Catching Up???

Internet scarcity has prevented postings lately. Maybe one day I will catch up. Looks like no photos for a while. Hey, I think I got one to load!

            During our final weekend in Thimphu the Sunday was the no car day for the month. Quite a treat to wander the streets normally choked with traffic and enjoy the idle of the street while watching an impromptu badminton match or a bit of soccer. Orientation wound up with a few last sessions, including travel details and the all important work permit.

            We loaded up a couple of borrowed school buses with everyone’s households. Looking a bit like refugees we headed for Punakah via Docho La which is the 10,000 foot pass between Thimphu and Punakah. The stop on the summit allowed us time to circle the 108 Stupas which were built to atone for a military action which the Bhutanese King felt he was pressured into undertaking. A rather different take on how the victors might normally commemorate a military success. Atop the pass the sky was blue and the Himalayan peaks along the Tibetan border were a spectacle worth enjoying for a little while.

            The trip down from the pass is long, windy, and bumpy dropping from over 10,000’ to below 3,000’. A few flowers, some green in some of the terraced fields, and a warmth to the air which seems foreign to February greets us as we unload for the day.

Shutters

            Traditionally the shops are closed at night with shutters. Many are painted in the traditional style. They are set and locked into place with a variety of handles, sliding bolts, hinged hasps, and padlocks. The new metal grates are much less interesting and less appealing.

Around Thimphu & orientation

Blog, somehow the word doesn’t sound speedy. Tweet, speedy. Text, speedy, email, sorta speedy, but blog sounds like its lagging. As I have been with entries for the past few days. We are winding up our orientation. Three mornings of some basic Dzongka lessons gave me a pretty good sense about where I stood in terms of having any likelihood of communicating beyond basic English with lots of hand gestures. This method has served me well in the markets here and I am prepared to set a good example of an English speaker for my students. I can handle hello and a few bits of politeness in Dzongka but not much else. Although I do consider myself to have a second language, Spanish, the Romance languages are of less help than English when it comes to hearing the pronunciation of Asian languages.

            We have had taxi practice, cooking demo, health hints, cultural awareness, shopping time, wandering time, bureaucracy time, and a bit of R&R when needed. The females seem to be washing their things out at night as good travelers should whereas all the guys are supporting the hotel laundry service.  My pile of household goods is getting difficult to squirrel away in my room. I was going to do all my cooking with electricity but our program director, Nancy, gave me some definite advice about having a gas burner available so that in the event, perhaps likely, the electricity went out for a while, as in days, I would still be able to cook, bathe, and boil drinking water. Nancy courteously allowed that I could take her advice or not but it seemed clear that my situation would be best served if I had a gas burner. I stuck with simplicity and got a single burner rather than a double, but even that entails a propane tank, regulator, and hose all now added to my pile. I may very well need one of the rooms in my apartment simply to transfer my pile into upon my arrival.

            Cooking was definitely a highlight. Neema led a team of three who took our freshly chopped ingredients and created a number of tasty dishes in what seemed to be a very short period of time. I am sure this was arranged to bolster our confidence in our ability to feed ourselves freshly made, nutritious, and very tasty food as we spread ourselves throughout the country. The days of 3 meals/day at the hotel with hot & cold running water are likely coming to an abrupt end for me rather shortly.

            The session on health was eye opening. Some good reminders and good information. Bottom line, we are on the other side of the world from our usual home. Health care is universal, free to everyone including us as employees. However, the level of care available in most of our settings is pretty basic, but the country isn’t that big so better care is fairly close and we do have access to very good evacuation insurance if needed. Best advice, eat well, drink plenty of clean water.

            Very nice morning walk up to the Buddha on the ridge above town. It is still under construction. All construction, and there is a lot of it going on, looks to be going slowly. Apparently this is due to some manpower shortages. Well, I’ll add a couple of pics and call it good for now. The trucks hauling goods from India are often decked out for good luck. The prayer flags gather in certain spots rather mysteriously.

Sunday picnic

As a group we are settling into a routine, we’re getting to know each other, we are enjoying being pampered a bit with a place to sleep and three meals everyday. Soon enough we will be on our own for all of the above in locations which promise to be very different from our experience here in the capital city of Thimphu where shopping is easy and there are euro style coffee shops if one hankers for a fix of homelike environment.

This past Sunday we, as a group feeling rather like tourists, were bused to a trailhead where we set off to hike up to Cheri Goemba also known as Ghagri Dorjeden which is a monastery hung high on a very steep ridge above a narrow valley with a wintry rushing stream in the bottom. The roofs of the monastery look as though they are flying out over space. The buildings, centuries old, create a place that tells the history of Bhutan. The monastery was established in 1620 by Zhabdrung Ngawang Namgval, the founder of the Bhutanese state according to WikiP. On the drive up we passed a shrined carved and painted onto a rock face. All this was a wonderful taste of the country which we are all eager to explore in our own regions and to learn whatever we can.

Monday we began work in earnest as we looked at curriculum and lesson plans began to find out how we would be expected to work at our schools.

A few pics

Orientation commences

Orientation is, as one would suspect, full of meetings, formalities, and necessities. We are learning a lot about the school system and educational philosophies of Bhutan. It does help to give us some background so that we might better understand the system of which we are becoming one small part. We did sign our contracts yesterday and that means we are all now civil servants of Bhutan.

I am slowly getting to know some of the others in the group, it is an incredibly diverse and eclectic group. No two people have anywhere near the same backgrounds. My roommate is a newly robed Buddhist monk, one of the teachers is a very recent college grad, many have taught abroad before, one has a handful of degrees including one in electrical engineering. I can be a bit slow getting to know everyone, I was a day or two behind when I got here and my first afternoon and evening was a bit of a wash as I was a little travel weary. The 24 hr break in Beijing was a bonus, but the short night in the airport in Bangkok still took its toll.

I am reminding myself of my way around Thimphu, we have a lot of shopping to do as most of us have to set up house where we are going. I am trying to figure out the basics I need to get started, I intend to be frugal, so far one electric pot and a few dishes are mine. I will have the option of coming back to Thimphu to shop on a weekend. We do have Saturday classes but I think the day is a bit shorter. A couple of the teachers are going to the eastern part of the country, the travel time by road is 4 days!! I am still a bit disbelieving of that. Travel is a difficult topic here, I am still trying to sort it out.

Every time we meet with an official or other professional as part of our training I am always struck by their humility and sincerity. They all express very honorable, humane, and mindful ideals and goals but also have a practical side which realizes these standards may not yet be currently achieved across the educational system. It is inspiring to hear them and to know that at the highest level the goals of the educational system are ones for which it is an honor to strive.

Enough already!