Bhutan is one beautiful, but strange country so far. After our trek and then the smog and craziness of Kathmandu, it was a wonderful and pleasant surprise to arrive here yesterday and breathe the sweet, pine-scented mountain air. We had met another traveler on the plane that had gone to Everest base camp with our same travel company, so we thought we would be together. However, he was met by his private guide and driver and we were met by ours! We saw some temples and fortress yesterday and then made our way to Thimphu, the capital city. It only has 100,000 people and the entire population of Bhutan is only 650,000. Despite everything being very clean and new construction going on everywhere, there is this controlled sort of communist vibe going on. You are not allowed to travel in the country without a guide, take pictures at any museums - even the folk heritage one we saw today, which was just an old house filled with artifacts and tools to show how they would have lived in the past centuries. At one museum, they actually took all cameras and cell phones away. In Nepal, it was quite confusing to keep all of the Buddhist and Hindu symbols and things separate, but here, 90% of the population us Buddhist (5% Hindu and 5% Christian), so our guide is teaching us much about his people and Buddhist ways. More later after our excursion today
Posted on: Fri, 18 Apr 2014 06:58:50 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015