Tsechu Culture Shock

I was still not completely adjusted to the time zone and woke up early today, around 4am. It was cold and I dreaded leaving the warmth of my numerous blankets, but I knew I needed to get a fire going so that I could finish drying my clothes. I got up and checked my clothes, they were still very wet, so I went to start a fire. I worked it for 10 to 15 minutes and it looked like it was going to go, so I crawled back in to bed to wait for the room to warm up. About five minutes later I noticed there was no more cracking from the wood burning and when I looked I saw it had gone out. So I crawled back out of bed and began round two. I really needed this fire going now if I was to have any chance of drying my clothes in time. I again worked at it, blowing out enough air to inflate a few of those rubber row boats we would play in when we were kids up at the lake. I again returned to my bed thinking I finally won. Nope, a few minutes later and I could see there were no flames going. I had to give it one more chance, and that was all that I could give it as I was down to my last pine stick and only a few matches. They restock the pine sticks like a hotel that restocks those little daily bars of soap, and you only get two sticks a day. I lit a candle first just in case I ran out of matches, and tried again. No luck, and now I had to wait until 6ish for the lodge to open to get more pine sticks, wonderful.


Looks like someone had some luck in starting a fire this morning.


After breakfast with the group we were heading to the Tsechu (Bhutanese Festival). Burning incense at the entrance of the Jakar Yugyel Dzong.


The costumes and masks are amazing.






However what I didn’t understand was the dancing and music, and I think this was mostly a culture issue. They only had three to four instruments which included drums, horns, and cymbals, but it sounds like nothing more than a random array of notes, and there was no rhythm that I could pick out. In fact if you watch the people playing the instruments, they seem to play them only when they feel like it, no tempo, no sheet music, pure randomness to my ears. The "dancing" also seemed completely random to me. There were only three moves that I could see, twirl to the left, twirl to the right, and then do a dip. Again I saw no patterns here and struggled with my western mind to see the attraction, because a lot of people did show up and stayed for the two days it went on for.










I made it through two and a half dances and it was more than enough for me. You may think I should have spent more time here, however keep in mind that each dance goes on for one to two hours. And I started to feel like this kid, who I did not talk to but could tell by the look on his face that he was thinking "Mom, can we go now, if not now then when?"


And I caught a few yawns here and there.


However there was a very interesting highlight, send in the clowns.


The clowns play an interesting role, they run around with wooden dildos poking women in their hootie-ha(s), yes, really.




They even went after children with it.


I was caught off guard here and a little shocked, I think I had an expression on my face like this kid did, and I’m sure he was thinking "Mommy, what is that man with the wooden stick doing to those women?"


I was wondering what the women and children were thinking to allow this, but then I remembered, this is their culture, their history, and their festival. I was a guest here and very honored that they were sharing this with me. Who am I to judge, in fact who are any of us to judge. We have different cultures and different histories, things have different meanings and we see things differently. I looked around and saw people laughing and enjoying themselves. And then I found myself giggling almost uncontrollably when the clown tied it to a stick and started surprising the people on the second story from below. Think about it, here you are watching a beautiful ancient dance when all of a sudden a wooden penis pops up from below, now that’s funny.


I walked around a little and in between the dances a lady started singing, it was nice, and had a good sound and rhythm, even though I had no idea what she was saying.


I also found a few young monks playing along on their drums.




And a few young kids whose parents brought along some additional entertainment. Bhutan now has some cell phones.


But a lot of kids were also very much involved with watching the dances.


Just up the stairs is the rest room, my old friend, the squatter.


I had gotten more then enough pictures and video and decided to head out. While I was free to walk around anyplace inside, my guide was waiting for me as I exited, and we headed outside.




Outside they had a few shops and a few places to eat.






And a few monks




They also had a few "carnival" games to gamble on.






After lunch we headed off to the Kurjey Lhakhang monastery, where it is said that Guru Rimpoche once meditated and his body left an imprint in the rock. You can clearly see an imprint in the rock, however how it got there could be up for debate.






Dorms where the monks live.


We walked around a little and saw many villagers coming in to give the prayer wheels a spin.




I then found this very mystical, but very small man, or maybe it was just a very big chair, I don’t remember.


Feeding the birds.


Kids playing in the courtyard.


This little girl wanted me to take her picture.


We walked back and headed to the car.




On the way we passed this group of women who my guide said were practicing for the naked dance. I asked him why don’t they rehearse naked, and he told me that only the men are naked for the dance, so we moved on.


On the way back to the lodge we stopped in the town of Jakar and I walked around a little.








Boy, I can’t wait to get back and try to get my fire going again. As we pulled up to the lodge I happened to spot the stash of pine sticks outside and my guide helped me stock up, he said he too could use a few extra. I had it cranking away in no time and was able to finish drying all my clothes. Now if I only could find someone to come in every other hour and put more logs on the fire throughout the night.

VIDEO: Day 5 - Jakar