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Odds are, this article would be in Chinese were it not for a twist of fate that made the mighty Ming dynasty turn isolationist after the death of Admiral Zheng He in 1433.

I remember reading about the exploits of China's legendary eunuch admiral, Zheng He (sometimes rendered Cheng Ho), as almost a casual footnote in the history books. All the big names in navigation were, of course, European: Ferdinand Magellan, Bartolomeu Dias, Vasco da Gama, Christopher Columbus. Occasionally I'd come across a reference to Leif Eriksson's discovery of North America in 1001; or an apocryphal tale of some intrepid (or gloriously intoxicated) Irish monk crossing the Atlantic in a coracle centuries before Columbus stumbled upon the West Indies.

It wasn't till fairly recently that the world has seen a resurgence of scholarly interest in the geopolitical significance of Zheng He's Seven Voyages between 1405 and 1433. Gavin Menzies published in 2002 a best-seller called '1421' in which he postulates that Zheng He had despatched a few ships from his gigantic Treasure Fleet to explore the oceans west of Africa, and that the Chinese had successfully circumnavigated the world a full century before Magellan (more on this at www.1421.tv). Menzies suggests, furthermore, that Zheng He's scoutships may have visited North America (where Ming pottery shards were recently unearthed), sailed as far south as Australia, and perhaps even the Antarctic. The eunuch admiral's navigators produced detailed maps which found their way to Europe, initiating a fever of maritime exploration at the beginning of the 16th century that saw Portugal, Spain, Holland, and England competing for supremacy at sea as a means to world domination.

In any case there can be no doubt whatsoever that the absolute master of the global seaways in the 15th century was Admiral Zheng He - loyal emissary of the Ming Court, supreme commander of the imperial Treasure Fleet, fearless explorer, and diplomat extraordinaire. Eunuch jokes aside, Zheng He was a ballsy larger-than-life hero who towered above his peers at a standing height of nine Chinese feet (approximately six-foot-eight by modern measure).

Zheng He's name at birth was Ma Sanpao. He belonged to a Central Asian tribe known as the Semur which converted to Islam before migrating to Yunnan Province. When the Chinese army invaded Yunnan in 1382, the 11-year-old Ma Sanpao was taken captive, castrated, and given as a personal slave to Prince Zhu Di, who seized the Ming throne from

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