Bhutanese Birthday

Last week was my birthday. It just so happened that the last day of the Nepali holiday Dasain (in India, it's called Durga) fell on my actual birthday (October 24th) and we had that day off. To celebrate, Emily and I threw a party on the night of the 23rd that featured "American food" like Oreos, Pringles, chips & salsa, "rice krispie treats" (made without marshmallows and with the puffed rice from the market), and hot dogs in BBQ sauce. Samir brought over his excellent homemade pizza, and others contributed with lemon pudding, samosas, more chips, alcohol, juice, soda, tempura chilies, bread, and lentils to form quite an excellent feast! We also had cakes from Ambient Cafe that they customized for me (because by now they are getting to know us quite well since we go there many times per week).

For most of the party, people just stood around and chatted and ate and drank. There was probably a total of 20 people altogether. Late into the party, as the number dwindled down to 8, we played a fun (and multicultural globalized version) of charades.

Preparing our "American Food" for the party. 

Everything is all setup, now just waiting for the guests! 

Chris and I. 

Gathering around the food ... always a party classic anywhere in the world.
(From left to right: Deb, Liz, Chris, Doug, Julia, Janet)

My good Bhutan friends: Deb, Kimi, Suraj, Me, Arun, Chris.

Emily brings in the cake as everyone sings "Happy Birthday."

Emily and I. 

Liz and Chris. 

Nancy and Julia. 

Suraj and Kimi. 

Talking with Janet and Samir. 

"Action shot" : Kimi, Runa, Arun, Cathy, and Liz. 

Suraj at charades. 

Emily struggles to act out "Born in the USA" while Arun just dances by himself. 

The next morning (my real birthday), our bookshelf still decorated. 

My birthday present to myself: a Buddha carved into yak bone. 

On Wednesday – the day of my birthday – Emily and I went with Chris and Liz to a tshechu at Dechenphu Lhakhang. Dechenphu is a temple that is home to the protector-deity of Thimphu valley. Locally, it is much-visited because people go to make offerings and pray whenever they are going to do something like travel or take a test or begin a new endeavor. Unfortunately, our timing was a little late and we missed the tshechu completely! Most often, tshechus are all day affairs with a break for lunch. At this tshechu, they stopped at noon ... just as we arrived. It was still a great place to visit and we had a very nice picnic on the hill in front of the lhakhang.

Dechenphu Lhakhang. 

The Prime Minister of Bhutan and his entourage descend
from the lhakhang after the tshechu. 

Atsaras precede the Prime Minister, dancing before him. 

The Prime Minister, Lyonchen Jigme Y. Thinley. 

After the atsaras escorted the PM down to his car, they then helped load audio
equipment into a truck. It was a funny juxtaposition. 

Bhutanese children that came over to have a picnic with us. 

Entering the temple grounds. 

A typical sight in Bhutan: a phallic fountain.
This one was dispensing holy water. 

Butter lamps. 

A courtyard behind the temple. 

The entrance to the temple building.
Only visitors in formal Bhutanese dress are allowed inside. 

Some boys that were following us around. They didn't really want
anything, they were just curious about us. 

Me, Emily, Chris, and Liz. 

When we got back from Dechenphu, Chris and Liz dropped us off in Thimphu and Emily and I spent most of the afternoon walking around Thimphu and hanging out at Ambient Cafe. Since it was a special occasion, we had drinks and dinner at the Taj Tashi Hotel – a five-star resort and a landmark of Thimphu. It was fun, although we definitely won't be going there too often. First of all, it is incredibly expensive by Bhutanese standards and since I get paid in Ngultrum, I know what prices should and shouldn't be in the local currency. For example, our meal was Nu4600 ($85) at the Taj, while just last night we had an excellent Indian meal with our table overflowing with food for Nu400 ($7.50). Second, the Taj is full of wealthy Western tourists and I neither fit in with them, nor do I particularly want to be associated with them. To give you an idea, a basic room at the Taj starts at about $415/night.

The entrance to the Taj. 

The view from the Taj. 

The entryway. 

We had a drink at the "Ara Bar" in the lobby of the Taj. 

Emily with her lychee martini. 

I went with the whiskey concoction. 

Cheers! 

The main restaurant, The Thongsel, overlooks a giant prayer wheel outside. 

We ate at the Bhutanese restaurant at the Taj, Chig-ja-gye.
It was definitely the highest quality Bhutanese food we've had here.
This was our appetizer: pork momos, hoetneys (see previous blog entry),
and local mushrooms.  

Our main course.

There was so much food we couldn't even finish half of it.
The restaurant wouldn't let us take any of it home, so sadly it went to waste.
The menu is a fixed-price four courses, but next time we will only order one!

The dessert was just a standard brownie with ice cream on top, but it
being an extreme rarity here, it was absolutely delicious! They even
wrote "happy birthday" just for me. 

It was a very good birthday all-in-all. Unfortunately, it wasn't a great week overall because there are some things going on at work that haven't been very positive. I won't go into all of the details here, but let me just say that Bhutan is not a great place to be for a personality like mine that puts a high value on communication, punctuality, efficiency, and respect for other people's time. As frustrating as it has been at times, I am still enjoying being here and am still in awe that I get to have an experience like this in my life.