A Different Galaxy

A Different Galaxy

Alina found herself at the Delhi Airport surrounded by a gathering group of people waiting for the Druk Air flight to arrive. They spoke in a language she had never heard before. Most of them were dressed in business attire, but she suspected that wasn’t their normal fashion. They were soft-spoken and addressed each other in respectful tones. She watched and listened with great interest. They were a clue to the culture and mannerisms of the place which she would soon enter. In the world of TVs and telephones there was an almost complete lack of information about Bhutan, Druk Yul: the Land of the Thunder Dragon.

A woman from the group came up to her, and Alina smiled, grateful for an opportunity to make contact.

“Hello, my name is Karma.”

“Hi Karma, my name is Alina.”

“Nice to meet you, Alina. Is this your first time going to Bhutan?”

“Yes.” She paused a moment. “I’m a little nervous. I know so little about your country.”

“Oh, don’t worry. We’re not dangerous.” She laughed. “Just watch out for the Yeti’s and the tigers.”

Alina laughed. She liked Karma’s sense of humor. It put her at ease.

“I should warn you that if you happen to see me on the street in Thimphu, don’t call out my name.”

“Oh, and why is that?” Alina asked with a mischievous smile.

“Because half the people on the street would turn around thinking you were calling them.”

They both laughed.

“So what advice would you give a newcomer?”

“First, and this is important, though I find it a bit of an irritation, the word “no” is considered impolite. We have developed ways to disagree or to refuse an offer without offending.”

“Oh my, please do share some of those, so I don’t get myself into trouble.”

“If you are offered food or drink you don’t want, just put your hand, like this…” Karma put her stretched out hand up in front of her mouth “...to say you’re not hungry or thirsty.”

Alina made the same gesture and Karma nodded approval.

“The rest becomes a careful dance of words, trying to say “no” without having to say ”no” – that is my source of irritation. It takes forever to agree on decisions and find resolutions to problems.”

“I’m guessing you and your colleagues just came from a meeting.” Alina said in sympathy.

Karma nodded.

The non-linear line of ticket holders began to move.

“I wish you good luck and a safe journey.” Karma said, as she rejoined her colleagues.

“Thank you, Karma. Nice talking with you.”

When the boarding started, walking across the tarmac in the October heat, climbing the plane steps and getting settled in their seats, it went smoothly in spite of the non-western approach – no straight lines, no pushing, no shoving, no heated arguments. Alina was surprised by the smaller size of the plane and pleased with the seating. She was used to being packed like sardines into a jumbo plane. She relaxed into her seat, ready for this new adventure.

When the plane reached the Himalayas, it cruised down the long corridor between the looming heights of the world’s highest mountains. This was her childhood dream, to come to the Himalayas. Tenzing and Hillary’s climb up Mount Everest had been an inspiration for her. Just as she started thinking about how long it took her to finally make her dream come true, the pilot announced that they were approaching Mount Everest. He said it could be seen to the left.

Alina couldn’t imagine how she would be able to distinguish Mount Everest from all the other towering white peaks around them. Then a murmur rippled through the passengers. She looked to her left and could see that it was distinct from the other mountains. The summit was not fully snow covered the way the other peaks were. It almost looked like a dark pyramid on top with wind swirls of snow blowing around it and upward. The side was triangular, angled downward and appeared almost flat on its surface.

She smiled to herself. She just saw Mount Everest with her own eyes. Not close-up while trekking upward but saw it in its full environment. It looked sacred to her. It felt sacred to her. This was the portal to what she was about to experience. She could feel it yet had no idea what that would be.

Soon the plane made a right turn and a steep descent downward towards the valley and the first airport established at Paro. The landing was gentle, and the people clapped. Alina smiled, happy to be arriving in the Land of the Thunder Dragon.

The few foreigners on the plane were directed to a room in a small wood building. They waited till they were called to line up and go through immigration to get their visas and passports stamped.

Alina could feel herself settling into a different pace. If there was an opposite to life in New York City, this was it. She started to feel her muscles relaxing and her breath slowing down even with having to adjust to the thinner air. But it was fresh mountainous air. She stretched her lungs open to breathe it in.

Once through immigration and customs she went to the pickup area where her guide was waiting for her. He was distinguished looking, standing still and upright in his white shirt and gho, long like a wrapped coat, and black socks to his knees. He smiled as she approached.

“Kuzu zhangpo,” he said with his hands folded in the prayer sign.

Alina made the same gesture to him, smiling.

“Come please, the plane was delayed, and we need to drive to Thimphu, where you will stay at a hotel. Then tomorrow we leave for Shingkhar. It will take two days.”

Alina nodded her understanding. He loaded her bag into the trunk of the car, and she sat in the left passenger seat. She knew the small yak-herding village she was going to would take a few days to reach. He drove fast on the winding road to Thimphu as night descended and she could feel nausea starting up. She prayed she could make it to Thimphu without throwing up.

When they arrived and she was registered in the hotel, he offered her dinner there, but the thought of eating did not seem like a good idea. She remembered Karma’s lesson and put her hand to her mouth, but said she would like a cup of tea.

“Yes, Ma’am. Would you like that sent to your room?”

“Yes, please.” She paused. “And what time will we leave tomorrow?”

“ We will leave in the afternoon.”

She nodded, though wondering about the vagueness of time. Something cautioned her to not ask him to be more specific. ‘You’re not in New York City, Alina,’ she reminded herself. ‘Just surrender to this new world.’

Her room was comfortable with its wood structure, solid wood bed with a thick stuffed and padded mattress, table by the bed with a dimlit lamp. The tea was just what she needed, and she soon was snuggling under the thick heavy blanket and sinking into a half dream-sleep state of wonder at where she was.

The next morning the sun coming in the window woke her. She stretched out and breathed in the cool air. After rising, bathing quickly, and dressing, she walked down the stairs to the restaurant on the first floor and ordered breakfast. She was hungry. The menu had a few western items, and the rest were Bhutanese dishes. She noticed that chilies seemed to be an ingredient used in many of their dishes. Did she dare ask if there were any native dishes without chilies? She ordered oatmeal instead, and figured however hard she might try, some of her “westernness” could not be hidden. The waiters were friendly and polite, all dressed in a uniform dark gray gho outfit with white shirt and large cuffs folded upward at the wrist over the gray gho sleeves. Sunlight flooded the room where there were several tables set, and only two other tables were occupied. The oatmeal felt soothing in her stomach. It was a good choice.

After breakfast she went out to explore that part of Thimphu. It was the weekend so there was not the hustle and bustle that probably existed on weekdays. There were very few cars, and people walked leisurely outside or shopped in stores. The stores were small, some had items that are needed in everyday life, all crowded together on small shelves behind the storeowner’s counter. There were fabric stores with rolled pads of yards and yards of materials for clothing and for khatas used for religious ceremonies and offerings.

Walking the streets, she loved the children she came across. They all had smiles and an openness, without the self-consciousness that is so prevalent in the west. Alina saw it as a fearless curiosity.

At noon she returned to her hotel room, not knowing when her guide would show up. She sat by the window and wrote in her journal while she waited. He arrived at 2:30, this time in a van and they headed up into the mountainous roads which were narrow with hairpin turns. As they moved from one mountain to the next, the road would descend into the valleys and then rise to the heights. Alina found herself putting on her jacket going up and taking it off going down at the temperature changes. There were some places where there was no valley at all, only the green jungle bottom of a funnel-shaped space.

She noticed the layered odd-shaped fields that cascaded downhill in some areas. They used whatever area was flat enough to grow crops on. One of the main crops was chilies, and she could see rooftops up and down covered with harvested chilies drying in the sun.

They finally arrived in Trongsa. Alina noted that there in Trongsa they were far from any hint of any kind that there existed a western world. ‘I am now totally a stranger in a strange land,’ she thought as she stepped out of the van and looked around. Alice in Wonderland. The Little Prince. Moby Dick. Favorites from her years of reading came to mind. An almost silent ‘Wow’ escaped her lips, unheard. She laughed in silence with a secret inner joy. ‘Where am I really?’

The small hotel she stayed at was run by a man whose face and expression was so untouched by greed or any kind of ill will that in the west would have seemed impossible to exist. His small son was like him, and Alina liked being near them talking with them in careful sentences just to feel their energy. She began to wonder how was she going to return to her life in New York City.

The next day they left early to get to Jakar and Ura and then finally to Shingkhar Dechenling. They stopped half way and had a prepared picnic lunch at an area with an expansive view of the valley below. Though high in altitude, the sky was clear and the sun was strong and warming. Her guide asked her if she had any questions. She started asking many, but soon noticed that he was saying ‘yes’ to all her questions, some answers contradicted previous ones. She remembered Karma’s lesson about not saying ‘no’. She also realized that in the west questions are almost always asked on a yes or not no basis, and began to see the limitation of that way of questioning.

The lovely but only ’yes’ answers picnic ended and they were on the road again. The sun was starting to set in the west while they were driving east. They turned off the cross-country highway and started on the large-graveled road to Shingkhar. It was a very slow bumpy ride. Darkness was descending and she could tell that her guide was anxious to get there before total darkness set in.

At last she could see the lights of the village below her as they approached. Entering the village on the softer dirt road, they came to a stop. The engine silenced and her guide announced, “Shingkhar.”

The Lama opened the van door and helped her out, while her guide brought her suitcase.

“Welcome to Shingkhar!” The Lama was smiling at her, seeing that she looked happy. “you will be the guest of the village headman. They have arranged a room for you to stay. Follow me, and you will meet the family.”

“Thank you.” Alina spoke with genuine appreciation.

They climbed the steep wooden steps up to the landing on the second floor. The Lama explained that the first floor was where the animals were kept. They entered the large doorway into the central room. It was warm inside. The kitchen/cooking area was in the center around the wood-burning bukari and against the wall to the left where large pots and pans hung. In a great nook to the left of the door was an enormous bed with pillows and several thick blankets. The Lama explained that the ‘aiya’ (grandmother) slept there with the young children to keep them warm. The adults slept in the outer rooms with windows and hot water bottles were needed.

She was invited to join them, seated around the bukari, and offered a cup of yak-butter tea. She nodded and did not put her hand to her mouth, though having no idea what yak-butter tea would be like.

She smiled at everyone, while they talked in their language and laughed. Occasionally the Lama would translate a sentence or two. But Alina didn’t mind if the laughter might be at her expense. She was enjoying the extraordinary experience of being with people who could not even imagine what her life was like. They were enjoying themselves and so was she. It seemed magical to her.

She tried to subdue a yawn that came up, reminding her that it was a long day and she was tired. The Lama spoke to them, and they gave her the prayer greeting while he led her to the guest room. There was a large mattress on a wood platform on the floor with a pillow and a blanket. He asked her how many blankets she wanted and she took out her sleeping bag and said that probably one would do. He told her they would bring her a hot water bottle, and then wished her good night. Her guide brought the hot water bottle a few minutes later. She could tell everyone had already settled down and gone to bed.

She closed the door and noted that all the door frames were formed with 2x4 inch high boards including the base that she would have to remember to step over. With the blanket over her sleeping bag, she crawled in shoving her clothes down into the bottom and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow

Alina woke up with an urgency to go. The hot water bottle was still warm on her belly, but the air she was breathing in was freezing and she could feel her outbreath steaming on its contact with the cold. To stay warm, she increased the pace of her breathing, while she fumbled around in her sleeping bag to find her pants, sweater, winter jacket and hat which she had shoved down to the bottom to keep her feet warm.

She was reluctant to get up, even after managing to get dressed, but forced herself to squiggle out from under the heavy blanket that covered her sleeping bag. She tucked the blanket around the pillow and sleeping bag to seal it up, hoping the warm hot water bottle would keep out the cold, while she went outside.

Opening her door and stepping over the ledge, she moved towards the central room, opened that door, stepped over the ledge and moved toward the outside door.

Managing to unlatch the heavy wood door and pull it open with a minimum of noise, Alina stopped for a moment to listen as the aiya’s slow sonorous breath continued undisturbed. Before stepping outside onto the stairway landing, in silence, slow and careful, she pulled the door closed.

At the landing she paused, looked up at the night sky and froze in place, mid-motion, with a sudden intake of the crisp frosty air – stunned, mute, and in awe. The sky was dark and clear on the moonless night. She couldn’t move. It was as though the entire universe was on display right there in that part of the sky, to be seen in all its dazzling glory.

Time seemed to disappear. For a moment she had forgotten the cold and the mission to relieve herself. She had not ever in her life seen so many stars all together, stars so clear and bright. It was as though she was floating in infinity. But then her urgency returned and pulled her back into awareness of the place and time she was in.

The sense of awe stayed with her. She became immune to the sub-freezing cold. With caution she descended the steep wood steps leading down to where they had set up a private pup-tented outhouse for her, each step a punctuation of this new physical journal writing itself on her cells and synapses, while she contemplated what felt like a very real possibility that she had, by some strange accident, landed on another planet in a different galaxy.