Word: dais
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...days, Bao Dai's favorite sport (in addition to chasing chorus girls) was tracking down tigers, elephants and gaur (fierce wild buffalo) on foot through the jungle. That took intelligence and guts. Both traits are needed in the fierce jungle of Viet Namese politics, and Bao Dai is displaying both. The Communist radio had predicted that he would be assassinated; the French authorities were so concerned that at public ceremonies they kept the crowds 100 yards from His Majesty and gave him an armored car. But Bao Dai scorned such protection. At Hanoi, which he proclaimed his capital...
...Medieval Touch. Bao Dai is gaining support. Many nationalists who in the past fought the French are joining him. They have come to believe that the French are sincere in giving Indo-China self-rule. By year's end, Viet Nam will run its own courts, finances, railways and utilities. The French will have to retain a heavy hand in military affairs; they are now training a Viet Namese national army of 90,000 to complement the 130,000 French troops now in Indo-China. Chief problem of the French is to clear the Communists from the country...
...most remarkable of these is perky little Ho Phap, self-styled pope of Caodaism, a faith (founded by him in 1926) which combines belief in everything from Confucianism to Christianity. Ho Phap, who claims 2,000,000 disciples, has a private army of 20,000 which provides Bao Dai's personal guard and bitterly fights the Communists as enemies of religion...
Among Bao Dai's other loyal followers are the Mois, a million G-stringed men and bare-breasted women who still lead a nomad life in the uplands. Last June, Buddhist Bao Dai personally took the oath of allegiance of a Moi tribal chief. The Mois still live under their ancient tribal laws, including the one that covers adultery. The first time an adulterous wife is caught, her lover is punished for seducing her. The second time, she is punished for permitting herself to be seduced again. The third time, the husband is punished-for not knowing...
This quaint law of Father & Mother Bao Dai's subjects has its larger applications. In the past, the French (and all the West) might blame Communist successes on the Communists, who seduced Asia's millions, or on the people, who let themselves be seduced. But today, in Indo-China and elsewhere, it is clearly up to the West to keep Asia's people in line, by offering them a better life than the Communist tempters...