April 7, 2009
It is so quiet in Bhutan that you forget about your usual needs for music, news, etc. When I wake up and look out at the misty mountains I hear the most wonderful bird song. I run for my camera and catch but a flash of a scarlet bird, then a blue one, then others.
Tshiring appears at breakfast, not in his usual ‘cho,’ but dressed like a boy from Rio with shorts and t-shirt. We pile into the Toyota again and drive on a bumpy dirt road along the river, which takes us beneath a huge suspension bridge, then up a ways until we see the horses waiting to be loaded, and meet the cook, the horseman, and his assistant. The poor horses have to carry gas tanks and burners, water, mattresses, food – it all gets pressed into huge sacks and tied in pairs on the horses, who grunt unhappily standing in their piles of hay. Soon the trekkers are off walking uphill at a fast clip and I am left alone with Ugen, who will be at my disposition until they get back.
Here are some pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/schateaubriand/WakingUpInPunakhaAndTheTrekBegins#5323830195861142930
The plan is I will stay in a Punakha riverside ‘spa’ (ha-ha) hotel for 3 nights and then meet the others when they come out from their trek. Ugen drives me back to the hotel to check in – it seems pretty empty and there is no internet. I have some lunch and off we go to see another Dzong, the Wangdue Phodrang, which lies in a little old village nearby. I am immediately charmed by the much less glamorous appearance, although beautiful and ancient. It feels more alive, monks of all ages dart here and there and I hear some not so expert sounds from a music class, which I get to peek in on. Before I get to the classroom I notice several lustrous and bored-looking roosters. Obviously no women here. In the low ceilinged classroom the boys sit on the floor in their saffron robes, blowing into horns so long they have to rest on the floor. When we approach the last temple, the one you have to remove your shoes and put away your camera to get into, I hear the droning of the teacher reading from those flat rectangular Buddhist scriptures I have been seeing in beautiful cases in the stores. He does not look at his students – older boys – who sit in pairs and who, in turn, seem to pay no attention at all. In fact several are checking their cell-phones, or, in one case peeling off a decal to put a tattoo on his leg. One student rises and pours camphor-flavored water into our hands, which we touch to our faces. Ugen prostrates himself on the floor and makes several bows to Buddha. When the teacher stops – and I steal a look at him – he, too, in on a phone. Once outside I admire the age of a wall, which to my artistic mind (so I think) looks a bit like a Mimmo Rotella (Italian artist), although with two faucets. I turn to Ugen, who smiles with his mouth red with betel and says, ‘toilet.’ Suddenly I understand the markings. Later we pass a classroom, which has absolutely nothing in it – just a dusty floor – with a great view of the surrounding mountains, of course.
I take a little walk through the village, which is ancient and messy and with the curious fact that all same-looking stores seem to sell the same stuff - those puffy bags of potato chips hanging in the windows, and inside the sacks on the floor with basic food stuff.. A little shaven headed boy attaches himself to me. It must be time for school to be let out, because all the children are in clean and neat versions of the traditional garb. I take pictures and the boy says, 'I have one dollar.’. When later I give two cute little girls a pen and a Brazilian candy each, the more forward one shouts, ‘Thank you. I love you!’
Leaving town, I see that the local cactus has big fig-like fruits and ask Ugen to stop so I can take a picture. He offers to get me one to try. I am dubious. I have experience with a similar type, which has to be cut practically floating in water and with utensils – there are so many spines, but he assures me, oh, no, and pulls out a really big knife from his ‘cho’ to cut it in pieces for me. An old man stops to look, and when he sees me embark on eating a quarter of the fruit (like one would a fig), he says, ‘you must not….’, but it is already too late. I have hair-like little spines on my fingers, on the sides of my mouth, on my lips and way inside my mouth. This is not pleasant and it will be several days before I pull the last one out with pincers from under my tongue. Then Ugen drops me at my hotel, where I have my solitary dinner and an early night.
Pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/schateaubriand/TheWangduePhodrangDzong#
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