A lure of Adventure

Bhutan is blessed with many great saints and scholars with rich culture and forest diversity. Many species of plants, animals and crop diversity were existed with abundance ecology and pristine environment. Many foreign visitors described the place as the abode of god or heaven to earth with immense joys and happiness.  The place that I have visited very recently echo absolutely beautiful and memorable and described as in the following ways.

Merak is officially two days walk from Trashigang Dzongkhag. There are two ways to follow like the one is from Rangjung through Chaling shongphu and other one through Khardung overlooking Phongmey village. Two ways meet at the beautiful place called Shebling a wonderful place where we can see many vales and mountains. Shebling is a grazing land where we can see lawn of grassland full of yaks surrounded by awesome environment. The moment we reach Shebling everything is silent and sometimes only sound one could hear is seldom voice of yak and its herders. One could meet many yaks with their individual babies grazing on the way and some with leech peak on their back especially if you are visiting around June, July and August months.  There are also yak herd house and big buzzing dog as care taker of the herd. As we walk continuously upward with alpine meadow environment one could reach place a mountain kind of Lhabtsa where one can take rest and follow downward path from there. Then we have to walk along the river bank and need to cross river more than five times. River its tributaries and distributaries are clean and very clear where one could really miss the sip. Then reached Merak village where one could see clustered settlements surrounded by river meander and lined up mountain. One could enjoy pretty landscape and environment with their culture and way of living. People out there very simple, interactive and magnificent whenever we interact with them.  Nomadic depend upon livestock mainly Yak,Zo and Zomo. They used to sell their cheese,butter and get maize, rice and other commodities in return.  The altitude is around 3000 to 4000 masl and snowfall start from the month of November till March. Yak herders remained in their yak herd and while only one or two people were living in the house during the period. Infrastructure like RNR, Community primary school, and one range office so called Merak Park Range under Sakting Wildlife Sanctuary.

Sambeykha geog is one of the remotest and farthest geog of Haa Dzongkha with four days of official work. Sambeykha is also called Sambey Aum. The geog has an area of about 432.8 Sq.Km (approx) and the altitude ranges from 1400 m to 2100 m above the sea level.   The farm road construction is on the way to Gakiling and Sombeykha. We had travelled up to Tegola and walked from there. The path meanders steep slopes fromn Tegola till the downstream river of Shebji village.  The area is covered by thick forest and one could never see sun of sky once started walking from Tegola downward forest to   the river before reaching Shebji. Then we have to walk upward to Shebji village once cross the river. Most of the office goer going for tour spent night at Shebji and started their next journey to Shava. The way from Shebji to Shaba is gentle slope and again downward moment from Shava till reaching another giant river stream. Meanwhile we have to walk again upward from the river stream and accordingly need to walk gentle slope pathway and finally land Sangbeykha geog center. Warm summer with heavy rainfall to cold and dry winters features their major climatic conditions. Geog has 85% of forest coverage with Sub-Tropical and Evergreen Broad Leave species. Bamboo, Cane Shoots, Ferns and Mushrooms are some of the non-wood forest products found in the geog. The soil is mostly sandy loam, clay loam, clay and sandy clay loam. Almost all the nice traditional crops of Bhutan were grown there with rich soil fertility.   Farmers out there cultivate buckwheat twice a year and the first cropping is start on last week of February to mid march and harvest by June end. The second cropping is done end of September-mid October and harvest December- January. 60% of the farmers cultivate sweet buckwheat and 40% bitter buckwheat. Vegetables like Chilli,Mustard green, Raddish, Pumpkins, Cabbage, Brocoli, Carrot, Cauliflower, Cucumber, Garlic and Onion. Paddy fields are lying fallow due to the lack of irrigation favourable soil for large scale paddy cultivation. The geog has total of five chiwogs and the geog is bordered by Sama gewog in the Northeast and Samtse Dzongkhag in the south. There are about 183 households and total population of about 1175. There is also a way from Sambeykha to Sibsoo which most of the villagers were still following its tract.

The places where people and nature relationship is enormous and the moment one felts were really unforgettable and rejoice.

Longing to repay a be -loved Father

Clear and  crisp was the sky that winter afternoon,
        I remember you sing a song beautifully,
You came by with herd of cattle in a cowshed ,
But the next morn as I played marble in the patio,
With your bamboo flute beside you lay motionless,
       No song came off from you or the flute.

While mother hugged and took me to other side from you,
        Pale faced I looked where you lay motionlessly,
               At six you left me very depressed;
               Burning is my mind to serve you,
               But it is not possible with you gone,
      This thought pains and pierces the core of my heart.

          With you gone chirping of birds stop too;  
           Sorrowful I become seeing other's fathers,
              Being orphan is sad and unlucky,
I conceal myself behind the thicket shading tears piteously.

             The past memories come flooding back,
              Your sincere advices and genuine care,
          The warm hugs whilst dressing every me every morn,
              Like calf sucking the  nourishing milk.

Oh, father! I cannot repay all those good deeds tinged with love,
               But I do pray everyday of my life,
In the belief that it will contribute to resting your soul in peace;
              Also in the belief that we get to be born again together,
           So that i get an opportunity to repay all your generous love.

Idea About Love

The word "love" consists of four letters which sounds soothing enough to give peace and harmony to people. Different people have different ideas about love which leads to happiness or sadness depending on their individual  understanding. For enlightened people, love is an instrument for providing a state of joy and happiness in the hearts of people. These kind hearted people have good thought towards others and benefit others as much as they can.

However, the concept  of love is frequently misunderstood by the yound and innocent people of today's generation. For them love is a sea of happiness to derive self benefit and self - fullfillment of hopes. That is why love remains an illusion and fleeting in nature. Love which is meant to provide happiness might end up with strife and pain if the essence of love is not understood in its right perspective.

Love doesn't happen by itself. Love has yo be earned. To earn love, you will have to love others. For maintaining a long term relationship with someone, you cannot seek love you do while sucking a fruit juice. Everyone should learn to help each other and share values together to maintain that spirit of good friendship.

Love is indeed, a mystery and misture of everything. How it is achieved depends on how you understand it.

Modernization will erode family value

Outlines:

ü  Deteriorating social obligation

ü  Threat of culture and local dialect

ü  Religious crises

ü  Influential  attributes from media

ü  Family conflict/divorce

Families are the bond of happiness, charity, encouragement and everything we do in our daily life. They are the source of inspiration and success too. One cannot achieve aims and aspiration unless supported by government, family, friend and etc. Modernizations come along with the advent of new scientific technology which is inevitable source of developmental foundation particularly in the field of socio economic development.  Science and its discoveries reached far beyond to make everything exposed clarity and truth through observation and experimentation. As saying goes, every advantage are incur with disadvantages. But negative things just happen so because of simple human negligence and excuses. Guru Rinpoche quotes, “it’s not the time that are changing buts it is the people who are changing.”  Nothing is going to change or erodes our existing phenomenal value if taken positively by every section of our society. Modernizations will erode important values only if someone falls victim of delusion, attachment and egoistic growth of strength otherwise not at all. As the topic demands that modernization erodes family value and therefore each area of discussion were in the following ways:

We the living creatures are driven by many social obligations to be fulfilled based on individual system and ways of delivery. In Bhutan every citizen is bounded by various social obligations like helping each other during the time of needs, making success of every step together and lot more. But with the passage of time this thing rarely exist and most are in verge of extinct forever from genetic field of its tradition. In the past many Bhutanese farmers had system of doing labor exchange and help poor and of course help labourless farmers in carrying daily chores. Now this family societal value is receiving lukewarm response where majority is working independently to reap one benefits and success as well.  The reason is because of farm mechanization approach and with saving of time framework to deliver effective work upon short duration. Owing to that reason modernization erodes that essence of values.

Many Bhutanese people working away from home spent some days with their family back home after the time interval of 2 to three years in the past. The very trend is slowly deteriorating which is driven by economy where many feels like less money or meeting could require more monitory support. Such reasons play role in our society which has never before. In the ancient time every Bhutanese people come together and know each other problem, and they even protect communities’ security like one blood origin of family. They celebrate joy, achievement and sometime mourn together to console one’s sorrow and melancholic mind. With the changing life style and habit nobody will bother like whats happening and particularly don’t know sometime who’s staying next to your compartment in a same building. Some people don’t bother even during some immediate accident or some minor problems occurred with vehicle and they just left with lower speed and sometimes short looks with empty helping hand. The victim driver left with drowsy numbness pain and remains with unbounded conscious like who’s going to help immediately?. This thing is slowly happening in our country which never is before in our history. Some people try to neglect family relation and support so because of individual reasons or problems. But the point loves and caring attitude within from our heart seems necessary even we don’t have resources to lend help and support.

Modernization erodes family value in terms of culture and dialect threat. Every family has unique ways and means of living and adopting personal value in a society. Let’s say suppose our semi-nomadic particularly Bropas has different dialect and dress code. Their worshipping to local god and goddesses vary from other community within Bhutan. The very culture should accept and one should pay respect because these are the pure indication of unique cultural identity beside our national language and dress code. It is the first hand responsibility of their younger generation followed by government and every civil society organization to conserve and make pride of ourselves. Modernization of course change the upcoming generation particularly in that region but taking care of ancient believe, homage and sense of doing normal duties is important irrespective of modernization. It is the people especially younger generation to tackle issues related to their culture and cope successfully like their parents.  Modernization especially with types of media like broadcast, print and screen could deviate their mind if one is not careful with their culture. Because many young people failed to adopt their culture and sometimes led many thing in our society which never has before.  Many people studied or stayed in foreign countries seem not easy going while wearing our dress and mode of worshipping to god and spirits. Few youngsters showing less interest in wearing proper dress while visiting religious place and poor response in watching our traditional mask dances. Some people attained annual religious festival (tsechu and domche) just to showcase their stylish sexy dress and some for pleasure in playing gambling. Majority of those watching are blind with regard to each mask dance origin, reason and their significant. On the other hand it is not necessary every one of us to be historian and watch dance yet attain with serious faith in opt for general blessing is important. Therefore, encountering this kind of situation in front of other legend is bit kind of shyness and fun as Bhutanese. There is a high risk of losing our local dialect and its related culture in future if one is not careful with the advent of modernization.

Modernization erodes family value in terms of religious and there are many religious in the world like Buddhism, Muslim, Christian Hinduism and etc. Every human being had right to follow any religion where you belong to and as per your family religion. Family are one that does breath and take same religion wherever you go or working in varying environment. People sometimes neglect one own religion and get appreciated with other so long in their interest. Hence creating conflict within family and thus loses its value. Modernization in this regard play kind of influential to those people who actually uncontrolled their mind and thus deluded or misguided so because of not using information properly.

Modernization can erodes family value with regard to drug abuse, malpractice and doing some nuisance in a society. Some people consume drugs and change style of working, eating, speaking and many actions so because they wanted to act like action showcased in broadcast media particularly television. They take intoxicating substances because of fashion and way of life as it shown in the television to act in a contemporary way. The sole purpose media is to give channel of communication which can expose large number of people to the same information at the same time. Many things will be brought in media which is very educative and awake many people from the world of darkness. Making best use of its service and act accordingly is very important whatever we do in our daily life. Some people misuse this very opportunity and land up taking negative thing.

Modernization will erode family value in terms of family conflict and divorce if not taking properly. If both the married couple are educated and either one staying foreign land many years and while coming to mother land cannot cope up with the existing culture scenario. Thus, arise clash of interest and finally packed bedding to remain as individual. Many confusion and arguments arises within the family. This is because mistaken person has perceived like changing time of his era which actually is changing nature of his deluded mind. The victim thus regarded modernization approach suited best upon his interest and therefore, likes to change him/herself. Hence they falls under the category of divorcee and lead everyone unhappiness in a family.

Everything by nature is susceptible to change but get resilient framework to remember our value is utmost importance.

My First Post

This is my first post on this blog. date 20th Feb, 2013