shortly thereafter, Rama's attitude
changed. He began four-wheeling the desert sands while the rest of us
walked. He also banned from all desert trips those who were unable to
keep up.

I could have written the story of "Rama and the Menorah Incident." I
once placed in the window of my room a menorah, a traditional candle
holder used by Jews during the celebration of Hanukkah. But when my
housemate and mentor noticed, he looked at me askance. "What, are you
crazy?" he said. "Take it down right away!" It was inconceivable to me
that behind a mask of intellectual and religious tolerance could lie so
powerful a bent to control. I removed the menorah from my window.

I could have written the story of "Rama and the Satanic Billboard." In
1982 and 1983, Rama occasionally said that he'd like to place a
billboard of his face above the busy intersection of freeways 10 and
405 in Los Angeles. He seemed excited about including this message:
"666--We're Back".

And I could have written the story of "Rama and the Blade Runner Day."
"Would you like to meet Harrison Ford?" Rama asked me over the phone
in 1983. By then, many San Diego devotees had moved to the expanding
Centre in L.A., based largely on Rama's advice. Centre meetings in Los
Angeles were first held in a small room in Hollywood, and then in a
large room with a stage in Manhattan Beach. By the time meetings were
held in the ornate Beverly Theater on Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly
Hills, Rama commuted each week from his ocean-view Malibu rental to the
expanding Centre in San Francisco.

"You mean Hans Solo?" I asked. "You bet!" I drove west, then north,
toward Zuma Beach. Twenty minutes later, I turned down a long driveway
to Rama's house, which he claimed that he rented from Goldie Hawn.
Hawn wanted to sell; Ford wanted to buy; and Rama, Anne, and I wanted
to see, in real life, a favorite image from the magic screen.

Rama wore a colorful shirt patterned with scenes of the tropics,
similar to one worn by Allie Fox (Harrison Ford) in The Mosquito Coast.
Obsessed with creating a world of his own, Fox bares a captive
community to his innovative dreams, poisoned experiments, and
diminishing sanity.

Rama suggested that we act busy, so I went outside and pushed a broom.
I smelled smoke. Nearby brush fires had been fanned out of control by
increasingly strong winds. The thick, yellow sky reminded me of Blade
Runner, a science fiction film starring Harrison