Bumthang - a tale of a winter's day

Entering Bumthang Dzongkhag from Mongar, you would go through Thrumshingla (la = pass), at an elevation of over 3500 mtrs. When you arrive at the pass don't let the icy cold keep you in the car, even in the high winter! The passes are all typically at the top of a mountain between two valleys and/or Dzongkhags (districts), and are cold and windy even in the summer. Thrumshingla like all passes in Bhutan is festooned with prayer flags. Unfortunately the once pristine snow at Thrumshingla has turned to slush today, thanks to the movement of cars through the pass, and sullied the sacredness and serenity of the prayer flags planted there in memory of sadly departed loved ones perhaps. My husband and I are returning to Thimphu in the west. Our vehicle is just one amongst hundreds making the journey west through Mongar and Bumthang after the Bhutanese national day celebrations in the eastern district of Trashigang, if that helps to make the ugly slush and the tyre marks easier to bear!                         

                                    Thrumshingla  

Carry on through the pass, and almost the first thing you encounter is a big board announcing the Situ Rhododendron Garden.  It must be breathtaking in the spring but right now in the middle of the winter we just drive past, making a mental note to return when the rhododendrons are in bloom.

                                                                                                  

The Situ Rhododendron Garden is part of the Thrumshingla National Park which falls within the boundaries of four Dzongkhags, including of course Mongar and Bumthang.  From here the road winding down towards Bumthang Valley is on the side of the mountain that does not receive the direct rays of the sun for a while. Here in the crevices in the mountainside is a fabulous show of icicles for anyone who is mindful enough to notice them.

Stop, have a roadside picnic at Kesamchhu, and enjoy the combination of the bright, warm, midday sun and  patches of virgin snow all around. The air here is clean beyond measure. Don't take my word for it - check out the lichens that not only grow in abundance but also grow very long - the longer and more abundant the lichen, the purer the air they say! 

Notwithstanding that lichens are known to be bio-indicators of air quality as they need very clean air to thrive, or that some of them look beautiful and colourful, I must admit that the the long wispy ones like in the pictures above don't look very pretty, at least not to me or anyone with an overactive imagination! They kind of remind me of cobwebs, which bring to mind ghostly places that have been untouched or undisturbed by time and the human hand. An undisturbed environment is incidentally another condition (in addition to very clean air) required for lichens to grow and flourish. 

As we continue on our way we see Ura Valley with its wide terraced fields in the distance. But instead of heading for Ura we take the Shingkhar Bypass around it. And then the road takes a turn that suddenly brings us face to face with the the highest peak in Bhutan - the mighty Gangkar Phuensom, standing there larger than life beyond so many mountains and valleys, yet seeming so close by due to its size, and bringing to the fore all my heart stopping awe of the mountains! How lucky we are to have a bright and beautifully clear day to view this giant with the unique, unmistakable shape!

Gangkar Phuensom

The Shingkhar Bypass I am told reduces the travel time from Ura to Bumthang Valley from two hours to 45 minutes! Bumthang Dzongkhag is comprised of Ura, Choekhor, Tang and Chumey Gewogs, which are sub units within the district. The most populated of these is Choekhor, also known as Bumthang Valley. We arrive in Bumthang Valley but drive past it and head straight for Druk Yathra, a wonderful little home based weaving factory in Chumey. Small though it is, it nevertheless produces some very fine articles with the typical Bumthang motifs and patterns. There are bags, jackets, runners, mats to sit on, kiras and more. The young factory owner Jigme takes care of the marketing and supplies, and his mother and wife take care of the running of the little factory in the courtyard. In addition to the regular weavers who are drawn from several households in Chumey Valley and who have been organised into a kind of cooperative, students are also employed to lend a hand with the weaving in the tourist season when the demand is high, which is understandable considering the factory is located smack bang on the main road to Trongsa and onward to Thimphu. Karma's wife treats us to hot tea and some special Bumthang preparations in a little coffee shop he runs right next to his factory. 

 Lightly sweetened little dumplings made of flour and sweet sticky rice with raisins 

The light begins to fade and the sunny day gives way to an icy cold evening. Bumthang Dzongkhag tends to be much colder than Thimphu in the winter, but that's hardly surprising given that it is slightly north of the capital. On the drive back through Chumey towards our hotel in Bumthang Valley, our escort informs us that the houses here are built of local stone, earth, timber and sometimes cement. Bricks are banned by law. Bumthang is often called the Switzerland of the East, but this is certainly not reflected in the construction of the dwellings which are clearly Bhutanese in their design and building materials. By the time we reach the Yu-Gharling Resort, built to resemble a Swiss style chalet on the inside, and one of the upmarket hotels in Bumthang Valley, the reception party of hotel employees has almost frozen into icy statues in the driveway of the hotel! We rush inside to find a beautifully warm wood panelled lobby and a warm chalet type suite. What the online reviews of the hotel say about it being the only hotel with radiators in the bathrooms is one hundred percent true:) That we are served one of our worst, most ugly looking and unappetising dinners ever that night is five hundred percent true.....hahaha! Also believe it or not there is no television in the suite, but it is brought in as soon as we ask for it. A nice touch and something a lot of tourists who just want to get away from it all prefer, I am sure!

This is terribly off season, but the district offers its own winter attractions. Nearby Gyetsa is where some black necked cranes from Tibet have migrated to this year, though the migration hub really is in Phobjikha Valley. We set off early the next morning in search of the birds. Gyetsa disappoints us, so we drive to the lovely little Chumey Nature Resort whose frontyard according to the friendly and well spoken owner, is literally a playground, feeding ground and perhaps a breeding ground for the elusive birds. It is one of two or three places (including Gyetsa) they have been spotted in in Bumthang this year. 

Chumey Nature Resort

Well, the birds elude us yet again, but we sit outside the resort and our trusty, thoughtful and highly organized escort pulls out flasks of hot tea and something to munch. We drink our hot tea and eat our biscuits while admiring the view and lamenting that we are too late for the birds' 7.30 am appearance and too early for their midmorning showing:( 

Will we stay and wait for the birds to show up? Wish we could but no way, we have a flight to catch from Bumthang to Paro to get us home to Thimphu! The owner happily chats with us, totally unresentful that we have perched on her benches and made ourselves very comfortable without ordering so much as a pot of tea from her......even off season, this is not something many hotel owners elsewhere in the world would do! She even rushes in and brings us little bench mattresses so we won't feel cold on our bottoms! Makes me want to come back and stay at this resort! So I go and check out the rooms - the ones above the front porch at the top of the resort have the best view of the playground of the birds! 

Our never-say-die escort has made it his personal cause to give us a sighting of the birds who are playing hard to get! So we go past Gyetsa again on the way back to our hotel, where we need to pack and leave for the airport. We give up after about fifteen minutes of waiting, but the wait has given us a chance to take in the beauty of the evergreen forests covering the mountains above the wide valley.....and..... 

   ........ these very interesting plants with the very bright red stems! They seem to be everywhere where we  are standing and they fascinate me, so vivid is the colour of the stems!

Even our determined escort has given up on the birds by now. Crestfallen, he instructs the police escorts at the head of our carcade to head back to the hotel. Within minutes of hitting the road, there is a call from someone in Gyetsa. Two pairs of black necked cranes have just flown in and landed not far from where we were so hopefully waiting for them! Mr. Never-Say-Die visibly brightens up - he is willing to turn back even now, but we are wet blankets, having finally accepted that we will have to come back here next year or catch them in Phobjikha, much closer home. 

Back at the Yu-Gharling Resort, as if to to make up for last night's awful dinner, we are served the fluffiest, lightest, most amazing omelettes, and to lessen our disappointment with the birding expedition, we have the birds in question right on our table under our noses.....to think we went from pillar to post looking for them.....what were we thinking:) Oh but wait these are not black necked......we just have to come back!    

It wears an off season look and needs work on the plastering and carpeting and exteriors, but at breakfast time Yu-Gharling does itself proud with the views it affords of the Choekhor chhu ( river), the wide valley, the grazing cattle, the Jakar Dzong, the beautiful blue rooftops, some weighted down by rocks....! While I am sure it must definitely resemble the picture perfect lush green Swiss countryside in the summer, Bumthang's winterscape is very unlike that of snow covered Switzerland, though no less perfect. For now, Bumthang has its own unique, soft brown and golden winter beauty that is totally Bhutanese......take a look!      

Jakar Dzong

Seeing Jakar Dzong through the smudgy windows of the hotel restaurant at breakfast time is just not on, but then again for the serious tourist (which I am) it is better than saying we did not 'see' supposedly the largest Dzong in Bhutan ....hahaha! Heading out to the airport to catch our flight, a shopping stop at the Bumthang cheese factory (started in the seventies with Swiss collaboration and know-how) en route is a must for the cheese lovers that we are! The adjoining Red Panda Weiss Beer Brewery, started by the same Swiss gentleman who set up the cheese factory, also calls for a shopping stop but only if we can finish all the beer we buy between now and the flight, or if we can carry it on board, both of which we can't! 

So we give it a miss and carry on to the little airstrip aka Bumthang Airport and wait on its colourful flag decorated tarmac for our flight to arrive ......

The tarmac of Bumthang Airport

Then we see it coming in to land, the little plane that we will board in a minute with a minimum of fuss and formality, and that we hope will one day bring us back for a sip of Red Panda, rich and sinful raclette or fondue at the nearby Swiss Guest House, a real look-see at Jakar Dzong and a rendevouz with our bird friends from Tibet!

     

Bhutan's Foodamentals

An American woman touring Bhutan with her husband mentions in her blog of November 25, 2014 that she felt dissatisfied with the meals they were served during the trip. A paragraph from her blog http://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-15930/the-secret-to-perfect-happiness-and-other-lessons-from-bhutan.html reads:

".......The Food

In Bhutan, the meals were all pre-set, meaning you didn't order from a menu. Every lunch and dinner was the same: plain white rice, sautéed veggies in oyster sauce, and mystery chicken stew. The few nights we finished dinner in fifteen minutes, from start to finish. We weren't drinking alcohol, so there was no reason to hang out in the hotel restaurant. We usually arrived at dinner hungry and looking forward to eating, but the seemingly rushed experience sent us back to our room, feeling disappointed."

I know after having lived here for just over five months that while it is not the most famous of cuisines in the world, plain white rice, sautéed veggies in oyster sauce, and mystery chicken stew are not all there is to Bhutanese food. Still, the American lady's blog set me reflecting on the food culture of Bhutan, seeing it mainly through my Indian eyes, from an Indian point of view. 

India has a cuisine that is world famous. Why is it famous? Is it because of the variety of cuisines within India? Why is Indian cuisine so varied? Is it because of the huge number of spices and ingredients that go into it and that have been available to us for millennia, or is it because of the variety of techniques that are used in cooking it? Or is it the human element involved in the cooking of the food? Do the ingredients make a good chef? Or can a good cook make great food no matter what the ingredients? I am not sure. But I guess the more the ingredients, the more the combinations, the creativity, the experimentation, the innovation. Unfortunately though not irrationally, all of this creativity and experimentation gives rise not only to greater analysis, dissection, and critiquing of the food, but also to passion, rapture, preoccupation and even obsession with food! We take in the colour, the texture, the fragrance of the food at a glance. We get put off by the size or shape of the piece of meat or vegetable in a dish. We lose our appetite when we encounter food smells that are unfamiliar to us. All this before we even put the food on our plate, let alone take a nibble. Indians are among the most fastidious about food. Yet it is a very important belief in our culture that to turn up our noses at food, to criticize it or waste it is to disrespect the Annadevata or Annapoorna. Annapoorna is Laxmi, the goddess of abundance, and abundance in its oldest and truest sense is measured not in terms of money, gold, wealth and riches but in grain and food in the granary. We have some of the poorest people in the world who often go without food, and in some parts of the country even starve to death. Food is life and as such it should be respected and valued. A beautiful belief, yet one which we (myself included) lose sight of in our passion for food!

Perhaps all cultures that have a great culinary tradition are guilty of this paradoxical behaviour - the more we love food, the more nitpicky and critical we are about it!   

In complete contrast to the average Indian, I must admit that in the five months I have been here, I have never ever seen or heard a single Bhutanese go into raptures about food, or about a specific dish on the menu at any lunch or dinner that I have attended (and I have met quite a few Bhutanese at quite a few events where there has been food). Whether it is a Bhutanese wedding banquet or a reception at a five star restaurant or a dinner at someone's house or a picnic or a meal at a restaurant, the interest in the taste and quality of the food is minimal. Food neither depresses the Bhutanese nor makes them ecstatic. They display the same equanimity towards food as they do towards most other things.

At the risk of sounding cliched, they eat to live, not the other way around. They eat what they produce, and embellish it with only very few, easily available ingredients from neighbouring countries. They use quick, basic techniques that the availability of time in a long day in the field and the cooking infrastructure would allow. Just to give an example, if cooking gas is used, the uninterrupted supply of gas cylinders and refills would depend on the regularity of transportation, which in its turn would depend on the weather, the quality of the roads, and the landslides en route! The availability of fancy or foreign ingredients would depend on all of the aforementioned factors as also the perishability of the ingredients themselves. As a result while it is an agrarian economy that is plentiful in red rice, corn, buckwheat, fruits and vegetables, we notice that most food is simply cooked or dried, steamed, ground, beaten, roasted or sometimes pickled, and consumed with or without the addition of a minimum of spices and condiments, so that it has a more or less neutral or natural taste as in the 'zou' (tiny, crunchy puffed rice') or beaten corn that is often consumed dunked in a warm beverage. Chillies are the only ingredient that spike the Bhutanese food and lift it substantially away from otherwise neutral flavours. Fruit is mostly consumed fresh or in dried form, rather than in the form of jams, jellies, juices, halwas, tarts, compotes, sauces, gateaus, souffles and cakes that we in other parts of the world are so fond of.

Crunchy 'zou'

Being a small, landlocked, mountainous country in which transportation is a challenge even in this second decade of the 21st century, is it surprising that the culinary art or culinary variety has not developed as in countries that are large, that have coastlines and all weather ports, geographical and climatic variety, and that have had land and sea trade routes with other countries for centuries if not millennia?  

Modern day Bhutan has no shortage of electricity, the roads are getting to be of better quality, more widespread and well connected, tourism both to and from Bhutan is increasing, air connections with Bhutan are multiplying, media exposure is ever growing, experiments with all kinds of produce not traditionally grown or produced in Bhutan are being conducted (the recent Mountain Hazelnuts Venture in Mongar and the older Swiss-like cheese made in Bumthang are cases in point), and the Bhutanese are being encouraged to go into agro processing to widen the country's industrial base. 

The Mountain Hazelnut Venture in Mongar

The Bumthang cheese has a pleasantly neutral taste similar to Swiss cheese

All of these factors may lead to the development of a more sophisticated and varied Bhutanese cuisine in the decades, or more likely in the centuries to come, for all world famous cuisines have taken that long to evolve into what they are today. Events like the upcoming food festival that will highlight and showcase Bhutanese food will provide a fillip to this process of evolution. (To read more about the food festival go to   http://www.kuenselonline.com/bhif-biff-music-plus-the-food-of-lifea/). More creative uses of local produce may result in time to come - for instance the local, slightly crumbly and neutral tasting, white cheese may be put to uses other than only in all the varieties of datshi, that most famous of Bhutanese dishes made by melting and cooking this cheese with either potatoes, chillies or mushrooms, to name the few combinations I have eaten. But then again this experimentation and innovativeness may not happen - maybe the Bhutanese would like to keep things just the way they are, maybe they would not want to become like all the rest of us who often look and behave as if we live to eat, for whom food must be delicious or nothing, for whom the taste and appearance of the food has the power to control how we feel about the world on any given day!  

Coming back to the blog that set me thinking about food in Bhutan, the American blogger says at the end of her blog "On the last day of our stay in Bhutan, we started appreciating the nuances of the food, the variations in the flavor of the sauce or the way the vegetables were cooked, or the unexpected presence of greens. Gluten- and dairy-free were mostly out the window for the week, and we stopped caring that our small meals weren't always enough to satisfy our hunger. .....(It is).a lack of choice that fuels the national happiness quotient they (the Bhutanese) often talk about. I realized that I don't need some of the things I thought I did to be happy. I don't need to have my meals always be delicious and balanced....... I need simple, clean and satiating food." 



I have found this to be true myself. All that is really needed when hunger comes a-calling is fresh, clean, wholesome and reasonably palatable food that satiates the appetite. Whatever we eat beyond what the stomach needs is because the palate and the eyes like it, and this is the part of the meal that causes us pain while seeming to give us pleasure. Having said that, I don't completely agree with the blogger when she says that there is a complete lack of choice - this is not strictly true. In their daily lives, the Bhutanese show and exercise a strong preference for Indian food apart from their indigenous cuisine. Their preference could easily have tilted towards Chinese cuisine, considering that the Bhutanese and Tibetan cultures are closely linked (and Tibet being a part of China is most certainly influenced by its food culture), but it has not. This goes to show that they are neither completely disinterested in food, nor are they completely without food choices. They just don't let it rule their lives and their happiness. This attitude, which seemingly regards food more as a means of sustenance and less as something that gives pleasure, probably accounts for the fact that one rarely sees an obese Bhutanese! 

While I happen to be a member of the nitpicky-about-food tribe, I think that it would not be a bad idea to start the new year by refraining from complaining about food, criticising it, and obsessing about it, and just give thanks to Annapoorna for the abundance she bestows on my household. It is easier said than done, but I sure am going to give it a try!  

As I sign off though, since this blog entry is about Bhutan's 'foodamentals', one thought I leave you with is that Bhutan is not without its own food paradoxes. A staunchly Buddhist country, I am told it does not freely allow fishing or the slaughter of animals for food. Yet the Bhutanese definitely like their meat a lot. So what do they do? They import most of their meat, poultry and seafood in frozen form and feel light of conscience and happy that their Buddhist principles have not been compromised! Notwithstanding this interesting paradox, and to give them credit for trying to stay true to their Buddhist ideals, butchers' shops and meat counters in supermarkets remain strictly closed on certain holy days of the week or month (I am not sure how these days are fixed), which must pinch the Bhutanese and sorely test their will power I am sure!     

A passage to India - the road to Phuentsholing

It is hard to explain the feeling of wonderment at arriving at the border between two nations. It is nothing to people who have lived in frontier towns, but to me, a Mumbaikar born and raised on the sea, and having lived either in cities in the hinterland or on the sea in various countries in the world, it is kind of momentous. We were off to Phuentsholing in southern Bhutan, a town on the India-Bhutan border. I had in the past driven across borders in Europe and the US, yet I felt once again the same stupid thrill I had felt then, at the sheer awesome simplicity of just driving under the Bhutan Gate, and finding myself in the town of Jaigaon in West Bengal, India! As simple as that, given that it is a peaceful border between friendly neighbours!

Driving due south from Thimphu which is at an elevation of some 8,000 feet, our journey to Phuentsholing, just 500 feet above sea level, was a study in botany, sociology, economics, geography, strange weather systems, and more.

Southbound to Phuentsholing!

Taking the road to Phuentsholing at the Chuzom (the confluence of the Wangchchu and Parochhu), we drove by Watsa village, still quite high up, and not long after leaving Thimphu. Looking across the valley, the mountains were a gentle kaleidoscope of muted auburn, russet, orange, brown, gold, yellow and green bushes. The play of the morning sun and shade picked out and showcased tracts of this foliage. 

Mountain slopes awash with the colours of autumn

Isn't the contrast of the rust, yellow and gold with the evergreen in the foreground just beautiful!

The lushness and greenery grew steadily as we moved southwards. It thumbed its nose at the autumn, growing into a riotous, dense and almost tropical forest cover of banana trees, ferns, climbers, large leafed trees and strangely even palm trees as we neared Phuentsholing.   

While this southern highway is very good for the most part, the Project Dantak people (who have worked tirelessly since 1961 to improve road connectivity in Bhutan) are working on completely eliminating and bypassing a small single lane stretch, thereby upgrading this entire artery to a double laned road and also cutting the travel time between Thimphu and Phuentsholing by a whole hour! At Chukha, about two hours into our road trip, we saw men at work on this project.

I'm not sure if it is because the innumerable hairpin bends in mountain roads help digest what you have eaten faster, but I was more than ready for the quaint little Dantak Canteen by the side of the road when it beckoned us as we arrived at Takti. The cooks are Nepali but you wouldn't know that from the quality of idli, dosa, wada, sambar, and choley bhature they served us! Do stop and enjoy the hospitality and ambience of this super eatery if ever you find yourself southbound in Bhutan!

Dantak Canteen - the super eatery

The little VIP room of the Dantak Canteen - even His Majesty the King of Bhutan stops here on his way south!

The sky was a beautiful autumn blue so far, but I could easily have believed it was the monsoon or even the height of a dank winter as we moved towards Gaeddu. Lying in a peculiar fold of the mountains, which stretches about 7 kilometers after Takti, Gaeddu is where the famous Gaeddu College of Business Studies is situated. Ghostly mists enveloped the mountainsides allowing a visibility of just 25 feet from the road in some places on this stretch. Trees by the roadside took on grotesque shapes, prayer flags looked forlorn as they flapped about shrouded by the thick mist, and nothing appeared to exist beyond the road as the mountain slopes fell away into an abyss and were swallowed up by an opaque milkiness.

Forlorn prayer flags flap in the misty wind

Visibility of around 25 feet - even the trees by the roadside are covered by the thickening mist

An opaque nothingness falling away from the roadside

An eerie sky at midday!

Coming out into the bright sunshine at Kamji was like coming out of a tunnel in a slightly sinister dream! Notwithstanding Gaeddu's unpredictable and often dreary weather, the college campus itself was lively and pretty, with stunningly beautiful marigolds still blooming everywhere. It was clear to see that the Director General of the college was easily its life, its soul, its driving force, the reason behind its good reputation and undoubtedly among the most inspirational leaders in higher education in the country! He had managed to mobilise almost everyone on the campus to come out and welcome us in a colourful Chipdrel procession, followed by the Marchang ritual. 

A beautiful mural at the entrance of Gaeddu College

The campus aglow with marigolds!

The Gaeddu-Phuentsholing run is just over an hour long. We began to see the flat and contiguous urban sprawl of the Phuentsholing-Jaigaon border area spread out below us almost half an hour before we actually entered the border town. Arriving at the Druk Hotel in Phuentsholing mid morning on a Thursday, we got to see perhaps the most bustling place yet in Bhutan. What luck that the Bhutan Gate is not even three minutes from the hotel. On one side of the road leading to the gate on the Bhutanese side is an immigration office where migrant labourers and other non Bhutanese from across the border were lined up in the hundreds for permits to travel to other places in Bhutan. On the other side of the road are shops and businesses. If I thought this place actually hustled and bustled, it was because I have lived in Thimphu for three and a half months and grown unaccustomed to the buzz of people hurrying, buying, selling, bargaining, pushing, jostling, rushing. It was in fact only as busy as an Indian street on a quiet day!

Bhutan Gate - Jaigaon in West Bengal is visible through the gate on the other side!

Driving through the Bhutan Gate into Jaigaon on the Indian side, the hustle and bustle took over my senses - the shops were overflowing with literally all kinds of merchandise from utensils to sweets to touristy souvenirs to clothing to home decor and furnishings, the traffic was chaotic, and the people were well......chaotic as well! I was in India, and I was fine.....everything was once again familiar within seconds - the chaos, the crowds, the noise, the buzz! Jaigaon market tempted me with its sweet oranges, mithai (Indian sweets), khoya (thickened, evaporated milk) and upholstery fabric and I succumbed, but left plenty unbought and still coveted for another visit! The outskirts of Jaigaon were more serene and surprisingly covered with tea gardens on both sides of the road as far as the eye could see. I had always thought tea only grew on hill slopes, but as far as I could see this terrain was flat as a board! Interesting!

The hum and buzz of the plains were great, yet, happily for me, I had recognized quite surprisingly that they were not something I had pined for in the time I had been in Thimphu. I had grown used to the mountains, the space and the pure air of Thimphu - it was time to head back, but not without another pit stop at the Dantak Canteen! From there onwards it was non stop to the capital and home, driving down to the Chuzom, taking the road to the capital, and driving into Thimphu City through the Thimphu Gate!

 

  

   

 

 

The Thunder Dragon in Fall in and around Thimphu

The Blessed Rainy Day, (which fell on September 23rd this year), officially marks the end of the monsoon and the onset of the Fall and harvest seasons in Bhutan. In reality though, it may continue to rain torrents till well after this date, as it has done in Thimphu. On the other hand, the crispness of Fall set in well before this date! The nighttime temperatures are dipping steadily now and there is early morning frost on the ground some mornings, but the days are as gloriously warm and sunny as promised to us!

The Thimphu Tsechu is a fitting celebration of the start of the season. Colourful and fun, it goes on all day for the entire three day holiday which ran from 3rd to 5th October this year. Deep, bass horns begin to sound from the Dzong early in the morning, continue throughout the day and can be heard far and wide in the town, acting effectively (to my mind) like a call to everyone to join in the festivities! While the official and traditional events which include pantomime, dance and music happen in the grand courtyard of the Dzong, the celebrations spill out onto the streets with people milling around, eating, drinking, shopping and trying their luck at various games stalls. Here are some scenes from the celebrations in the Dzong......
   
A comic, slightly slapstick play/pantomime started just as we entered and continued the whole time we were there.....take a look!

The space behind the yellow curtain acted as a makeshift green room for the pantomime participants....

It was a warm, dry and perfect day prompting the audience to shield themselves from the hot sun in the pic below. The orange clad group of people walking through the stands are the DESUUP, a volunteer group trained in leadership skills, disaster relief, evacuation and emergency services, disaster management, forest fire fighting and dealing with natural calamities.

Tsechu time is dressing up time for everyone including this little girl in her own little kira!

A drive from Thimphu to Paro and back at this time of year and in this part of Western Bhutan sees the Bhutanese preparing for the winter and taking advantage of the drier days and golden sunshine, though as mentioned earlier it continues to rain for a while even after the Blessed Rainy Day. The road is dotted with splashes of red rooftops neatly spread with chillies put out to dry. The drying process, which is the same for sliced apples among other fruits and vegetables, is interesting......the rain comes, wets the produce, the sun comes and dries it out, only for it to get wet again.....the process continues till the rain stops and the sun finally does its job!

The picture below is taken in the bright mid morning sunshine (isn't it just so vibrant!), the one further down is taken in the fading evening light.

Nearing Paro, which is less congested than Thimphu and more agrarian, the season presents itself in all its abundant, golden glory of paddy fields standing ready to be harvested ....... 

No account of the Fall season in and around Thimphu would be complete without pictures of meadow upon meadow of wild cosmos. If other flowers begin to steadily wilt and surrender to the cooler temperatures, surprisingly the dainty and delicate cosmos proves to be a fighter, flourishing as it does all the way into the decidedly colder November nights!   

In keeping with the gentle pace of all things Bhutanese, the Fall colours on the trees take their time appearing, taking a gradually staggered approach as against the almost overnight leaf metamorphosis that results in their riotous and concerted change of garb in some places in the world! Scroll down to see a stunning rainbow of the first yellows of the season........

If the nights get steadily colder after the Tsechu festivities, if feels as if the sun will shower us with its warmth and radiance all through the impending winter .......it is the middle of November now and there are still days when it is too warm to don even a sweater, let alone a jacket. There are still flowers and vegetables and herbs growing in the garden where they are safe from the early morning frost! The skies are blue as ever, and the rain I am told will stay away from now till the end of the winter!  

A HAA-worthy valley!

Okay so I didn't exclaim HAA (though it most certainly is HAA-worthy!) as we neared this part of Bhutan, but I did remark to my husband traveling in the car with me that the mountains here suddenly looked very different from the mountains I had seen so far during my two weeks in the Land of the Thunder Dragon. I even remarked that these looked like the mountains in traditional Chinese paintings, individual mountains, not the rolling, continuous mountain ranges I had grown used to seeing. "Are we driving in the direction of China? Are we nearing it? These mountains look unlike others in Bhutan", I said to my husband. I had not studied a map or asked about the location of Haa or done any reading on it before we set off. Anyway,  I can't remember what he said in response to my question and I forgot all about my observation.

Half an hour later we are warmly received with traditional khadas (long white silk scarves) by our hosts and led into their quaint, beautiful, and impeccably maintained house. Haa gets very cold in the winter, and the houses are built to keep in the warmth. Made entirely of wood, decorated in traditional Bhutanese style with wood carvings and colourful frills and trimmings, the floor is springy and cushiony, lifted away from the ground as it is by probably a foot or more. We are treated to the famous richly coloured, shiny, chocolate brown Hoentoe or buckwheat dumplings, a speciality of this region. Hoentoe has more than twenty ingredients and happily for me these are completely vegetarian!

Between bites of the Hoentoe and during the conversation with our hosts I find out that the border with the People's Republic of China is as little as 30 kms away from where we are! Yippee! I feel elated that my instinct had been correct, that we had been traveling towards China, which is in fact quite close by to Haa Valley. However I am soon deflated when informed that Haa shares a border with Tibet, (which is admittedly technically China), and for this very reason has nothing to do with the mental images I had of the mountains of Guilin that I had seen in Chinese paintings. Tibet is a plateau and Guilin is far way. So much for my logic!

It had been a complete fluke that I had guessed we were near China. What had in fact prompted the question I put to my husband and struck me as different and interesting was the first sight of three distinctive and separate yet very similar mountains, that had I am told, drawn a delighted gasp of "HAA!" from the first visitors to this valley many centuries ago, and given it its name! I love this story of how this beautiful valley got its name - simple and beautiful!

The Lhakhang (monastery) Karpo in Haa Valley is under renovation. The living quarters of the monks around the temple are being rebuilt but the temple itself is open for visitors. Legend has it that while the idol of the Buddha in the sanctum sanctorum of the temple was being built, and when the body had been completed, a monk turned up with a Buddha head that fit perfectly on the torso! Having handed over the head, the monk apparently just disappeared into thin air! Another legend associated with Lhakhang Karpo (White Temple) tells how it got this name...... a sacred white pigeon from Tibet landed on the spot where a temple-monastery complex came to be built, which was given the name Lhakhang Karpo! 

Driving around the valley, the buckwheat fields of pretty and delicate pinkish-peachish flowers flanking the road force me to stop and take pictures. Here is just one of the many I took. 

As we drive between the buckwheat fields I get the feeling I seem to be seeing more traditional Bhutanese houses in Haa Valley than anywhere else I have seen in Bhutan. But then I have not seen much of the country, right? Anyway, the top storey of a traditional dwelling is reserved for drying chillies, corn, hay, meat, vegetables. This top storey is covered by the roof but has no walls and is open to the wind and air under the eaves. The bottom storey originally used to be meant for the animals, but lately in the interest of hygiene and health the animals have been moved out. In the old days however, the middle storey which was meant for humans remained insulated, sandwiched as it was between the animals and the drying food!

Driving back from Haa to Thimphu we take a different route from the one we took on the way up. This time we drive all the way up to Chelela pass, down the other side of the mountain to Paro, then down to the Chuzom (the confluence of the Paro River and the Thimphu River), from where we take the road back to Thimphu. (Check out my earlier post to read about the Chuzom at  http://himalayangembhutan.blogspot.com/2014/08/hello-bhutan.html)

Chelela Pass is cold, windy and cloud covered. Hundreds of prayer flags stand fluttering amidst the ghostly clouds. This is the highest point on this road. The Pass closes down in the winter, hence our eagerness to make the return journey using this route while we are still in the summer. On a clear day I imagine the view down from Chelela Pass must be phenomenal!

So what are these prayer flags? When a relative passes away, prayer flags are hoisted in high, sometimes remote and difficult to access places that are also likely to be windy. The prayer flags are inscribed with prayers and chants to ward off evil, and to help the soul of the deceased to free itself. This is one of the explanations I have been given. I am sure there more.... 

After Chelela the road winds itself to the other side of the mountain and steadily downhill to Paro. We stop by the roadside to take in a bird's eye view of the Paro River and the airport. For the first time we see how narrow the valley is and how tricky it must be to manouver between and around the mountains in the top left corner of the picture below and land a plane on this airstrip!  

Tempted though we are to see a plane come in to land, we don't linger too long here and are soon on our way home ..... I need to get back to unpacking the hundreds of cartons lying around waiting for my attention, and more importantly to prepare for a royal visit to the Residence the next morning!!!!!