached to the ship's starboard side, with...
...President Mohammed Khatami, whose attempts at reform have been stymied by supreme religious leader Ayatullah Ali Khamenei--may be able to quell this rebellion, as it did a similar movement in 1999, aided by progovernment civilian militias. "Our leader has ordered us to protect the revolution," said Assad, a corpulent militia member, as he attempted to stop cars heading to the protests Friday. Assad characterizes the students as "prostitutes and gays...