And Miles to Go Before I Sleep...

New Snow

We leave Taktsi early in the morning before the birds begin to sing. Across the valley, the mountains glimmer under their mantles of new snow. A deep silence lingers in the valley, encasing the new blossoms erupting on the bare branches of the trees. We drive as quickly as is possible on the twisting, treacherous roads in order to reach the first road block about 45 minutes outside of Trongsa on the road to Thimphu. There are two major road blocks along the Trongsa-Thimphu road where it appears that the entire side of the mountain has given way, plunging down into the steep valleys and leaving the road a mere hint carved into the slopes. As a result, road workers shut down passage on the road for long periods of time in order to rebuilt the road. Coming from Trongsa we must reach the road block by 9am in order to get by or we have to wait until 12:30, which makes reaching Thimphu in one day an even longer journey. As it is, if we make it through this first road block, by the time we get to the final pass over which we must drive to Thimphu, we will have to wait until after 6pm to be allowed to pass.

Just Past the Roadblock

We skate through the first roadblock and continue on. Much later in the day, we arrive in the deep, wide valley of Lobeysa and the College of Natural Resources where we are spending a couple of nights. Lobeysa sits at about 3,500 feet, about 4,000 feet lower than Taktsi. Hence, here spring has arrived. The air is warm, soft and wind swirls through the wide valley. The market is filled with fresh oranges. Flowers are coming up everywhere and the pine forests in which the College of Nature Resources is located are fragrant with the poignant smell of pine.

High Altitude Rhododendrons 

Spring Flowers

More Flowers

We settle into the guesthouse to await the arrival of the School for International Training’s study-abroad students, who should be arriving shortly. The next day, I am to give them a short lecture on the Chimi Lhakang, the temple initiated by the Dukpa Kunley, the Buddhist saint on whom I am writing my dissertation.

Signs of Drukpa Kunley

When morning arrives a large group of us walk up to the Chimi Lhakang and sit under the large Bodhi tree that shades the temple. I give a short presentation on Drukpa Kunley and the history of the Chimi Lhakang, but the best part of the lecture comes when we convince the Bhutanese guide for the SIT students to repeat some of the oral stories he was told about Drukpa Kunley as a child. These get everyone laughing, including the Bhutanese students from the College of Natural Resources, who have come along for the lecture. And in fact this is one of the best parts of this project—the oral traditions of Drukpa Kunley. For me, this element of my project will be the most challenging, but likely the most rewarding, as it will require me to travel to local villages and hopefully convince people there to tell me their stories. Obviously, this is not something I can do alone—the language barrier alone would make it nearly impossible, never mind the politics of being a foreigner simply arriving in a remote village. Happily, I have made contact with a number of people from these areas who are willing to facilitate these meetings. However, since I have committed to teach English poetry for the first half of this semester at ILCS, my ethnographic wanderings will have to wait until later this spring. After the lecture is finished, we all go inside the temple to receive a blessing from the ten-inch carved phallus and bow and arrows of Drukpa Kunley. The SIT students seem a bit taken aback by this—a blessing from a carved penis? Most of them are not particularly interested in Buddhism and this whole event must seem a bit odd. But they dutifully bow their heads for the blessing and receive a palm-full of blessed water to sip and splash over their heads. I try to pry some information concerning the texts stored in the lhakang from the local monks, but the only monks available look to be about 8 years old and know nothing at all about the texts. Soon we are all on our way back to the local restaurant catering to foreigners at the entrance to the long trail up the lhakang for the obligatory buffet lunch. Chris and I take our farewells and begin the drive up the long Dochu-lha pass to try to get to Thimphu by early evening. Again, we skate through the second roadblock without delays. As we descend into the Thimphu valley, the sunlight suddenly turns red. It is only 3pm, but the light is much like it would be at sunset, a kind of ochre brilliance that slides up and down the mountain slopes. Finally, as we come around one curve, I am able to see that the sun is obscured by huge plumes of smoke. From our vantage point, it appears that the entire Thimphu valley must be in flames, but as we continue our descent, we are relieved to note that the fire is behind the mountains in which Thimphu is located. It’s not clear how much danger there is to Thimphu itself but at least it is not currently on fire.

Waterfall

That night we stay with a friend at Royal Thimphu College, the only private college in Bhutan, located south of Thimphu up on the mountain slopes. It’s a beautiful location and the facilities are lovely—a welcome change from the chaos and ongoing construction of Taktsi. But the next morning we are up early to meet the head of research from RUB, who is accompanying us up to Tango Monastery where we will meet my new friend, Tulku Ngawang, a young man who is considered to be the reincarnation of Lopen Norbu Wangchuk, who was the third principle of ILCS in the early days. Tulku is bringing us to meet the highest reincarnate lama in Bhutan, His Holiness Gyalsey Tendzin Rabgye, who also just happens to be a reincarnation of the grandson of Drukpa Kunley. The day is gorgeous, cold, clear, and blue, the only downside being the clouds of smoke that continue to rise over the ridges, occasionally blocking the full brilliance of the Bhutanese sun. As we approach the base of the mountain upon which Tango Monastery perches, Dorji calls Tulku. He is on his way down to meet us and to perform a Rab gNas—or blessing ceremony—for a friend’s new car.

Royal Thimphu College

We decide to seize the opportunity and ask Tulku if he can also bless our new car, even though it is very dirty from the long road the endless plumes of fine dust that take the place of thick, sticky mud in the dry season. He is more than amenable and we are told to open all the doors of the car and to provide some offerings for the short feast that will take place as part of the blessing. We also have some silk scarves and a small, golden prayer wheel that is solar powered to put on the dashboard. I love these little golden prayer wheels. Most Bhutanese cars have them and I was insistent that we buy one too. But since we have not yet mounted it, it is a perfect object to be blessed before pasting it to the dashboard. A group of monks arrange a small altar with food and drink offerings, incense, scented water, and some texts. Tulku sits with them and they all chant from a short text. After a bit, one of the monks gets up with a bunch of lit incense that is smoking and walks over to our car. He passes the smoke over and throughout the interior of the car and then goes over to Tulku’s friends car (which is far cleaner than ours) and repeats the process. The same procedure takes place with a vase of purified water, which is poured over every surface of the car, both inside and out. After these ritual purification, the monks and Tulku chant some more and Tulku plays the ritual instruments that signal the protective deities to come and inhabit the cars. When he finishes, we are all served a small cup of tea and a small plate of the food that was on the shrine, which is now considered prasad, blessed food. We barely have time to lock the car before Tulku is hurrying us up the trail to Tango so that we will not miss our audience with His Holiness. While he insists that he walks very quickly and we might not be able to keep up with him, in fact he talks so much on the way up that it takes us over an hour. But as we walk I listen to him tell stories about his past lives. These are tales he’s heard from the disciples of his past life, and they are quite fascinating. Apparently, many of his past lives were famous astrologers, who prophesied for lay-people. Most monasteries have their own astrologers, but Tulku’s past lives were known for their accurate predictions. I told him we should write such stories down, before they become lost in these dark mountains.

Tango Monastery

The audience with His Holiness takes place in a beautiful house built high above the monastery with a spectacular view facing down the Thimphu valley. The house is one of the nicest I’ve seen in Bhutan, with wall-to-wall wood paneling and thick soft carpets. His Holiness is only 19 years old. He is a skinny young man with thick coke-bottle glasses and a bald head. But his radiant energy fills the room as soon as he enters it. As I hold out a scarf and kneel down for his blessing, I give him a very traditional Tibetan greeting given to high lamas. He gives a peal of delighted laughter and looks straight at me through his thick lenses. “Thank you!” he says loudly in English with a big smile. I like him immediately.

His Holiness' View

Through Tulku and in my own halting Tibetan, I explain my project to him. He’s thrilled and tells me that this project is very important. Drukpa Kunley has been deeply misunderstood. The tales of his drinking and lechery have led people to think that he is merely a jokester.  But, and at this point His Holiness looks very seriously at me, he is, in fact, a Buddha. He blesses my text and my project and tells me to send any questions I have to him through Tulku. I am delighted. The audience could not have gone better and I feel fully accepted into the Drukpa Kagyu world of which Drukpa Kunley was so much a part. Hiking back down to the car much later in the day, I feel blessed by the place as much as the people. Finally, after nearly a year of being here, the doors are truly opening, psychologically and well as physically.
See next blog for continuation of this trip...