Bhutan Chanting and pics

Hello all: the short video above was taken by Chencho, Day 9, in a nunnery near Bumthang. It is a great example of what it was like to hear the nuns chanting. Don't forget to turn on your speakers!

These two pics from Day 9 have already been pub'd: 

And, other pics never before pub'd:

Those are drums being played by turning the wrist and the "ball" or "rock" is striking the alternate sides of the drum

The audience is rapt

This pic is from the afternoon session, Day 12, Phobjikha, taken by Karma on Tashi's phone

THB, Karma, DB....in the rain

With this form, THB actually hit the target (though it more likely this actual shot went into the ground well short of the target)

Observations: Seoul, Bhutan and Bangkok

Observations

Can you see DB's color palette? This is the OMA purchase, lookin' very good!

Empty seats reserved for our absent partners

There’s a subtext here that THB can’t fully illuminate: the trip changed dramatically when CYS and SAS dropped out at the last minute due to illness. It definitely changed things for THB and DB. How so? Who knows? We’ve been friends for years and really looked forward to their perspective and insights on the strangeness and wonders of places we had never been to before. That we missed, big time. For example: it’s a lot easier for 2 people to hear what the guide is saying than 4 people crowding around. Two more asking questions THB didn’t even think about is a huge loss. Debriefing at end of day: priceless and much missed. All conjecture…how’s that for an observation!

National sport, high tech version

B-Pop group making sound walls

Graduation day pics take on an i-pad and being reviewed by graduates

Not the only time THB had a taste of moonshine before noon

1.  Bhutan Graciousness: Other than Thimphu, the big city in Bhutan with all of 110,000 in population, travel is to small cities or small towns or even small villages. Maybe that has something to do with how gracious the people are…or it has something to do with their Buddhism beliefs. In any case, people in general were very kind, cheerful, and helpful. There was no resentment of tourism. There were two times when THB felt some small resistance or acrimony and they had to do with very small amounts of money…much more likely THB’s issue than anything the Bhutanese did.

2.    Jet Lag: For the last few years we’ve been going somewhere first for a few days to overcome jet lag before the real trip starts. This time we took a night flight to Seoul from SFO and landed at 4:30am, stayed up all day and by day 2 felt pretty good. THB was surprised it worked so well. Going home? A night flight to SFO landing in the evening. It’s day 3 and THB has had one good night’s sleep and general wooziness throughout.

3.    Connectivity: Many of the places we stayed have installed universal sockets and/or have left a power strip in your room that has 4 universal sockets ready to go. That is a blessing for THB and DB; we know we’ll need one accessible socket for the C-Pap machine and the power strips free up another source for charging multiple devices as well as a place for THB to leave the netbook plugged in. Not every place had this set-up, almost all did. Internet worked well enough to easily handle posting of pics.

At a high pass with the Himalayas in the background

Looking down on Tiger's Nest

4.   Altitude: There’s a lot of altitude in Bhutan. Starting in Paro, 7,000 feet, Bumthang, 9,000 feet, Punakha drops to 4,000 feet, and then the 5 or 6 passes at 10-11,000 feet and Tiger’s Nest at 10,000 feet. THB and DB each had bouts of mild altitude sickness; DB took small doses of Diamox over several days for mild headache symptoms and THB took nothing and had one tough afternoon that resulted in heading to bed for a 3 hour time out.

5.   Buddhism (as we saw it there): There’s not enough space to discuss Buddhism in this post, or in any post. It’s vast and a moving target. Tashi summed it up by saying that in Bhutan Buddhism has the group at the highest level of prayers and then the individual beneath that and in other countries like Thailand the individual comes first and then the group. Pay said that in Thailand there are two major types of Buddhism: one that includes many Hindu deities and beliefs (like her mother and grandmother follow) and the other that is more strictly Buddhist and leaves aside anything with Hindu roots. Highly generalized for tourists; close to a truth or two? And, to top it off: practitioners have high level difference. Japan: monks can marry and have families and eat no meat. Bhutan and Thailand: monks cannot marry and do eat meat as long as they aren’t the ones killing the animals.

Giant tapestry at Paro festival 

Close-up

Most of the chorus of nuns we heard chanting prayers (in temple/assembly hall in building behind us)

6.   Temples: THB couldn’t keep all the stories of the deities straight even after staring at picture after picture. In Bhutan we visited many temples and got inside. Some were full of mostly current statues and decorations as it was pretty common for temples (and monasteries and nunneries and dzongs) to have suffered major damage (lots of fires, they had a lot of lit candles all over the place) and thus have gone through many renovations. Most of the temples were used as “assembly” halls and had pictures of the monarchy and a few had pictures of the head monk (not too often). In Thailand, the temples we visited were more casual, not as protective of the insides as sanctuaries for praying and observing religious customs.

Meeting Oma, the textile artist

7.   Art: Hard to separate art and religion in Bhutan. THB very much appreciated a lot of the “art” in the temples even if the vast majority looked liked items which on their own would be considered too glitzy to be sold at antique stores. Of course, THB could not take pictures of the stuff he really liked. And, some of the newer/renovated temples are starting to put up drop clothes to help maintain the more important and older pieces. Otherwise, the best art we saw was in the textile museum in Thimphu: worth a detour and a couple of hours of walkthrough.

Suknam Jun above with Ria and DB and self-portrait below

Inchen serving tea cut off a "brick"

An Inchen "chair"

8.    Guides: In general, THB and DB have shifted to using guides more and more often during our travels, finding that we are trading money for time and understanding. It’s expensive and sometimes ineffective, sometimes extremely rewarding. In Bhutan, unless you are Indian, it is unavoidable: the government mandates having a guide and charges $250/pp/day “tourist” tax.

Maria in Seoul, city tour

Prof Woo and Ria

DB and Evan during food tour

i)    Seoul: Ria was our “art guide” for two days. Although she was recommended as such, she really knew very little about guiding or art.  However, she did contact three artists that DB had researched and we were able to see those, as well as a couple of small galleries that DB had also found, mostly from our visit to Collect in London last year.  Overall, the artists were interesting and fun and we had two great days, despite our disappointment with the guide.  On the other two days we scheduled 3+ hour tours, one “city” tour and one food tour. In each case, the guide spoke easily understandable English, provided good explanations of what we were seeing, and made the time spent seem very productive.

Tashi

Karma, our spiritual guide at the monastery/college just up the hill from GG Lodge

King #4 descendants

Chencho on the right, wife in between DB and THB

Looking down on Tiger's Nest before heading down the trail

DB getting double-teamed on archery range lesson

ii)    Bhutan: Tashi and Chencho were in an awkward spot when two of the four dropped out at the last moment, plus Tashi was a last minute sub as well. At the beginning, it seemed like we were going to spend all our touring time and meals as a foursome. Over time, we adjusted: sometimes they didn’t stay at the same hotel that THB and DB did, didn’t show up for every meal, and realized that we were fine with not maximizing every day with events from post-breakfast to pre-dinner. By the end of the trip, things had smoothed out and even Chencho, who didn’t speak English and could understand what we were saying, started to laugh and smile a lot more. Tashi never stopped smiling and laughing. Overall, an excellent two-some, very protective of us, for most part active listeners, and value added big time. Bonus: seeing Chencho’s delight in giving us an archery demo. Regrets: Tashi and Chencho took videos and pics that THB asked for copies….never sent.

Pay and tour attendees

iii)   Thailand: We decided to do a “greatest hits” tour and hit the jackpot: Pay was a live wire, easy to understand, spend extra time with us, nursed us through a very hot and humid 4+ hours, and at same time found a way to let us understand her perspective on life in Thailand. Here’s a case where we might have attempted on our own about half of what Pay showed us; huge plus given our limited time in town. Another simple twist of fate: when the the Mandarin booted us out, we ended up in great hotel in a great room, in a better location, and with a terrific guide. How often does that happen?

1.    Miscellani

i)      Bhutan: If a bridge goes straight across the water, it was built by Bhutanese; if the approach is curved gently, it was built by the Japanese.

ii)  Air quality: no matter where you were, the locals blamed the poor air quality of some outsiders blowing bad air their way. Chinese factories are spoiling Seoul’s air. Bhutan doesn’t have bad air, it just can be naturally hazy and smoky all without any help from the locals. Bangkok: it ain’t them, it is stuff being blow in from somewhere else.

iii)Traffic: wherever you go, there you are. Seoul and Bangkok: terrible. Thimphu: terrible. Interestingly, in all three stops there was worries about the local economy being in a downturn. And in all three there appears to be unrelenting building going on, especially in Bhutan. Something didn’t quite jibe. For those of you that have read Rosling’s book (reco’d by THB early in the trip, check out Gapminder to see how these three countries are doing).  

iv)  Conscientiousness: everywhere things ran on time, nobody was ever late, nothing was oversold and under-delivered. THB and DB came to rely on the times and schedules.           

v)   Grafitti: Almost none in Bhutan, same in Bangkok. THB can’t remember in Seoul

vi) Smoking: In Bhutan and THB thinks Bangkok, seems to be banned in public. In Bhutan, there is a lot of chewing of betel nuts and leaves, and it also his done very surreptitiously. 

Posting a comment:  Dear Grandpa, can you please tighten up the posts, thx, J&C...or it C&J?