There are so many things to catch up on with this blog. I didn’t expect to become so busy so fast, but I suppose that is a good sign. The next series of blogs are an attempt to fill in the gaps over the past two weeks. I begin at the beginning, which is always the best place!
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| Memorial Chorten on Losar Year of the Male Water Dragon 2012 |
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| Prayer Flags over the River |
Chris and I began our virgin journey in the new car on a hazy, early spring day. We were both a bit nervous about the drive. The single east/west road in Bhutan is a narrow, endlessly twisting strip of blacktop that more often than not disintegrates into pitted ruts and holes large enough to take out any car’s suspension with in a single moment. Have I mentioned that in Bhutan people drive on the left side of the road—so the driver’s seat and gearshift are on the opposite side of the car than what we are so used to? Driving is, therefore, very slow, especially in a car like ours where the motor is about the size of a lawn-mower. But happily, the car climbed easily up the long, serpentine pass of Dochu-la and I actually began to have fun wrenching the steering wheel from side to side while simultaneously attempting to see far enough ahead to stomp on the brakes if and when a huge dump truck was bearing down on us. As we crested the top of the Dochu-la, we were forced to stop for an hour while a giant excavation machine worked to clear the huge boulders and piles of mud and sand that had covered the road over the night in a landslide. This kind of delay is exactly what makes a 7-8 hour journey into a 12 hour journey. As we waited, we watched the mist slide through the needles of the tall pines that blanket the top of the pass and sipped Chris’s concoction of very strong, very sweet, black tea from a thermos.
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| Virgin Journey |
Finally, we were allowed to pass and almost immediately, I pulled over to allow the convoy of huge trucks barreling down the twisting road to the Punakha and Mangde Chuu hydroelectric projects to pass us by. These huge trucks, driven by both Bhutanese and Indian drivers, have largely destroyed the roads, which were never built to sustain that kind of heavy traffic. They supply most of the traffic on the roads and almost never pull over to make room for other cars. As a result, whenever I see one, I just pull as far over as possible (usually this has to happen in a split second) and hope that the truck can make it past me. Many Bhutanese drivers, however, head straight for the truck, each driver only barely twisting the wheel at the last moment to avoid a head-on collision. Bhutanese drivers would be excellent candidates in “Chicken.” But such games are not for me—I just want to get there in one piece. Descending into the Punakha Valley, the air is warm and sultry, orange trees are laden with fruits, and the market is abuzz with activity. This time of year is the best time to be in this very low valley (for Bhutan—only about 3,500 feet), as it is not yet too hot, but winter has largely departed. It is this valley, in fact, where I hope to do the bulk of my ethnographic research, as it is the home of most of Drukpa Kunley’s activities in Bhutan and the locale for his temple, the Chimed Lhakang.
Leaving the Punakha Valley, we begin the endless ascent of the Pele Lha, the pass marking the division between western and central Bhutan, where one then descends down through the Black Mountains towards Trongsa and our home in Taktsi. About halfway up the Pele Lha, we pull over for a luncheon under pine trees laden with cones and interspersed with the vivid pink blossoms of what looks very definitively like Red Bud (my favorite blossoms of spring).
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| Calves Hoping for some Chocolate |
We’ve been driving for about five hours and there is still a long way to go. The ascent of the Pele Lha is endless and the road is absolutely terrible, with plunging cliffs off to the left and steep rocky slopes extending precariously overhead, looking as if they may give way at any moment (as they have obviously so often done before) and bury the road in rubble. We make our way laboriously upward, often traveling no more than about 10-15 miles per hour. (Not that one ever travels faster than about 35/45 miles per hour in Bhutan!)
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| Approaching the Summit of the Pele Lha |
Finally, we reach the summit, where a prayer-flag festooned chorten bisects the road and our car must circle around to the left in traditional circumambulation-style beneath thousands of fluttering prayers streaming away in the cold, mountain winds.
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| Photo by Jmhullot-Summit of Pele Lha |
This pass is marked by an unusual kind of dwarf bamboo—not a pretty plant, but a striking one with its sharp razor-like needles. Descending the pass is far easier than our ascent, partially because the road is much better, still twisting and turning dramatically, but without the precipitous drop-offs to the side. Instead, we are treated to views of sloping valleys now bright with new green growth and just-blossoming fields of rapeseed flowers, brilliant yellow against the gray skies and green rice paddy fields. I love these high valleys, through which two breeds of yak also roam—one normal in size and the other a miniature version with their shaggy heads and long thick pelts—they are about the only living creatures that actually appear to be warm!
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| Warm Yak |
By the time we began the approach into the Trongsa Valley, we were feeling quite exhausted. Happily, rather than continue on to Taktsi that night, I had booked us into a nice hotel for our final night out, and as a way to celebrate Chris’s birthday. The Yangkhil Resort (“resort” being the term used in Bhutan to designate almost any kind of guesthouse, but particularly one’s with their own restaurants), is located about a half-mile from Trongsa itself on the side of a mountain with a fantastic view of the Trongsa Dzong—the largest dzong in Bhutan perched on a spur of land that stretches out over the churning Mangde Chu River far below.
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| Trongsa Dzong |
The Dzong is still an important administrative building, housing the headquarters of the government administration for the Trongsa dzongkhag. Historically, Trongsa town was a strategic central location for the control of Bhutan and for centuries it was the seat of the Wangchuk Dynasty (the Kings of Bhutan) and of
penlops (governors) who effectively ruled over much of eastern and central Bhutan. It is also a major monastic complex, with around 200 monks. Even in the ever-present rain (which has made it reappearance as soon as we entered the Trongsa Valley), the Dzong is an amazing sight as it vanishes and reappears in the shifting mists.
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| Yangkhil Resort in Trongsa |
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| Birthday Dinner |
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| Birthday Brownies |
After a dinner in the hotel restaurant, we collapse into the most comfortable beds I’ve had the pleasure of sleeping in while in Bhutan. Usually, beds are only slightly softer than wooden planks—I never knew you could even make a mattress as firm and hard as the ones I’ve encountered in Bhutan—but at Yangkhil Resort, the beds, while still very firm, have at least a modicum of cushioning and sleep comes easily after nearly ten hours of arduous driving. We are almost comfortable—only the anticipation of actually returning to Taktsi makes us both a bit nervous. The best part of this journey has been that we have done it entirely ourselves. No more bus--just the freedom of having our own car and stopping whenever we please. While buying a car is an expense that Chris's salary cannot afford, it transforms our way of life here. I can now go to conduct my research whenever and however I wish. Even the endless red tape of licenses, registration, plates, check-up's, and the "road-worthy permit" cannot dampen the sense of freedom we both notice! I don't feel very good about adding traffic to the streets (given that the car dealership in Thimphu told us that they are selling an average of three to five cars per day!), our car is not in Thimphu, where most of the traffic in Bhutan actually is and where the only congestion is. Instead, we are out in the wilds, and getting to town is now only a simple (heh, heh) one-hour drive.
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