Product Description

Eric Hansen survives a cyclone on a boat off the Australian coast, cradles a dying man in Calcutta, and drinks mind-altering kava in Vanuatu. He helps a widower search for his wife's wedding ring amid plane-crash wreckage in Borneo and accompanies topless dancers on a bird-watching expedition in California. From the Maldives to Sacramento, from Cannes to Washington Heights, Eric Hansen has a way of getting himself into the most sacred ceremonies and the most candid conversations.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #106865 in Books
• Published on: 2005-10-18
• Released on: 2005-10-18
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 240 pages

From Publishers Weekly
The best, most enduring travel writers don't invite readers to merely view vistas through other eyes, but take the trip further, deep into the psychology of place. Hansen (Stranger in the Forest; Motoring with Mohammed) does just that in this lyrical collection that is equal parts travelogue, memoir and anthropological treatise. He details explorations from his 20s, 30s and 40s (he's now 57), all of which are compelling, surprising and utterly memorable. Though some are set in Europe, most take place in distant, alluring places in Asia and the South Pacific. "Night Fishing with Nahimah" recalls Hansen's extended 1977 trip to the Maldives Islands near Singapore, where he journeyed to smuggle fish from the islands to the mainland. In the Maldives, he encountered an island paradise awash in contradictions, devoutly Muslim yet devoid of sexual inhibitions. (Hansen also nearly died there from severe hepatitis.) "Listening to the Kava" takes him to the outer islands of Vanuata, where he partakes of a hallucinogenic drink with local men. "Life at the Grand Hotel" evokes Hansen's months-long stay on Thursday Island in the Pacific after the prawn trawler he was working on nearly capsized in a storm. The wild goings-on at the seedy little hotel are hilarious, poignant and distinctly of another era. But Hansen's most enthralling tale is "Life Lessons from a Dying Stranger," about how, while negotiating Calcutta's bureaucratic maze for shipping large packages, Hansen volunteers at Mother Teresa's "Nirmal Hriday" (Home for Dying Destitutes). This haunting vignette alone makes this magical book worthwhile.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
*Starred Review* This extraordinary collection of short essays may leave readers disoriented as it leaps from the French Riviera to the South Pacific, India, Manhattan, California, Borneo, and back to California. But the characters Hansen meets along the way anchor themselves indelibly in the reader's imagination. In spare, unsentimental, yet deeply moving prose, Hansen relates a story of human generosity featuring a retired ballerina who shelters a homeless woman and strikes up a deep, abiding friendship. Hansen's accounts of his sojourns on isolated islands of the South Pacific strip away inhibitions of Western culture, giving him freedom to explore extremes of unabashed life, sex, and love, along with ritual hallucinogenic drugs. A brief stop in Calcutta to ship his worldly goods back to America turns into months of battling an incorrigible bureaucracy yet yields great blessing as he volunteers his idle hours as a barber in Mother Teresa's hospice. A second portrait of a ballerina, this time a retired Russian who has become a society caterer while living in a decaying Manhattan neighborhood, chronicles how an undaunted spirit can overcome life's worst reverses. Other delightful, affecting surprises await in these narratives of uncommon and daring lives. Mark Knoblauch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year

"Three decades spent crisscrossing the map . . . have honed in [Hansen] a meticulous knack for observations and the confidence to describe what he sees in both bold strokes and fine ones. One after another, remarkable figures leap from these pages vibrant and alive."
--San Francisco Chronicle

"The kind of exhilarating read that awakens your sense of wonder. . . . Eric Hansen has a lively curiosity, a good eye for detail and a swift, engaging prose style. When he travels, he doesn't merely observe but plunges fearlessly into the unknown." --The Washington Post

"Deft storytelling, flavorful prose, a canny gift for bringing characters alive on the page, a receptivity to all that is strange and unruly in our world--these traits make Hansen an extraordinarily pleasurable and eye-opening author to read." --The Seattle Times

"By turns revealing, enlightening, and just plain fabulous fun. . . . A wonderful and satisfying read." —The Boston Globe

"[There is] sheer lunatic joy to be found in these essays. . . . Hansen's curiosity, ability to meet people on their own terms and willingness to try just about anything make the experience fascinating. His gentle, straightforward prose and the fact that the reader truly never knows what will happen next make Bird Man rewarding reading." --The Miami Herald

"[An] inspired collection. . . . These are heartfelt reports from the road, told with simple eloquence and gentle humor."
--Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"In his range, his clarity, and his depth of understanding, Eric Hansen is the match of any travel essayist at work today. To travel well is a rare skill; to write about such travels as well as Hansen does is art. The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer does more than entertain--it informs and transports the reader in a way that is second only to the experience itself. That's the sign of a master. "
--Joe Kane, author of Savages

"A riot. . . . Hansen has done things worthy of awe and jealousy." --Entertainment Weekly

"The intrepid traveler can spin a good yarn, knowing how to go beyond the externals of exotic and not-so exotic locations to get to the heart and soul of a place. . . . Written with the lyricism, structure and knowing touches of a fine work of short fiction."
--San Jose Mercury News

"A real travel professional. . . . Hansen draws out-loud guffaws. . . . Unlike many world-wearied writers, Hansen avoids studied cynicism and forced sentimentality." --New York Times Book Reivew

"A fine journalist. . . . The way he . . . builds both tension and pathos, is so touching that the reader is drawn into the story. . . . He's so good at descriptions of place, the magic of travel, and the mystery at the edges of the world." --The Oregonian

"Eric Hansen a traveler's traveler--curious, imaginative, subtle, and brave. The Bird Man and Lap Dancer is the latest report from his life of adventure, told with typical style and verve.  It should be read, enjoyed, and passed among friends." --William Langewiesche, author of American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center

"Moving. . . . Hansen writes [with] a resonance and psychological depth not usually seen in more routine travel narratives. . . . Each story combines nuanced portraits of memorable characters with lyrical descriptions of human fallibility and generosity . . . [that make] this heartfelt collection a magical and uplifting read." --The Economist

"Eric Hansen's lovely book of true-life adventures is a gift. Few writers aspire to such honesty, or manage it so engagingly. A compelling read." --Bill Barich, author of Laughing in the Hills

"Imagine the world of Joseph Conrad invaded by a real-life Rocky Horror Picture Show. But there's more to Hansen's stories than mere weirdness and wonder. Some of them are private memories, polished by time; others conceal parables. All are simply and beautifully told." --Tim Mackintosh-Smith, Yemen: The Unknown Arabia

"Each essay [is] more fantastic than the one before. . . . Hansen's world is not just a world of romantic adventure, but a world of complex human interaction that a less-perceptive writer would have not been able to bring home. . . . If you want to be totally entertained by an exotic and bizarre cast of really cool folks told in a clear and enjoyable style, get a copy of The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer. It's quite a trip." --Anniston Star

Customer Reviews

Barn Dance at Sea
This is the first book by Hansen I've read, and I enjoyed it. It is a very funny and quick read. There are not many travel writers who describe events like "It was like an all-male barn dance at sea." Or describe a man spitting his flaming dentures off a pier on Thursday Island.

Also interesting for birders
This is what I wrote to a USA forum of birders (birdwatchers):
Eric Hansen, well known from his impressive travel stories located in Yemen and Borneo, has published a collection of short stories titled the Bird Man and the Lap Dancer - Close Encounters with Strangers. The main story is about a real wildlife biologist in California and the interest a few female 'special club' dancers developed for going out with him to go birdwatching. It's not hard to believe how weird this story is, but possibly in a different way from what you think. Even though birding practically disappears from halfway this 45 pages long story, it's interesting enough from the birding perspective alone. There is even some serious talk about birding, like the standardising of bird census techniques in the USA. Good to know that these subjects have made it to the world literature!
The other eight stories are not about birding but often show Hansen's great gift in describing outdoor atmosphere.

All of My Stories Are True
My Aunt Dagmar once told me - `All of my stories are true and some of them actually happened.' I strongly believe that is a sentiment shared by Eric Hansen.

"The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer" is an excellent read. Hansen is a first-rate writer and has no problem holding the reader's interest from one page to the next and from story to story. I was somewhat surprised to find that the first story was a character study about a relationship between two women rather than a travel story per se. However, as I read on, Hansen made me realize that travel is not just about place, but also about the people the traveler will come across in his or her journeys and I grew to appreciate the subtitle - "Close Encounters with Strangers."

I am not at all disappointed in the tales the author has to relate. But, deep down I feel that is mostly what they are - tales. This is especially true of the title story. Perhaps I come to this conclusion because in this story Hansen at times seems to lose his narrative thread and delve a little too deeply and a little too long into the psyche of the characters rather than the encounter. This story, to me, feels like a fantasy and firmly embeds this book in to the growing genre of "creative nonfiction."

While I would not place this book in the Travel section, I do highly recommend it to any one who is interested in reading about colorful people in exotic settings.