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January 31, 2005

Hungry? Iron Chef Chhimi!

Lately we have been eating at home a lot (Save money and all). So for a change from the usual Chinese stir-fry we decided to try something different. Went to the Williams Sanoma website and tried the Grilled Eggplant, Red Onion and Pepper Sandwich with Basil Mayonnaise and Broccoli-Leek Soup. Surprisingly it turned out almost perfect. If you like - you should try and make the Basil Mayonnaise - it is Mayo up another notch.

Posted by chhimi at 07:47 PM | Comments (1)

January 30, 2005

Serving up some Sunday Links!! And how would you like your eggs?

• What's your personality test: Just in case you didn't know you had an ass of a personality. Speaking from experience ;)
• Florida preacher dies after saying 'And when I go to heaven...: Only in Florida!!
• The Science of Flirting: For my single friends or married ones ;) [Stare into each others' eyes, Don't play hard to get ...]

Posted by chhimi at 02:20 PM | Comments (2)

Caught up with the bandwagon!

I have finally caught up to the bandwagon I started. (See December "Love Actually is... December 02.") Anyways, I am the proud parent of a spanking new Canon 20D. Christmas/Birthday has come a little early this year. Pictures coming as soon as we get better weather and I finish cleaning up my computer.

Posted by chhimi at 02:24 AM | Comments (1)

January 28, 2005

Temps de nuit à Paris

Beautiful Paris! J'aime Paris. It was really beautiful and I had the best time of my vacation out there. I would love to go back to Paris again. Maybe when it is not that wet. There is a lot of shots of the Eiffel Tower and that's because Tabitha and I fell in love with the Eiffel Tower.

Posted by chhimi at 03:31 PM | Comments (2)

Links for Friday

• ONLY IN DENVER: A Denver police sergeant is under investigation for allegedly threatening to arrest a woman Monday for displaying on her truck a derogatory bumper sticker about President Bush. ($5 Says cop gets away free with slap on wrist after all Denver's record for catching Kobe and Jon Bennet killer well you know the rest of the story.
• Mad Cow makes out with Goat - Goat gets Mad Cow: On a serious note - Mother Nature's is telling us to become Vegan. & Spongebob is still gay!!
• Legalizing Cockfighting: "Oklahoma, one legislator is proposing a blood-free alternative: fitting roosters with little boxing gloves and letting them slug it out."
• Man castrates self: Who needs a Rabbi when you can do it yourself? Just Google it --> How to castrate oneself? SEARCH! On another note about genetelia - "Man mistakenly cuts off genitalia, dog eats it." "I confused it with the chicken's neck," said an elderly Romanian.

Posted by chhimi at 10:14 AM | Comments (1)

London at Night

I think these were the most difficult night shots I have taken. Not because it was hard to take but rather the weather was very un-cooperative. (Freezing Temperatures – wish I had a glove or something) And for all you photography buffs – Most shots were at ISO 100 f/11.0 taken at Aperture mode on a Canon Rebel (Kit Lens) and also if you have a great person to snuggle up against or patiently waits for your artistic little arse. (Thanks Wife)

Posted by chhimi at 08:45 AM | Comments (0)

January 27, 2005

Links of the day

I am going to try and add links to sites that I find interesting on a daily basis. (The keyword being daily - like I wish I could work out on a "daily" basis. I will try my darndest.

• Cell phone radiation levels: Comparison charts by manufacturer. Your brain is being fried - thank you call again.
• Spongebob is GAY!: So is it Patrick or do you thing Spongebob has a thing for Squidward? Ooooo!!! I get it Spongebob must be gay after all check his tight Squarepants out. Ok you crazy Christian activist groups you really need a life. The only homosexuals are those damn priest molesting small boys.

Posted by chhimi at 10:03 AM | Comments (0)

January 26, 2005

Getting to KNOW Me! (this is going to be a treat)

1. What time did you get up this morning? When my wife and alarm woke me up
2. Diamonds or pearls? Neither, and don’t give my wife hints
3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Cookout
4. What is your favorite TV show? Many - I am a certified couch potato looking more like the couch
5. What did you have for breakfast? Tuna Sandwich I made (Tuna - with Sandwich spread and my kickass Basil Mayo) on a bed of Tomato and Alpha Alpha Sprouts) I love eating incase you don’t know me
6. What is your middle name? Who knows, I don’t even know what to call myself legally - don’t want my kids to go through this same crap
7. What is your favorite cuisine? All things Yummy, Seafood, Spicy Food, Thai Food, Chinese, Indian oh Yeah Mum's cooking (ask me what I don’t like - American cuisine (burgers and all tasteless bland food) esp. Thanksgiving Turkey - Yes I am thankful its only once a year I get to torture my palette.
8. What foods do you dislike? See above hehe
9. What your newest hobby? Photography
10. What is your favorite CD at the moment? No CD not much of a music guy - used to like sappy escalator music
11. What kind of car do you drive? A tiny Red Toyota Corolla with 160,000+ miles on it. Time for a new car. Maybe a giant SUV environment polluter with an obnoxious sign that says I support our troops -- idiots if you support the troops quit draining the OIL reserves and we wouldn't have to see that dang sticker.
12. Favorite sandwich? Not much of a sandwich person like I said no bland food. But my trip to Paris opened my taste buds.... baguette and Foie Gras now that is a kick ass combination
13. What characteristics do you despise? Whose characteristics - if it is not mine then I hate assholes. How do I know who an asshole is - well cuz I am one.
14. Favorite item of clothing? Nothing, just the bare necessities.. Lately for the last year or so -- I haven’t been able to run Free as the bird (got Housemates)
15. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? I'd like to go home - and if I am done with that then maybe keep traveling around the world. Don’t want to be an ostrich with my head stuck in the ground
16. What color is your bathroom? Don't seem to recollect - white ask me about my reading material in the bathroom instead
17. Favorite brand of clothing? Isn’t this the same as the above - whatever makes me look good and believe me not a lot of clothing out there that can make me look good...see the trend Low self esteem nothing positive to say about myself.
18. Where would you retire? Now, I dunno away from the hustle and bustle
19. Favorite time of day? Night, I am like a vampire. Seriously I like the night
20. What was your most memorable birthday? This upcoming one... they are all special -- so you guys throwing me a surprise birthday party.
21. Where were you born? PHUENTSHOLING, BHUTAN. And DAMN PROUD of it.
22. Favorite sport to watch? Without a doubt Basketball, then maybe soccer -- sports I hate to watch - baseball and cricket and golf and oh yeah the outdoor channel on ESPN. Who the hell cares how you tie a fishing hook or how you good you are at killing BAMBI with a semi automatic rifle with scope and laser... make it more challenging go naked to the forest with your hunting knife - now that might be fun to watch.
23. Who do you least expect to send this back to you? Everyone
24. Person you expect to send it back first? My wife
25. What fabric detergent do you use? Oh I am a brand name consumer when it comes to this TIDE and CHEER none of that fake brand names
26. Favorite Color? Blue as in I am feeling BLUE!! Used to like Red
27. Are you a morning person or night owl? You are really pissing me off --- I said NIGHT see above
28. What is your shoe size? Tiny and your point being
29. Do you have any pets? Four fat goldfish, Siamese fighting fish 2 housemates and wife (just kidding)
30. Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with us? I am going NUTS over here. BACHAO!!!!!!
31. Gold or silver? Ok this is a dumb question -- I don’t like shiny things
32. Beach, City or Country? All -- depends on my mood... I think country -- mountainous country
33. Favorite ice cream? Chocolate! When I am in the mood for sweet stuff. I usually can’t tolerate sweet stuff or I don’t have a sweet tooth
34. Favorite flower? I don't take time to stop and smell the 'flowers'...
35. What did you do for your last birthday? Whatever my wife did

Posted by chhimi at 04:02 PM | Comments (0)

Dang WEBHOST

Here is something I posted some time back before my webhost took a nap. Summary of my vacation.

Posted by chhimi at 03:28 PM | Comments (0)

January 21, 2005

My Photo Album is back online!

After a long and tiring process my Photo Album is back online. Please go ahead and check it out. I will move archive my Paris and London pictures there when I can. In the meantime give it a whirl and try and post some pictures on my site. (NOTE: some albums maybe locked)

On another note, I am trying to start a couple of NEW blogs one will be called CHHIMI's POD or Picture of Day (Basically this will constitute of a (you got it) a picture of day – the reason why I am keep it separate is so that you guys will not be bored with the weird pictures I will be experimenting with. Note the slight subtlety not the same as PAD like my brother's site. The other new blogs that I will be starting time permitting will be a movie review section (Your critics will be the chhimi bros. - My brother and I have been avid movie watchers for more than a decade and we seem to have PhD’s in them) so we will be bringing you our reviews Bhutty style (New Release or DVDs). It's going to be huge so check back soon. (Watch out Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper!) The other site/blog will be TOP SECRET.

Posted by chhimi at 03:48 PM | Comments (0)

January 17, 2005

Day 5 & 6: Paris

Day5&6 -Paris: Christmas Day in Paris...trying to hit all the tourist sites and absorb everything we could!
- Sitting in the metro cart going down from Sacre Coeur	- Anybody want to ride the carousel?	- In front of the Moulin Rouge
- Look! Tabitha is so strong!	- The Grand Arch...can fit Notre Dame in that space!	- Sweet Tabbie!
- Louvre & Pyramid in the background.	- Enjoying a little sun light!	- Omg! How Embarrassing?!
- Oooh...Paris at Dusk.	- She Rock?!	- Bigger than life Louis Vuitton!! Wow!
- Christmas Stroll on Champ Elysees	- Enjoying the moment	- Cutie Pies!
- Mussels of Brussels. Leon de Bruxelles...thanks to those metro ads!	- View of Paris from Sacre Coeur	- Mmmm...Ice Cream!
- menu?	- dress?	- apple bread? this is where we went for breakfast almost on a daily basis...Mmmm...soo yummy! Petite Dejeuner!
- Artist view of Paris	- Serenity	- Concorde
- The Real Moulin Rouge windmill!	- Pierre, this is for you!	- Window shopping inside the Louvre
- Taking a break and capturing the Parisian air. C'est Manifique!	- Looking Cool!	- Time flies when we're having fun!
- Sweet view... ;-)	- Look! Chhimi with no glasses! Such a handsome devil!	- Crap! We are lost!
- Sacre Coeur	- help! I am stuck	- ahh the Louvre - Glass Pyramid
- doing the "can-can"	- a little loving...	- and a little playing!
Merry Christmas from Paris

Posted by chhimi at 10:16 PM | Comments (2)

January 16, 2005

Day 4: Paris Notre Dame

Day4 -Paris: Christmas Eve in Paris - Tabitha's plan was to attend midnight mass at the Notre Dame. Imagine that - us going to mass or anything remotely religious - they would have been thunderbolts from heaven trying to strike us down. But we did enjoy a really wonderful day at the Notre Dame.
- Outside the Notre Dame - built on a Roman temple it took two centuries to get built	- beautiful proportioned west facade is a masterpiece of French Gothic architecture	- after climbing 420 steps - we get a awesome view of Paris
- Flying Buttresses at the east end of the cathedral have a span of 50 feet (taken from Square Jean XXIII)	- HINT: climbing the 420 odd steps - if you are fat like me you may be short on breath and some places are pretty tight	- In front of a building that had angel Michael fighting something!
- do you think Tabitha can balance the see-saw?	- the spires (245 ft) in the background is from Saint Chapelle (this was something we missed - maybe the next time we are there again)	- square that had a statue of Michael slaying some evil thingie.
- Oh well! I guess I can't win the position to be the next Quasimodo	- ahhhhhhhh!	- restaurants nearby the Notre Dame
- view of east side of Notre Dame! from Square Jean XXIII	- a little too old! but enjoying the moment nevertheless	- ahh just enjoying Christmas Eve in Paris
- this smart car's are too kewl - I wish they sold them in the States	- Saint Michel Metro station	- enjoying Moules (mussels) and fries
- Tab just chillin!	- Tabitha's wishing she was visiting during midnight mass	- view of the West Facade and the 3 portals that depicted Christ life!
- Tabitha's expression as she dodges a pigeon flying at her	- Tabitha and some stone gargoyles	- Please DONOT touch the bell honey!
- cage protecting the gargoyles from Tabitha	- inner child	- Christmas in Paris
- having a great time	- Lost	- Flying Buttress -- hehe butt.....Hey Beavis he said butt...heheh
- cuddling up for warmth	- waking along the Seine	- lunch time
- enjoying her sandwich	- watching ppl ice skate	- view of the streets near Saint Michel
- directions?	- a close up view of the gothic towers	- view of interior takes in the high vaulted central nave, choir and high altar
- Last Judgment Tympanum	- another view of the interior	- South Rose window depiction of Christ
- stained glass window	- Joan of Arc	- view of tympanum (decorated space often carved over a door or window lintel)
- a view of the square from up above.	- nutty European teen skating in his underwear -- ppl out here skate only at one speed (VERY fast)	- Nutty Japanese tourist at Champ-Elysees
Day5-Paris: (Coming Soon)

Posted by chhimi at 09:38 PM | Comments (0)

January 14, 2005

Day 3: Paris Versailles

Day3-Paris: After a very exhausting day at the Louvre - we decided to hit Versailles another must do thing on our list. Here's an important tip if you have time take it easy. Or you end up losing 7lb at the end of your trip. (Coming Soon)
- sandwiches. Foie gras for breakfast!	- a view of the Latona Basin and the Grand Canal	- Bassin d'Apollon
- in front of the Chateau	- too cold -- need coffee	- Tabitha loves to do the victory symbol all the dang time
- Petit Trianon home to Louis XIV or XV mistress	- bedroom of one of the mistress	- walking the trails from the Chateau to the Petit Trianon - beautiful walk except the weather was not very co-operative
- more beautiful fountains (wish it were working)	- Honey please DONOT touch the fountain!	- outside the Chateau
- Chateau and fountains	- one of many 700+ rooms at the Chateau	- Versailles is filled with a huge park and garden - visit it as it is FREE
- Neptune Fountain - this was a gigantic fountain - I wish it were turned on.	- Galerie des Glaces (the Hall of Mirrors, where the Treaty of Versailles was signed to end World War 1)	- don't I look cool
- doing a Bhutanese rain dance in front of the Bassin d'Apollon - maybe/hoping that the fountain would start	- Taken by the Grand Canal	- who's your daddy? .... is it Louis XIV? Nope my daddy is TOM Ma.
- more art/paintings between the Louvre the day before - I had enough art to last me a life time	- wonder what they are staring at?	- an old french dood chilling with his dog (PS: French love their dogs they go everywhere with them)
- Louis XIV's bedchamber occupied the exact centre of the chateau from 1701 onward. It was a key setting for events in the Sun King's day and was arranged to reflect this ceremonial function.	- The Battle Gallery is included in the Chateau's grand circuit. At 120 metres, this is the longest hall in the Chateau. It recounts French history through masterpieces.	- RER-C (train) back to Paris. HINT: If you take the RER-C from Paris to Versailles buy the package (includes entrance to the entire chateau and trianons and headsets) it is really cheaper this way.
- The Chapel royal at Versailles is consecrated to Saint Louis.	- huge room in the Chateau with cool painting on the ceiling	- Not this is what they should attempt on weekend warriors (HGTV show)
- cuddling up for warmth	- enterance of the Chateau	- freezing in the park (my seven layer of fat could NOT protect me from the cold)
Formal Gardens Day4-Paris: (Coming Soon)

Posted by chhimi at 01:59 PM | Comments (0)

January 13, 2005

Day 2: Paris Louvre

Day2-Paris: After a well rested night we decided to hit the Louvre. This was on Tabitha's list of things to visit. We ended up spending the entire day there. As it was raining and I think we spent it well.
- medieval fortress	- Sphinx	- enjoying herself
- Tabitha trying to mimic Falcon God Horus	- always with the weird Asian "Victory" symbol	- Louvre houses more than 6 000 European paintings
- enjoying the paintings	- large format French paintings	- more paintings
- too much art for one day	- breakfast (viennoiseries & espressos) at the Metro	- walk like an Egyptian ---
- chilling at the Louvre	- oh My!	- refueling time (lunch break)
- Flying Mercury	- "culture-shock"	- enjoying the paintings
- metro	- is it me? or do those sphinxs look Asian	- freaky looking coffins
- a scarry mummy	- enterance to the Louvre - Glass Pyramid designed by architect Ieoh Ming Pei	- wine cheaper than water and soda.(that is why you don't see many chubby French doods)
- Napoleon?	- Feast at Cana	- ??
- The Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon and the Coronation of Empress Josephine	- Crown	- ferris wheel on the Champs-Elysees
Day3-Paris: (Coming Soon)

Posted by chhimi at 03:58 PM | Comments (0)

Heaven & Earth

Arriving in Bhutan for the first time can give a person a bad case of the Shangri-las. The dirty monsoon heat of New Delhi quickly becomes a stifled memory, a brief stopover in Kathmandu the staging post for the heart-stopping flight east across the Himalayas. Everest, enveloped by clouds this afternoon, cedes to a hundred-mile chain of monumental, lethal snow cones with the legendary names of Gauri Shankar, Lhotse, Kanchenjunga, and, to the east, Jannu, known to its visitors as the Peak of Terror (and successfully climbed for the first time only this year). Then the plane begins its descent, and the darkly wooded crests and ridges of the Himalayan foothills mark our crossing into Bhutan.

Marijuana grows wild, and voluminously, throughout the country. But, miraculously, there is no drug trade in Bhutan—nor, from what I can discover, even a single pothead. Only the pig farmers harvest the accidental crop, to fatten their animals. They've discovered that it gives pigs an insatiable appetite. The painted penises are an unashamed petition to the fertility god, and not just for the Bhutanese. In recent years women from all over the world have been coming to Bhutan in hopes of receiving Kunley's fertility assistance.

Read More:

Heaven & Earth
by James Truman

Think Buddhist Bhutan is an otherworldly aerie in the clouds? Not quite... James Truman discovers that spirituality, in this land of dzongs, divine madmen, and Gross National Happiness, comes with a healthy dollop of carnality

Arriving in Bhutan for the first time can give a person a bad case of the Shangri-las. The dirty monsoon heat of New Delhi quickly becomes a stifled memory, a brief stopover in Kathmandu the staging post for the heart-stopping flight east across the Himalayas. Everest, enveloped by clouds this afternoon, cedes to a hundred-mile chain of monumental, lethal snow cones with the legendary names of Gauri Shankar, Lhotse, Kanchenjunga, and, to the east, Jannu, known to its visitors as the Peak of Terror (and successfully climbed for the first time only this year). Then the plane begins its descent, and the darkly wooded crests and ridges of the Himalayan foothills mark our crossing into Bhutan. The approach to the Paro airport is notoriously dicey; only a handful of pilots are certified to attempt it. A series of hard banks and looping figure eights puts us alongside a cliff face, and suddenly we're a wing's length from Bhutan's most famous site, the monastery of Taktshang Goemba, held in miraculous suspension halfway up the rock wall. One final bank and we just clear the chimney of a house beneath us, then bounce to the ground, roaring to a halt a few yards shy of the runway's end.
Out in the cool afternoon air, we're still somewhere between earth and sky. Billowing mists cascade down the hillsides toward the valley floor, while funnels of smoke spiral up to meet them—the sacred offerings of alder wood and juniper that burn constantly, scenting the air. The impression is magical, the invitation compelling. Here, it seems, is a place to rest one's head in the clouds.

The drive into the town of Paro takes us along a narrow country road lined with willow trees; beyond lie meadows and rice fields and clusters of farmhouses in the traditional Bhutanese style, handsome and baronial with their white-plastered walls and timbered beams. Pedestrians thread the roadway, all of them in some manner of national dress. And in one form or another, everyone does wear a dress. We pass farmers sporting the gho—the male costume of a patterned smock worn with knee-high socks—and monks on afternoon recess in the traditional Tibetan Buddhist robes of saffron and burgundy. Packs of schoolgirls seem to be competing for who can wear the most colorful kira, the kimonolike dress that for women fulfills every duty, from farmwork to fashion statement. We see a group of girls being hauled into the back of a police truck. Have they gone too far? Not at all. With so few crimes to solve, the police fill their days with other things, such as ferrying children to and from school.

Meanwhile, through an open window I detect a pungent, dimly familiar smell and glance out at what looks like a giant marijuana bush. My hunch is correct. Marijuana grows wild, and voluminously, throughout the country. But, miraculously, there is no drug trade in Bhutan—nor, from what I can discover, even a single pothead. Only the pig farmers harvest the accidental crop, to fatten their animals. They've discovered that it gives pigs an insatiable appetite.

Paro itself is a broad main street of shops and tiny bars, with a town square that doubles as a parking lot. Most of the merchants sell exactly the same things at exactly the same prices. The Wal-Mart philosophy has yet to arrive in Bhutan. Shopping here is based not on bargains or convenience but on long-standing relationships between families and shopkeepers. There is no agony of loyalty: You shop according to friendship.

We stop on the other side of town, at our first hotel. Tourism in Bhutan is so recent—it began only in 1974, after the coronation of the present king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck—that there is no consensus about how visitors should be architecturally acclimated. Our hotel, the Kyichu Resort, is built in a fanciful Alpine Modern style; our rooms, though perfectly clean and comfortable, are wedges in a concrete octagon.

Our traveling party numbers four: my friend Sebastian Beckwith, an epicurean tea merchant and old Bhutan hand; Sonam, our driver, who has recently left the monastic life to become a soldier ("less hard," he explains); and Karma Lotey, our tour organizer and guide. There are generally two kinds of trips available to visitors: the trekking tour and the cultural tour. I'd opted for the latter, with a few days of trekking thrown in. Over dinner at a tiny restaurant in Paro, the Sonam Trophel, where we are the only customers, Karma goes over the itinerary. I was warned about Bhutanese food before leaving New York; Ruth Reichl, the editor of Gourmet, assured me that it was well known to be the world's worst cuisine. In fact, she was investigating a story that the king was negotiating with some chefs in Bangkok to invent a few national dishes less off-putting to visitors. Our dinner, which will turn out to be the best of the trip, is an appetizing multicourse affair of fried beef dumplings, chicken soup, a vegetable casserole, deep-fried chicken, and the popular ema datse, hot peppers stewed with cubes of cheese. Pungent and sour, it is an acquired taste, and there are many opportunities to acquire it: It is the national custom to eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

During Karma's briefing, it becomes clear that being a travel guide in Bhutan is no ordinary task. The usual particulars of history—of great leaders and commemorated dates and authenticated happenings—are in short supply, either lost or unrecorded. And what is known doesn't make for light reading. Buddhism's arrival in Bhutan in the eighth century unleashed a thousand years of bloody conflict between rival schools and sects, interrupted only by pitched battles with warmongering lamas invading from Tibet. In the seventeenth century, a layer of civil government was added to the theocracy, plunging the country into nearly two hundred years of civil war. The appearance of the British in India led to another hundred years of skirmishes, squabbles, and uneasy truces. So while Bhutan's survival as the world's last Buddhist kingdom has an aura of grace to it, the visitor has to give up the idea that it's because the people are New Age peaceniks.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Bhutanese prefer to relate their history through folklore and legends. In this version, the country's founding story occurs in the middle of the eighth century, when a reincarnate Buddha, Guru Rinpoche, unified both Bhutan and Tibet under Buddhism, first subduing the local animistic deities and then, in an enlightened example of missionary work, installing them as protectors of the new religion. Thus was born the fascinating interplay of historic and prehistoric traditions that still defines this country's (and Tibet's) religious practices. In one of Guru Rinpoche's most celebrated feats, he rode a winged tigress over the mountains of central Bhutan to alight on a cliff ledge outside Paro. This is the site of Taktshang Goemba, the monastery we saw from the plane the day before. It seems like a promising place to begin, so the next day we set off for the long hike up.

Today is a public holiday, "The Day of Rain," marking the end of the monsoon season. Though the sky is a hard, brilliant blue, Karma assures me that it will rain before nightfall. As we apply ourselves to the upward trek, groups of schoolgirls wearing the traditional full-length kira come barreling past us, shyly amused by the lead-footed foreigners. The heavy traffic, Karma explains, is the result of the country's being in a special period of mourning, occasioned by the recent death of the Royal Grandmother, the wife of the present king's grandfather. In a few weeks, her body will be carried in procession across the country for cremation; until then, according to Buddhist belief, prayers and pilgrimages will still have a beneficial effect on determining her next earthly incarnation.

Ascending through pine forests, we emerge in a clearing to find a teahouse and a group of German hikers, our first sighting of fellow tourists. The trek to Taktshang Goemba is the obligatory first-day warm-up for hiking tours, acclimating visitors to both the rugged climbs and the airless nine-thousand-foot elevation. After this, they'll be off the map for ten or fourteen days, in the highlands where (many Bhutanese believe) yeti still prowl. Together, we grit our teeth and sip cups of butter tea, the national beverage made of meat stock and yak butter. (It tastes much as you would expect.)

A short climb puts us on a lookout shelf directly across from the monastery, which is closed to foreigners. But the miracle is fully apparent from across the gorge. Guru Rinpoche's arrival by flying tigress may sound like a story, but the human feat of building a monastery into the face of a sheer cliff couldn't have happened without it.

So the story resonates with a kind of fulfilled truth. And since open-fire cooking and continuously burning butter lamps ensure that monasteries are vulnerable to regular devastation (this one last burned down in 1998), the toil of reconstruction marries story and fact in perpetuity, keeping both alive.

We turn around and make a leisurely descent, stopping to chat with a middle-aged man who is sweeping the path with a homemade twig brush. I am intrigued that someone would spend his holiday engaged in this particularly useless task. He explains to us that he is accumulating merit. With both their present lifetime and many thousand forthcoming reincarnations to worry about, the Bhutanese devote themselves to accumulating merit—and thereby erasing bad karma—with the ardor of pilgrims. While I'm mulling this over, another man joins our party, jabbering in an excited approximation of English. He is returning from the monastery and is joyously, wholeheartedly, astoundingly drunk. I notice that Karma and Sonam treat both men—the do-gooder and the good-for-nothing—with equal graciousness and respect. There's a practical aspect to this: In a small country of large, related families, ripples of conflict make big waves. But one also begins to see that a Buddhist culture holds pride and shame, piety and earthliness, as something other than polar opposites. Just as we reach the end of our trek, the perfect blue sky clouds over, and to Karma's unsurprised satisfaction, it begins to pour.

From its mountainous border with Tibet to the north, Bhutan slowly descends south and east in a series of forested ridges and lush valleys. All travel is a labor-intensive procession of heaving ascents and plunging, twisting downhills. The public buses making the cross-country trek earned the nickname of Vomit Comets from the first generation of visitors, and as the name has stuck, so have tourists taken to the more commodious means of minibuses and SUVs. Our small group climbs into a black Toyota for the two-hour hop to Thimphu. A tiny village until the 1960s, when the present king's father decreed it the new capital, Thimphu is now an almost-bustling town of fifty thousand, with a raggedy commercial main street of government offices, traditional shops, and new mini-malls. A kind of Beverly Hills is taking shape in the slopes above it—an enclave of guarded driveways and smart, Western-style apartment buildings. But the core of the town is its dzong, the magnificently medieval fortress that, reflecting Bhutan's power-sharing arrangements, houses the separate offices of the king, top government ministers, and the Central Monk Body, the Bhutanese Vatican. Surrounding it, rather incongruously, is Bhutan's only golf course.

My hope in Thimphu is to meet some of the royal family, who enjoy the nation-defining popularity once shared by the British Windsors. This seems especially notable since the king has four wives, all of them sisters, and has had children with each (a fact the Bhutanese don't find nearly as fascinating as foreigners do). But the situation has been complicated by the Royal Grandmother's death, and negotiations for our visit seem to have stalled.

And then, after lunch, we receive a summons: We will be allowed to pay our respects to the Royal Grandmother. We pile into the SUV and take off past the dzong and the foreign ministry and head out of town. Soldiers line the road as we turn into a private driveway that leads past the royal palace and uphill to a clearing where two brightly colored marquee tents flutter in the gathering wind and rain. We're led toward them and sit on benches surrounded by obediently silent schoolchildren. An attendant offers us tea or coffee; when I decline, she looks quietly furious and tells me I must have a cup. A few moments later, an older woman wearing Western makeup—the first I've seen—approaches, proffering a newly opened pack of Benson & Hedges. Not wanting to make the same mistake twice, I take one, and we sit together smoking, watching the misty squalls roll down the hillside toward us, bemused spectators at some washed-out Felliniesque pageant. From the nervous chatter around us, I slowly deduce that I am actually sharing a smoke with royalty—this is the king's aunt.

Invisible ice has been broken, for we are quickly led back to the SUV and escorted up the hill to a modest bungalow that once served as the Royal Grandmother's meditation retreat and is now the scene of her lying in state. Billowing clouds of incense and the gravelly sound of Buddhist chanting fire the air with a voluptuous solemnity. A dozen or so monks, some of them mere children, are wearily intoning the sutras of death and rebirth; they've been here for weeks, barely sleeping, and they will remain for several weeks more until the funeral procession heads east. In Buddhist culture—and one where, until recently, the life expectancy was in the low forties—death is held as an opportunity as much as an ending, the necessary bridge between lifetimes. For the Bhutanese, the Royal Grandmother also served as a bridge between generations, and their mourning is freighted with history. Her husband was the second king in the royal lineage that, beginning in 1907, brought an end to the centuries of civil war, skirmishes with Tibet, and struggles with the British colonizers to the south. A delightful fictionalized memoir of this period, The Hero with a Thousand Eyes, tells the story of the second king's court: With its unfathomable intrigues, capricious punishments, and outrageous entitlements, it could be the story of any feudal, medieval kingdom. Except this one occurred in the era of Roosevelt and Churchill. Indeed, it wasn't until the ascension of the third king in 1952 that serfdom was formally abolished in Bhutan.

The handsome woman who greets us, dressed in a dark kira of mourning, is introduced as Ashi Dechen, the daughter of the third king and the sister of the current king. She leads us into an airy sitting room furnished in an Anglo-Indian style, and over the droning and cymbal-clattering sounds of the monks outside, we share tea and marble cake. Hearing my English accent, she reminisces about her and her brother's schooling in southern England. I struggle to picture the dislocation of a Himalayan prince and princess leaving the closed kingdom of Bhutan for 1970s Britain, with its tabloid press and Socialist politics and abrasive pop culture. But our conversation stays within royal protocol, with an occasional detour to discuss meditation practices and religious beliefs. At one point, I mention our difficulty in getting permission to enter some of the more sequestered monasteries. She nods her head sympathetically. From that moment on, as if by magical decree, every door in Bhutan opens to us.

The following morning we leave Thimphu for the next valley east, climbing higher this time through mists and pine forests on roads still wrecked from the monsoon rains. Bears, tigers, wolves, and antelope live freely in an environment that the government fiercely protects, for reasons of superstition as well as ecology. As we drive through the clouds to the pass at the ridge's peak, a chorten, or shrine, divides the road. Surrounding it, as far as the eye can see, tall masts of prayer flags bow and flutter in the cold misty air, a sight that manages to be both godforsaken and godly at the same time. In a country that still assigns deities to most actions and places, who would not anchor his or her prayers to the top of the world?

From the peak we cruise down through hairpin bends to the lush valley of Punakha. Sonam, whom I've come to regard as a reincarnated New York cabbie, honks and jousts with oncoming trucks decorated like carnival floats and roars past the wheezing, overstuffed public buses. A burst of sunshine suddenly colors the rice fields in yellow and viridian, and I see that we are now in a subtropical zone where orange trees and banana plants supplement the ubiquitous apple orchards, the backbone of a lively export trade to India. On the roofs of the white farmhouses, bright red peppers are drying in the autumn sun. Punakha was once the capital of Bhutan; in a eureka (or Brasília) moment in the 1960s, the king decided that rather than try to modernize it, he would start again, in Thimphu.

The Punakha Dzong, once the national headquarters, guards one end of the valley, at the confluence of the Pho (Father) and Mo (Mother) rivers. The dramatic location was foretold by Guru Rinpoche, and construction was begun in 1637. How much of the original remains is, like most Bhutanese history, a matter of conjecture. A fire in 1986, followed by a huge flood in 1994, destroyed half of this dzong, including the main hall, and its replacement has just been completed. We walk around it, admiring the lavish wall paintings of deities and demons (which, in Buddhist belief, are closely related if not identical). It's a strange feeling: I wonder if we would hold such reverence for a rebuilt Ponte Vecchio or a repainted Sistine Chapel. The issue of authenticity—and artistic preservation—is a recent one in Bhutan. Historically, paintings have been touched up or painted over as they've faded: The action brings merit and, besides, artistic styles have stayed within a continuum of tradition. (It's also worth remembering that a quintessential form of Buddhist art, the mandala, is a celebration of impermanence.) But with the country's opening to Western eyes, its older treasures have become more valued. And protected: At a similar moment in Nepal's history, its cultural heritage was being scavenged and sold off. So while more visitors are being admitted to Bhutan, the doorways to its greatest art are quietly starting to close.

Our visit to the dzong is a few weeks short of the resident monks' return here for the winter season. A small caretaker staff is in place, along with a herd of dirty-faced initiates who are playing a game that involves throwing rotten fruit at one another. Upstairs in the sleeping quarters, we meet one of the monks. He shows us his dormitory, a tiny room with no beds that usually sleeps four and also serves as a workshop for making drums. His mouth is stained a deep red from chewing betel nuts, a mild, naturally occurring stimulant that rural Bhutanese seem to munch on from morning till night (at first glance, everyone looks like they just went a round with Mike Tyson). He is a lifer, one among the tens of thousands supported by the government. Back in Thimphu, I will get to meet reincarnated lamas—the kind that get us foreigners hot for spiritual fireworks—but it strikes me that the everyday reality of Bhutan's Buddhist state lies here, in a gentle, toothless old monk whose family once found him a reprieve from rural poverty in the local monastery and whose exclusively religious education ensures that he'll never leave. Later, we watch the ragamuffin boys in their evening class being drilled in a chanted prayer. But for differences in language and doctrine, I imagine we could be in any Catholic monastery during the Middle Ages. It comes as a mild relief to walk outside and see the townspeople congregating for Bhutan's other popular religion, the game of soccer. Even the king likes to play: He dares the opposition by keeping goal.

The next day we haul ourselves up and over to the neighboring valley of Bumthang, Guru Rinpoche's first destination in Bhutan and now the revered site of numerous sacred temples and monuments. Preparations are under way for the arrival of the funeral cortege in two weeks, and road crews are out in force. Nevertheless, the main street, a muddy tract bordered by shops and guesthouses, has an untamed Wild West aspect to it; the Bhutanese seem to share with us a romantic inclination for rougher times. In the surrounding hills are the caves where Guru Rinpoche once lived and meditated, and it is to these that the Bhutanese repair for contemplation. Retreats are a crucial part of Bhutanese life—an enforced shift from doing to being. But as life speeds up, the doing naturally predominates. And so, testing the Buddhist belief in human interconnectedness, many Bhutanese no longer make their own retreats; they sponsor monks to do it for them.

At the beginning of our two-day trek the following morning, we climb through wildflower meadows and pine forests to a small temple built into a rock face. The lone resident monk is instructing a visitor in some detail of ritual, and we're invited to attend. As they chant and pray, incense smoke trails through the open screen windows behind us, tracing a passage between the hard blue sky and the hushed forests below. It's easy to fall into a picture of a life in retreat up here; but it's easier to leave, to keep moving. On our way out, we pass the cabin of a man who stayed, now several months into a year's solitude. From inside we hear a low moaning, a sound that haunts me for days; I have no idea if I've eavesdropped on a conversation with the divine or the later stages of a nervous breakdown. Afterwards, I ask a senior monk who's completed the obligatory three-year retreat what I'm to make of this. He shrugs and suggests that the difference between the two is not as significant as I might think.

Our hike takes us deep into the valley, through alpine meadows and terraced rice paddies. At journey's end, we set up camp beside a large, traditional Bhutanese farmhouse, the home of the local village's chief, a rustic swashbuckler whom everyone addresses in English as Uncle. We're invited into his house for tea, and it's a shock to see that even the more prosperous Bhutanese live without furniture. A whole family will sleep in one room, which is often the kitchen, on floor mats; another large room will hold the family shrine; the rest of the space is used mostly for agricultural storage. Over tea, it becomes apparent that there is a family drama involving Uncle's daughter, a ravishing young woman of twenty-four. Her husband of two years is in America studying, leaving behind a son he's never seen. His most recent letter announced that he was staying on for two more years and couldn't raise the money to make a visit home. What makes the situation especially delicate is that the faithless husband is Karma's younger brother. As Uncle and Karma go at it in Dzongkha, the most common of Bhutan's multitude of languages, I gather enough meaning to work up a typical Western response: outrage against the transgressor, pity for the victim. Yet neither of the parties seems to share my reaction. Later, Karma explains that this is just a cordial negotiation about child support. As in all disputes, it is understood that karmic destiny ultimately plays the cards; individuals do the best they can within a clearly rigged game.

That night after dinner, Uncle commandeers the young women from the village to entertain us around the fire with traditional songs and dances. I had begun the evening by sampling some of the wild marijuana. Uncle, meanwhile, had worked his way through several tumblers of arra, the local moonshine. Together we make an appreciative audience, and the girls perform with gusto, singing in high, keening voices reminiscent of Chinese folk melodies. During one particularly heart-wrenching tune, I ask Karma what the girls are singing about. "This is a very beautiful song about impermanence," he explains. I ask if Bhutanese schoolgirls are much concerned with impermanence. "Almost certainly not," he replies, howling with delight.

The meeting of spirituality and earthliness may be Bhutan's most delicious mystery. Driving across the country, the first thing you notice is the religious apparatus: the shrines and temples and prayer flags. The second is the multitude of houses adorned with colorful drawings of penises—small, medium, and large, but mostly extra large. While these do duty as atavistic symbols of fertility, they also underscore the casualness with which the Bhutanese approach sex. The courting rituals of the young would, in the States, probably qualify as date rape. (The popular teenage practice of night hunting involves boys breaking into their crush's home and pouncing while the family sleeps.) Nevertheless, women hold equal status in marriage, inherit most of the family property, and, as far as I can tell, have no inhibitions about expressing themselves. One day, feeling queasy from the pepper-heavy diet, we go to a country market to look for bananas. The market women find this inexpressibly hilarious. They make numerous suggestions to Karma about where the foreign men should look for their bananas. One says that we'd be better off buying her cabbage. We leave the market empty-handed and red-faced.

The patron saint of Bhutanese mischief is a seventeenth-century lama called Drukpa Kunley, also known as the Divine Madman. Kunley is so popular in Bhutan that the national newspaper publishes an ongoing comic strip devoted to his legend. In the holy-fool tradition, he wandered the land doing battle with demons, carousing freely, and insulting all religious dogma. His crazy-adept verses and sexual antics—exposure to his Flaming Thunderbolt was said to bestow enlightenment—were recently published in English, and they're irresistible reading. One typical segment has him interrupting the devout prayers of prostrating monks with his own litany, which ends:

I bow to philanthropists with self-
seeking motives;
I bow to traders who exchange wisdom
for wealth;
I bow to renunciates who gather
wealth secretly;
I bow to prattlers who never listen;
I bow to tramps who reject a home;
I bow to the bums of insatiate whores.

Kunley's status as a saint holds true to an aspect of Tibetan, or Tantric, Buddhism that embraces sexuality as a gateway to enlightenment. But he may also embody the animistic beliefs that Buddhism overlays. The painted penises are an unashamed petition to the fertility god, and not just for the Bhutanese. In recent years women from all over the world have been coming to Bhutan in hopes of receiving Kunley's fertility assistance.

We make our own pilgrimage to his monastery, Chimi Lhakhang, on our drive back through the Punakha Valley. A brisk half-hour walk through rice fields and up a grassy hill brings us to the white-walled compound that, to my astonishment, also houses a school for young monks. We find the resident lama inside the main temple attending to an altar laden with offering bowls of arra. I ask him about the school and how one goes about teaching holy foolishness. He counters that Kunley's actions were the spontaneous expressions of an enlightened being and cannot be understood or tolerated in an initiate. (In other words, don't try this at home.) Before he can elucidate, our attention is drawn to two young couples who have just arrived carrying newborn infants. Both were apparently conceived after visits to the Kunley shrine, and the parents are now asking the lama to name them. With an unimaginable nonchalance, he strolls over to the altar and retrieves a longbow, a horn-shaped flask, and a large bamboo phallus, and while touching each baby on the side of the head with the latter, announces their names. As we say our good-byes and leave, I realize that I've just witnessed two children being baptized with a dildo.

Traveling through Bhutan, hoping to make sense of its multiple personalities, one is reminded of Charles de Gaulle and his exasperated comment about the impossibility of governing a country with 246 different kinds of cheese. The situation in Bhutan somehow seems worse: nineteen different languages, two competing schools of Buddhism (with growing Hinduism in the south), hundreds of national and regional deities, many with numerous manifestations and conflicting meanings, climate zones ranging from mountain glaciers to tropical valleys to sunbaked plains, and only one main road. The ringmaster of this unruly enterprise begins to assume the aspect of a hero, for visitors as well as for the Bhutanese. His photograph is everywhere, in temples and shops and street-corner bars. The king is now in his thirty-second year on the throne (he landed there at age sixteen), and to him has fallen the epic, camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle task of bringing Bhutan into the modern world without destroying it. Around him lie only cautionary tales: Tibet, insular and isolationist, occupied by China since 1951; tiny undefended Sikkim, annexed by India in 1975; and laissez-faire Nepal, overdeveloped and overrun by tourists, plundered of its national treasures.

The king's solutions include a push toward economic self-reliance, a preserved—some would say enforced—national identity, and a reduction of his own powers. In 1998, in a largely unpopular move, he handed the daily administration over to a national assembly, which he also invested with the power to vote him out of office in an annual referendum. This isn't quite a democracy—the king chooses the candidates who stand for election to the assembly. But this is supposedly an interim measure before he unveils the fruits of his present labor, which is nothing less than the writing of Bhutan's first constitution.

Adulation of the king is widespread and contagious. It is the national climate. I start to picture him as a kind of Kennedy-Jefferson-Emerson hybrid—a charismatic, God-chosen genius dreaming a new nation into being, equal parts visionary, emperor, and monk. While the four queens live up in the Beverly Hills section of Thimphu, the king lives alone in a modest log cabin that he built himself, and is said to spend his private time in quiet contemplation. The cabin's entrance, at the foot of a hill just outside town, is manned by guards, but petitioners still sometimes congregate in the mornings and the king will hear their grievances. Sadly, he rarely meets foreign journalists. However, Sebastian has used his connections to gain an audience with the king's confidant, the home minister Lyonpo Jigme Thinley, and one bright morning we head down to the capital dzong for our appointment. Compared with the regional dzongs we've visited, this one feels brisk and businesslike. The Central Monk Body occupies one end, the king's offices take up a corner tower, and the top government ministers are housed in the rest. From the middle of the inner courtyard, rising with the mad, voluptuous geometry of a beached galleon, the utse, a three-story structure of private chapels, holds the center.

We are ushered into a well-appointed second-floor reception room to meet the lyonpo (minister), an elegant middle-aged man of weathered face and martial bearing. My immediate interest was to question him about Gross National Happiness, a core Bhutanese philosophy on which he had spoken widely. Introduced as an idea by the king in the late eighties, Gross National Happiness can first strike cynical Western ears as a dodge—something dreamed up by an international ad agency to cover the bald spots in a threadbare economy. But listening to the lyonpo, I begin to understand GNH—which is essentially the quantifying of progress in measurements both spiritual and material—as the ingenious melding of Buddhist mindfulness with everyday pragmatism. "Our first question about any new program is to ask how it will contribute to Gross National Happiness," he explains, before rattling off the four supporting structures of GNH. The first, to create equal education and health care throughout the country, is already succeeding. Life expectancy has risen from a dismal forty-eight years to more than sixty-three in just fifteen years, and the literacy rate from seventeen percent to forty-eight percent. The second is rigorously enforced green policies that keep twenty-six percent of Bhutan as protected forestland and an agreement with India to build hydroelectric plants in the country's narrow, teeming gorges that promises clean energy and economic deliverance. The third is the forthcoming national constitution, the final step to a multiparty democracy. And the fourth leg in GNH is the promotion and preservation of traditional Bhutanese culture.

It's around the last one that things get a little sticky. Fifteen years ago, the Bhutanese government began expelling tens of thousands of Nepalese immigrants after a census showed that they were becoming a majority of the population. At the same time, the wearing of the gho and the kira, the traditional Bhutanese dress, became mandatory in schools and public offices. On our travels, we see a lot of Bhutanese, especially the young, walking about in Western-style clothes without censure. We also see many Nepalese men, women, and children, but we see them exclusively on the sides of the roads, living in tarpaulin shantytowns, working on road gangs. Their underclass status is unmissable.

The closer one looks, the easier it becomes to see a government presence in many aspects of daily life. At the new video game parlors in Thimphu, inspectors drop by to check that no one is playing games with violent content. Cable TV recently arrived—but only the channels approved by the government. At the end of our journey east, in the beautiful wildlife preserve of the Phobjikha Valley, we spend an evening with the local populace, watching a variety show put on by the district high school. In the first sketch, a group of children ridicule an old farmer for not enrolling in the government's literacy program for adults. The audience laps it up, but I find myself speculating that I could have seen a similar entertainment a few hundred miles north, in China, during Mao's Great Leap Forward.

None of the Bhutanese I talk with seem unduly bothered by this. Their faith in their leaders is at times awe-inspiring, at times scary. "Our hope is that Bhutan will not be unique but will set an example for the rest of the world," the lyonpo had said to me. Implicit in his hope was another: that Bhutan—or at least the government of Bhutan—can set its own terms as it opens to the world. It has already achieved this in the first wave of tourism. All visitors have to go through a government-approved agency and must spend a minimum of two hundred dollars a day. But the economy needs a second wave of tourism. One day, I fall into conversation with an official from the World Bank, which is heavily invested in Bhutan. He paints a less rosy picture than does the Bhutanese government: The hydroelectric deal with India is so in India's favor that Bhutan won't benefit for at least a decade; the much-touted philanthropy of foreign nations is usually less in the actuality than in the announcement; and even the green policies are threatened unless tourism revenues grow significantly.

And so it is that in the bars and restaurants of Thimphu, where Western-style entertainment (and its corollary, Western-style boredom) fill the evening hours, every Bhutanese I meet introduces himself or herself as a travel agent. It becomes a running joke—we estimate that travel agents now outnumber local deities. The nightly conversation turns around Christina Ong, the Hong Kong billionaire who is opening a luxury hotel in Paro, and Amanresorts, the ultraluxe Asian chain that is building six boutique hotels across the country with the idea that guests will spend a couple of nights in each and travel by foot and in a fleet of SUVs between them. Out in the Phobjikha Valley, where black-necked cranes migrate for winter, we had watched the bulldozers lay foundations for one of the Aman hotels, Paro's now-completed Amankora, with beautiful views of a restored temple and an ethereal landscape beyond. This may be a lovely way to see Bhutan, but it could also mark the beginning of the country's transformation into an upscale Dharma Disneyland. Or perhaps that's too easy an assumption. The lesson of every nation's history, and a vital tenet of Tibetan Buddhism, is that thinking you know what comes next is the pinnacle of folly and delusion.

http://www.concierge.com/cntraveler/articles/Editorial/Article/data/cntraveler/2004/11nov/bhutan.xml/

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January 11, 2005

Why Is Everyone Going to Bhutan?

CREATE A MYSTIQUE Never gave Bhutan much thought until recently? You're not alone. Until 1972 outsiders weren't even allowed into the hermetic kingdom sandwiched between China and India.

Why Is Everyone Going to Bhutan?
By JANE MARGOLIES

WO years ago, Penny George "couldn't have located Bhutan on a map." But after hearing friends rave about their trip to the tiny Buddhist kingdom tucked in the Himalayas, Ms. George, president of a foundation that promotes holistic medicine, was hooked. This fall, she and her husband made the long journey from their home in Minneapolis to Bhutan's sole airport, then spent seven days on a guided tour, trekking into virgin forests, tiptoeing into temples and passing through villages where men and women still go about in traditional dress. "Bhutan has bubbled up in the collective consciousness," said Ms. George. "I just felt like I had to go."

Move over, Cambodia. Bhutan is the new must-see destination in southern Asia. With Tibet in the grip of Communist China and Nepal deemed unsafe by the United States State Department, this peaceful nation half the size of Indiana is emerging as a big draw, attracting those in search of a spiritual journey, a hiking adventure - or just a chance to experience a place before the rest of the world gets there. The number of visitors to Bhutan, as small as a few thousand not long ago, increased to 9,000 last year, a third of them Americans. Travel agents report an upswing in interest in Bhutan, and tour operators like Abercrombie & Kent are adding both trekking and cultural trips to their rosters. "Among those who have been everywhere, seen everything," said Rok Klancnik of the World Tourism Organization, a United Nations agency based in Madrid, "interest in Bhutan is growing."

But why? How did a place with one main road, and only five months of prime travel weather, catapult to the cutting edge of high-end tourism? And how, indeed, does any destination suddenly appear on the radar screen? Bhutan - a Brigadoon of astonishing beauty - has done what it takes to become a travel hot spot:

CREATE A MYSTIQUE Never gave Bhutan much thought until recently? You're not alone. Until 1972 outsiders weren't even allowed into the hermetic kingdom sandwiched between China and India. That year, Bhutan invited foreign dignitaries to the coronation of the present king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, and roads, lodges and an airfield were built to accommodate the guests. Once that basic infrastructure was in place, the country began, in 1974, to admit tourists - but only a select few. The lesson, according to Lisa Lindblad, a New York travel agent, was: "If you keep something out of the offering, it captures the imagination, it develops a mystique."

"It's difficult to get to, obviously, and there's very little in the way of infrastructure, which is part of the reason people want to go there," said George Morgan-Grenville, president of Abercrombie & Kent Inc. "I think what you're seeing in Bhutan is the early adopters. These are the people that want to travel to a destination before anybody else gets there."

SET A HIGH THRESHOLD Unlike, say, Nepal, which threw open its doors to visitors and was quickly overrun, Bhutan has taken a cautious approach to tourism. "We learned from the mistakes of others," said Dasho Lhatu Wangchuk, director general of the Department of Tourism in Bhutan. From the start, travelers were required to get visas and book with an authorized tour operator (independent travel in Bhutan is not permitted), and they had to pay a minimum per-day fee ($200 in high season; low-budget backpackers need not apply). That fee wasn't the only thing that helped establish Bhutan as an exclusive destination. There were also the "quotas." According to Mr. Wangchuk, Bhutan never actually set hard-and-fast tourist quotas, but rather came up with target figures based on the number of people it felt its limited lodgings could accommodate (the original figure was a few thousand visitors; the current number is 7,000, which has obviously been exceeded). Still, the notion of there being a finite number of trips available every year has, many feel, contributed to Bhutan's cachet.

WELCOME A FEW LUXURY HOTELS Gray washcloths as rough as sandpaper. Skimpy hand towels for drying off after a bath. Bhutanese guest houses, though they might offer the charm of stenciled walls and handpainted furniture, have been notoriously lacking in hotel amenities (and even, at times, adequate heating). But now two new five-star resorts in the settlement of Paro are upping the ante. Open since June, the Amankora Paro - with 24 paneled suites for $1,000 a night, double occupancy, plus tax and service, but including meals - is the first of six spa-equipped lodges being built in Bhutan by the Singapore-based Amanresorts chain. (When the other five properties open this year, Aman groupies will be able to make a circuit of the kingdom, all within the company's pampering embrace.)

And in November, Uma Paro, the latest from the Hong Kong developer Christina Ong's Como Hotels and Resorts, began welcoming guests to its 20 rooms and 9 villas (the latter, which start at $900 in high season, plus meals, tax and service, come staffed with butlers). Now travelers can unwind after a hike up to the cliff-clinging Taktsang monastery, one of Bhutan's most famous sites - with a deep-muscle massage. "Clients who have refused to consider Bhutan because of its reputation as a tough destination are now all excited about going," said Pallavi Shah, president of Our Personal Guest, a New York travel agency.

CREATE A BUZZ Sixteen pages in the November issue of Condé Nast Traveler, in which James Truman, the editorial director of Condé Nast, recounts his own adventures in Bhutan, don't hurt. (Although a warning from Ruth Reichl, the editor of Gourmet, that Mr. Truman was about to encounter "the world's worst cuisine" might have put off some readers.) Nor does having a few celebrity visitors to boast about. In response to a query about high-profile guests from this reporter, an Amanresorts official revealed that David Tang, founder of the Shanghai Tang stores, had chosen the Amankora for his recent 50th-birthday celebration, attended by "Fergie and a whole bunch of socialites from London." Mr. Tang's cellphone number was readily supplied, and the retailer, reachable in Hong Kong, was more than happy to drop the names of a few of the glittering guests (Kate Moss, the model Frankie Ryder and, yes, the Duchess of York) at his weeklong shindig. And, of course, to rave about the resort.

HOLD THE GUILT At peace with itself and its neighbors, Bhutan isn't marred by political conflict or extreme poverty. Travelers don't have to contend with beggars or worry about crime, and it's possible to come into friendly contact with the Bhutanese people (English is taught in schools). Besides, who wouldn't be captivated by a country where the king, who is revered by his people, has instituted a policy of Gross National Happiness as a way to measure progress in his land? "Going there during our presidential campaign was almost healing," said Penny George of Minneapolis.

CULTIVATE THE EXOTIC Although satellite TV has landed in Bhutan and cellphones are in use, the government has mandated that women wear the traditional kira, a Bhutanese kimono, and men the gho, a smocklike wrapper that comes to the knees, in schools and public offices. (The country was also the first to ban the sale of tobacco and smoking in public places, just last month.)The Bhutanese live pretty much the way they always have - in pastoral hamlets. Their traditional culture, which revolves around Buddhism, is largely intact. "It's more Tibet than Tibet," exclaimed Marsha Blank of Watchung, N.J., a docent at the Newark Museum, who went on a two-and-a-half-week trip through India and Bhutan organized by Abercrombie & Kent; (800) 554-7016; www.abercrombiekent.com.

IMPRESS THE ENVIRONMENTALISTS The alpine highlands! The lowland jungle! Thanks to the government's farsighted conservation measures, Bhutan possesses flora and fauna that is unrivaled in the Himalayas. While Nepal and India's forests have been plundered, Bhutan's, which cover 72 percent of its land, are in fact increasing. One popular pilgrimage spot for Bhutan-goers is the Phobjika Valley, where endangered black-necked cranes migrate for the winter.

CROSS YOUR FINGERS The government, banking on revenues from tourism, has set a goal of 15,000 visitors by 2007, and is encouraging the country's fledgling hospitality industry. Hotels - and not just the foreign-owned "destination resorts," such as Amankora and Uma Paro, but also Bhutanese-owned lodges - are springing up. And the country's single airline, Druk Air, which provides the only flights in and out of the country, has just bought two Airbus 319's to handle the additional traffic.

Bhutan watchers, like the Bhutanese government itself, are waiting eagerly to see whether cracking open the kingdom's doors a little wider yields the benefits hoped for - or results in the undoing of this place so often referred to as Shangri-La. "Bhutan is going from a medieval to a postmodern culture very quickly - from no phone to cellphone, from no mail service to the Internet," said Brent Olson, who has been to the country more than 35 times since 1986 and is now the director of business development for Geographic Expeditions, a tour operator based in San Francisco; (800) 777-8183; www.geoex.com.

Marsha Blank, for one, is glad she and her husband visited Bhutan this fall. Avid travelers, they have been twice to China and twice to Vietnam in the last dozen years. "We saw tremendous changes in those countries in a four- or five-year span of time," she said. "I'm glad we got to Bhutan when we did, before it was too late."

JANE MARGOLIES is a freelance writer in New York.

http://travel2.nytimes.com/2005/01/09/travel/09bhutan.html?pagewanted=1&oref=login

Posted by chhimi at 04:02 PM | Comments (1)

Paris

Day1-Paris: After a really unforgettable crappy flight on American Airlines we reached Paris. We took the Air France shuttle to our hotel (TIM HOTEL) in Montparnase. (NOTE: Take the RERB to the city much faster = NO traffic) First thing we visited that afternoon was the famous Eiffel Tower.
- brrr, it was pretty cold in Paris	- don't we look cute	- ahh Paris
- in front of the Eiffel Tower	- awesome dinner at Bec Rouge (a tiny restaurant in Montparnase) avg. dinning time 3 hours	- trying to mimic the poster for "French Kiss" I don't think we got it right.
- view of Eiffel Tower and a banner that says Olympics in Paris in 2012	- a view of the tower from Palais de Chailot	- nice bronze statue
- arrival at CDG - waiting for our shuttle!	- Tabitha loves to ruin my picture with that symbol	- Tabitha looking cool
- in front of a carrousel	- crouching "Tabitha" Hidden Chhimi	- naked statues
- honey please don't tough his butt	- I came, I saw and I conquered	- don't I look cool
- in your face Victoria Secret. Used to study in Darjeeling in India	- Tabitha's dinner at Bec Rouge - Beef Tartar (Mad Cow ring a bell?)	- This is what I call a salad
Day2-Paris: After a well rested night we decided to hit the Louvre. This was on Tabitha's list of things to visit. We ended up spending the entire day there. As it was raining and I think we spent it well. (Coming Soon)

Posted by chhimi at 01:49 PM | Comments (2)

January 10, 2005

London 2004

These are our memories from London (Good & Bad). Please click on the thumbnails to see a larger picture. I will have these pictures in the Photo Album and more when I get it fixed.
- the Tower Bridge	- GLO or Global Foods	- Big Ben
- Westminister Abbey	- Buckingham Palace	- Buckingham Palace Fountain
- more Buckingham Palace	- not related - Paparazi style	- Westminister Chapel
- Really HOT HOT!	- muy Caliente	- pissed at Westminister Abbey
- right before subway cop told me to stop taking flash photography	- elementary Watson	- London Crap - I mean Eye
- a whole lot of spice	- really expensive shopping area at Picaddily	- how many asian chicks can you fit in an old English phone booth?
- devilish smile	- my wife worrying the wildlife	- what the heck is this building?
- Trafalgar Square	- Eurostar on our way to London	- I am too cool
- near Big Ben	- some building close to the Abbey	- postwoman?
- bus	- inside Westminister Chapel	- what Tabitha really thinks about London
- Chinatown	- Picadilly Circus	- horsey
- Portabella Road	- Tabitha cannot find the "blue" door from Notting Hill	- Notting Hill
- Tower Bridge and NOT London Bridge	- Underground - TUBE	- Trafallgar Square
- If you want to purchase this picture please contact me.

Posted by chhimi at 02:02 PM | Comments (2)

January 09, 2005

Coming Soon

Posted by chhimi at 12:04 PM | Comments (0)

January 05, 2005

Catching up to the "Real World."

Back home in Sacramento and the reality is sinking in. I am not in Paris anymore, my vacation is over and I got to “Forget about Paris.” But it is really hard to forget about Paris – a vibrant city, rich in culture, fashion, history and the list goes on. For that impatient bunch of people (just kidding) waiting on my pictures I promise I will have them up by next week. (For those of you accessing my Photo Album – I seem to be having some technical difficulties – I hope to have that resolved soon) I am still feeling under the weather – thank you London.

On other news – the only news is the TSUNAMI to hit South East Asia. All across Europe observed a three-minute silence for the victims of the Tsunami. Lets see if the United States observes something similar. If I recall correctly during 9-11 the world offered countless condolences and paid their respects for the lives lost. For those of you who have not been bombarded with places where you can contribute here are a few more links.

CARE: Anti-poverty organisation Care International - has already provided food for thousands of affected people in Sri Lanka.

OXFAM: is active in Indonesia, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Sri Lanka and India. Their relief operations include distributing food packs and hygiene kits and setting up water and sanitation facilities.

More about the TSUNAMI

Posted by chhimi at 08:50 AM | Comments (1)

January 02, 2005

Sick As A Puppy

Okay, I have no idea what my body is doing to me this time around. I got back on Friday night and started hearing popping noises in my ear. I didn't really think anything of it but on Saturday, it just got worse and now it is accompanied by a dry cough. By Sunday night, all I can do is sleep. I just hope it is not an ear infection and that it's just a mild cold or something. I need some extra Vitamin C Orange Juice for sure!

Posted by chhimi at 10:58 PM | Comments (0)

January 01, 2005

Back in the USA - Happy New Year!

Well our beautiful vacation is over. Back in Sacramento – I spent New Year shuttling my brother and his girlfriend who is visiting us from New York. We celebrated New Year driving down I-5. Still extremely tired my body is still adjusting to the different time zones and the fact that I have spent New Year Eve in two continents. I miss Paris. I will slowly post my pictures on my site so look out for them. (*Special: I will have a set of pictures that follows Dan Brown’s “DaVinci Code,” as Robert Langdon solves puzzles and codes.)
In the mean time, check out my first set of many pictures to come.

Day 1 - Eiffel Tower

Day 1 - Part 2-Eiffel Tower and Dinner at "Bec-Rouge."

Posted by chhimi at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)