Travels to a Himalayan Mountain Kingdom: Bhutan

Day One:
Monday October 6, 2008
Bangkok, Thailand, Temperature: HOT AND HUMID!
Hotel: Westin Grande Sukhumvit

Well, after over a year of planning the time has finally arrived where I’m starting my dream vacation – 17 days in Bhutan. I’ve never taken this much time off work but am so looking forward to it. I’ve been very fortunate to work with a very nice and capable local Bhutanese travel agent – Bhutan Norphel Tours and Treks. Lemo who speaks and writes perfect English helped me put the itinerary together. Caryn, a good friend from work, is joining me on this trip along with a new friend Margot who is a journalist/writer and extensive traveler.

Instead of a trekking tour, Lemo and I decided we should do a cultural tour which will take us to all the places I was most interested in and also includes time to enjoy one of the most important fall festivals in Bhutan. We will travel from the West of Bhutan to the East. We will travel from the West of Bhutan, starting at Paro where they airport is, go through Central Bhutan by driving through some spectacular mountain passes and end up in Eastern Bhutan to Trashigang. I’m expecting amazing scenery and because of the drastic changes in altitude – we will go from 300meters to over 3000 meters, I expect to see a vast range of flora, nature and animals.

Why Bhutan? Because it’s the only country where the Tantric version of Mahayama Buddhism is practiced so it’s where much value is placed on living harmoniously with nature. I very much want to learn more about that version of Buddhism and how it influences the lifestyle and happiness of people. As a matter of fact, the King of Bhutan uses a GNH measurement to see how the country is doing. GNH is the Gross National Happiness factor.

Where is Bhutan? It is a country the size of Switzerland that is nestled between India and Tibet. Because its located in the eastern Himalayas, it has been pretty much isolated and is sparsely populated (about 700000 people). It has the world’s youngest monarchy and just this year the people voted for a democratic constitution because the king asked the people to support it. Contrary to popular belief, Bhutan has had a pretty violent history strife with civil wars until the late 1800s where the first king was finally able to unite the country and through political stability, Bhutan was finally able to enjoy economic prosperity, peace and happiness. However the King made sure that economic prosperity did not come with compromise to their Buddhist values. This is what I find fascinating about Bhutan and I hope to learn more when visiting the country.

So how do you get to Bhutan from Tokyo? I first had to fly to Bangkok and spend a nite there. I took the 6pm Northwest flight from Tokyo, which arrived in Bangkok just past midnite. Fortunately, I was able to find Margot who was flying United and connecting through Narita. It was such a coincidence that I could find her as we have never met before and if you’ve been to Narita its like finding a pin in a haystack! Anyhow, we got to know each other and agreed to share a cab to the hotel once we arrived at Bangkok’s international airport. By the time I got to the hotel it was 1am and met up with Caryn as we were sharing a room. I was afraid I’d wake her up but she took a nap and after 10s of hours on a plane from LA was jet lagged so was up at 1am. However, since I was tired, after a shower, we went to bed and agreed to get up early as she quickly needs to adjust to the time difference.

Caryn and I woke up around 6am and got ready for breakfast. Caryn was jet lagged and hungry because she missed dinner the nite before. Fortunately for us, the Westin had a great breakfast buffet of Western, Thai and Japanese food. I actually enjoyed an omelet with bacon as it has been awhile since I had a Western breakfast.

Afterwards, we decided to take a walk around the neighborhood in hot and humid Bangkok and stopped in a jewelry store. I found a beautiful pair of yellow sapphire stud earrings that I decided I have to have. I’ll definitely have to go back to the store when we get back from Bhutan and pick up the earrings.

Since we were staying in the business district of Bangkok, there was not much “street market” activity going on. It is shocking though to come from Tokyo and see stray dogs and women, men and children begging on the streets in the business district of Bangkok. It was hard to enjoy the walk while there was still so much suffering even in Bangkok and felt guilty about wanting to spend money on the sapphire earrings.

We then got back to the hotel, rested and got ready for our 2pm lunch date with Margot. We decided to go to Cabbages and Condoms – a restaurant recommended by a friend and written up in the NY times. The restaurant serves excellent traditional Thai food at very reasonable prices in a funky setting. The restaurant was conceptualized in part to promote better understanding and acceptance of family planning and to generate income to support various development activities like AIDS education. In addition to the restaurant, there is a great gift store and proceeds of the restaurant and the gift store go to helping the variety of causes they support with regards to family planning and safe sex. We had a delicious and very filling meal, and afterward we rushed back to the hotel as the skies turned dark and from a distance we could hear the thunder.

We all decided to take the rest of the day easy with Caryn and I going for spa treatments at the hotel as we had to leave the hotel by 2am to catch our 435am flight to Paro, Bhutan!!!

Streets of Bangkok

Even in the Business District we saw some street vendors

The view of our hotel from a quiet albeit small park in the middle of the business district

At Cabbages and Condoms we saw some innovative uses of Condoms and Birth Control Pills. Here's a pic of his/her outfits made from condoms and birth control pills . (Sarah Palin will not be caught dead here!)