Shaping BO 2010 – songs, sex, spirits and the serious stuff!

 

 This weekend was Shaping BO - the annual Bhutan Observer staff retreat, held at Pelri Cottages in Paro. The idea of spending my weekend sitting in meetings wasn’t thrilling. Having to leave at 5:45am on a Saturday definitely didn’t help either. To top it all off the place where we were staying is supposed to be haunted.

Sushil (our designer) was eager to fill me in on his encounter with the Pelri ghosts in 2009. He made sure I was well aware that the owner of Pelri Cottages had recently passed away. I would’ve laughed this off as an attempt to scare the foreign girl, except that Sushil didn’t seem like he was joking and his story was backed up by our cartoonist and the marketing manager who had stayed in the same cabin the previous year.

But, as it turns out, this weekend was one of the best I’ve had in any part of the world!

Songs

After the first day of meetings ended, all of the staff from the Observer  (including the bureau staff) sat around a big bonfire. The Bhutanese whiskey was cracked open and the fun began! To break the ice everyone had to sing a song. The punishment for refusing to sing? Washing the dishes for all 50+ of us!  

At first everyone was either too embarrassed or too sober to sing. But as the whiskey got flowing everyone was volunteering for another round of songs. For some reason I decided to sing Bob Marley’s Buffalo Soldier and even Madame Phuntsho belted out a tune in Dzongkha (the national language). By the end of the night, we had the entire Observer staff singing Dzongkha songs and dancing in a huge circle around the bonfire. I had no idea what the songs were about or how to perform the steps, but I found myself having the time of my life! Never would I have thought that one day I’d be drinking Bhutanese whiskey and dancing around a bonfire with a bunch of reporters in the Land of the Thunder Dragon.

  

Sex

Needrup (the Observer’s English editor) utilized the bonding session to give us a detailed insight into the subtle art of ‘night hunting’. Night hunting is a traditional form of Bhutanese courtship that is still practiced in some parts of rural Bhutan, including where Needrup grew up. It involves meeting a girl at night in her bedroom for a “midnight rendezvous”. Needrup had us all in stitches as he told us about his many experiences of night hunting, including the time he trekked for two hours through the forest to the next village to visit a girl that he fancied, only to arrive and see his best friend hanging from the wall as he climbed to the girl’s window. Or, about his many friends who’d inadvertently ended up with wives after accidentally sleeping in at the girls' houses. When this happened and the girls’ parents caught them, the local lama would be called and the couples would be forced to marry. He told us how, without torches or mobile phones, it was difficult to be completely sure that you had actually climbed into the right bedroom. This led to many awkward encounters that involved less than impressed fathers being woken up by adolescent boys in the middle of the night. If I ever hear any of my male friends from home argue that flowers, chocolates, dinner and a movie is a lot of effort, I’ll tell them, before they complain again, to trek through the forest for two hours, climb up a wall and wake up a sleeping father in the middle of the night!

Spirits

When we woke up the next morning (feeling a little worse for wear) we found out that one of the members of our staff had been taken to hospital. Apparently he’d been haunted by spirits and fallen unconscious. What was even spookier was that he’d been staying in the same cabin that Sushil had stayed in the year before! In the end he was fine, but I must admit I was slightly wary for the rest of the trip! (So much so that at one point I had a severe stomach ache and was convinced that it was the work of the Pelri spirits)

The serious stuff

Of course the retreat also involved meetings and serious discussions about the future of the newspaper. Topics included:

• Whether the Observer was still in line with its original vision and mission statement
• The need for a solution to the saga of the printing press
• Human resources issues
• Circulation problems
• Problems in the bureau offices
• The need to decide on a theme for the annual Faces of Bhutan magazine

 One topic that I found particularly interesting was the debate on whether to include international news in the Observer. This issue arose from reader feedback about the Observer’s failure to cover Aung San Suu Kyi’s release. Needrup strongly felt that including a page dedicated to international content would compromise the vision and mission of the newspaper as being “truly Bhutanese”. He argued that if there was not enough content directly related to Bhutan, reporters would have to “download” content from the internet.  I can understand where Needrup is coming from but, from a marketing perspective, I argued that if consumers want to buy one newspaper a week, they are more likely to choose the newspaper which gives the broadest coverage.

This same conflict arose in regards to Madame Phuntsho’s proposal for an environmental page. Needrup argued that there isn’t enough content originating from Bhutan to fill an entire page, and that not enough is going on in Bhutan to warrant a page specifically dedicated to the environment. I argued that this is exactly why we SHOULD have an environment page. I am constantly noticing how Bhutan’s picturesque environment is being destroyed by waste, especially in Thimphu. The environment falls directly under the pillars of Gross National Happiness yet there are few effective initiatives being undertaken in Bhutan.  Environmental issues in Bhutan, such as climate change and pollution can’t be isolated from what is happening in the rest of the world, especially when India and China are right on its doorstep. In the end, it was decided that over the next couple of months we would explore the feasibility of begin for a reporter with a background in science.

Sitting in the meetings and listening to the passion and commitment of the staff to maintaining the vision of the newspaper made me optimistic and confident about the paper’s future. I walked away from the last meeting with the following 'to do' list:

• To organize and write another BO Focus (supplement focusing on specific social issues in Bhutan)
• To get sponsorship for: 

             - My Page (A page for children with content by children)

             - The READ Bhutan project

             - The Dzongkha poetry competition

• To write an article for the annual issue of Faces of Bhutan

From the serious stuff to the not so serious stuff,I enjoyed every moment of the Shaping BO 2010 and can’t wait to see what 2011 brings for the Observer!

The land of BST, lamas and printing dramas!

When the Bhutan Observer’s Annual General Meeting rolled around I hadn't heard about BST (Bhutan Stretchable Time). So when I arrived in the office at 9:10 for the 9:00am meeting I expected to be met by 50 pairs of Bhutanese eyes staring back at me. Instead, the room was empty.  It wasn’t until about 9:50 that my colleagues began to wander in and at 10:10 the meeting finally got underway.


The meeting gave me an insight into the challenges that the newspaper is facing.  Sustainability and funding were recurring topics. But the most difficult problem facing the Observer at the moment is the drama over the printing press.  The amount of heated arguments  that this issue has caused could fill an entire series of a Bollywood soap drama .


Since I arrived in Bhutan, the Observer has usually managed to be ready for distribution by late Friday evening. Unfortunately the intended publication time is Friday morning. The late publication has huge ramifications for the paper and affects everyone from the advertisers to the reporters and also the readers. 


The process is made even more difficult when there’s a special supplement for a national celebration (and there are plenty in Bhutan) such as the 4th King’s birthday, 5th King’s birthday, Coronation Anniversary, Descending Day Of Lord Buddha etc. etc. So on the Anniversary of the 5th King’s Coronation I went to the printing press with Tashi to help compile the newspaper. The printing press is a tiny building with one printing machine that and a ladder that goes upstairs to an upper level where about half a dozen women put the paper together by hand. As I discovered, this is quite a tedious process! There is also issues with the quality of the printing. In fact, last week the copy of the Observer that was distributed to BICMA (Bhutan’s Information, Communications and Media Authority) had three blank pages and the wrong date on the cover. Needless to say, management was less than impressed. 

Putting together the paper at the printing press 

Solving this dilemma is vital to the future of the Observer.  Management is working hard to find a solution. In a country where the printing press is a relatively small industry there are few alternatives. One potentially viable option would be to print at the government owned Kuensel printing press but again financial issues are a major consideration. Another possibility that’s in the works at the moment is the establishment of a printing press in cooperation with some of the other private newspapers. This could be a lucrative commercial venture if the print media continues to grow as quickly as it has in the past two years! 

Working at the Bhutan Observer

Interviews. Conferences. Road trips. Meetings. Research– there is no such thing as a ‘typical day’ at the Observer office.

At the moment I’m working on an upcoming issue of BO Focus, which is a monthly insert focusing on specific social issues in Bhutan. This issue is on ‘Food nutrition and food security’. Contrary to my preconceptions, food security is not about locking your food up at night and is actually a really interesting issue! I’ve been assigned three articles and have been working on them non-stop. 

In 2007-2008 there was a global food crisis. India banned the export of rice to other countries so that they could feed their own population. Bhutan, which imports 90% of it’s rice from India, faced a potentially devastating situation. Luckily, India lifted the ban on Bhutan after less than a month because of good relations between the countries. But the question remained: What would’ve happened if India HADN’T lifted the ban?  The rice crisis made the Bhutanese realize how ill prepared they would be if they were cut off from their supply of imports and food security became an important topic on the national agenda. 

An important part of the research has been finding out what the government is doing to ensure food security in Bhutan and this entails interviews with politicians and ministers. In a country as small as Bhutan, getting access to public officials is relatively easy but getting answers out of them is definitely not! Traditionally, the Bhutanese culture doesn’t encourage the questioning of authority figures and people are still very wary of the media. The perception of politicians and public officials during the transition to democracy is quite interesting. The boundary between being disrespectful and merely questioning public officials has not yet been established and it seems that the media is at the forefront of testing this boundary. 

I’ve interviewed people from the United Nations Development Project, Ministry of Agriculture and the Food and Agricultural Organisation. Despite my initial frustration after a lot of persistence I was able to get some really good quotes and information for my articles.

One of the best parts of researching for the issue was my road trip to Paro with some other people from the  Observer team!  We went there to interview a lady who’s had to stop cultivating her rice on her farm. With all the hotels and resorts that have sprung up around Paro there’s no longer enough water to go around. She gave us a tour around her traditional Bhutanese farm and showed us the old rice fields, which are now completely useless because of the water shortage. Meeting and speaking to someone who's been directly affected by urbanisation made me really think about the true costs of development

Aum Rinchen Wangmo, who has had to abandon her rice farm because of urban development

Apart from this, my big project for the three months of my internship is to create a strategy to encourage support for the media from the government, readers, writers, students and advertisers. As I’ve mentioned before, free media is a relatively new concept in Bhutan so there is no culture of “using” the media and media literacy is very low. Madame Phuntsho has suggested doing a short documentary and supplementing this with brochures but this may change as I get to know the country more and figure out what the best method of communication would be.

Road trip!!!!

Bhutan’s national dress - My battle with the kira

Unless it’s exam time or I’ve had a big night, I can usually walk out of my house feeling reasonably confident that I’ve dressed myself correctly. Unfortunately, since I decided to start wearing a kira to work I haven’t had this luxury. After two weeks of trying to master the intricate process of folding and wrapping, getting dressed still takes me half an hour and at least four failed attempts. I can’t help but envy the elegance of the Bhutanese women as they glide around the city in their perfectly wrapped kiras while I struggle, tripping over my hem as I shuffle from my house to the office. 


Bhutan’s national dress code (Driglam Namzha ) was introduced in the 17th century and is worn everywhere that formal dress is expected i.e. the office, government buildings, school and special occasions.  In the 1980s Bhutan began to implement a series of laws to protect their culture from the dominant influence of China and India, and the national dress became enforceable by law. Anyone found in public out of national dress was charged by police.

Coming from Australia where the closest thing we have to a national dress is a flannelette shirt, boardshorts and thongs, the cultural importance of clothing is easy to underestimate.  But to the Bhutanese the significance of their clothing extends far beyond fashion or aesthetics. The debates surrounding Bhutan’s national dress symbolise many of the contentious issues facing modern Bhutan. The old vs the new. Culture and tradition vs modernisation. Cultural protection vs cultural diversity.

A Bhutanese woman in her kira and men wearing the gho which is their national dress.

The half kira

I find it hard to believe that anything, apart from perhaps childbirth, could be harder than putting on the kira. But the kira now worn by the majority of women in Bhutan (including me) has actually been adapted from the traditional full kira and is apparently much easier to put on. This transition has not been without controversy and has been a hot topic, even in national parliament.  While the younger generation sees the half kira as a necessary adaptation to modern life, older generations see it as cheapening of Bhutan’s traditional culture. Singay Dorki, 81, believes that “When you wear clothes in half, it means your life span gets shortened by half.” And others believe that this is just the beginning of the path that will inevitably lead to the loss of the kira altogether. 


Personally I see the adoption of the half kira as a positive compromise between the protection of culture and the inevitable modernisation of Bhutan. Women are able to meet the demands of modern life and still observe the national dress code. The half kira has prevented (at least temporarily) the complete abandonment of the kira. 

Attempting to look elegant in a kira!

And while I think that the full kira is beautiful and an important part of Bhutanese culture I don’t think I’ll be donning one anytime soon if I plan on making it to work before lunchtime 

Gross National Happiness

Many travellers liken the experience of going to Bhutan to going back in time. With people walking around the city in their kiras and ghos, traditional style buildings and the relatively recent introduction of the internet and television - it's easy to understand how they come to this conclusion. But in other ways Bhutan seems to be far ahead of the rest of the world - for example, the government's admirable commitment to achieving Gross National Happiness (GNH).


The idea of GNH was proposed by the Fourth King, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, and is the basis of policy formation in Bhutan. Any policy that is put forward must be measured against the four pillars of GNH: 

• sustainable development;
• preservation and promotion of cultural values;
• conservation of the environment;
•  and good governance.

What is put forward in policy doesn't necessarily work perfectly in practice. But the fact that the goal of "happiness" rather than "wealth" is given so much attention puts Bhutan one ahead of the rest of the world. 


 Never was this more evident than during the recent global financial crisis, which completely changed the world's ideas about capitalism and provoked us to question our dependence on material wealth as a source of happiness. It was in this climate that the Prime Minister of Bhutan, Jigme Thinley, was asked to give the opening address at the 2010 World Leaders Forum. I was watching a replay of this on BBS last night.  Thinley proposed "happiness" as the 9th Millenium Development Goal to which the audience responded with rapturous applause. 


Not only is the Prime Minister an amazing orator, the speech also gives a fantastic introduction to the Kingdom of Bhutan and the farsighted philosophies that guide their public policy. Definitely worth a listen!


Some of the highlights: 
On GNH: 

“We are the only country so far that promotes happiness through deliberate public policy and action.”

“It is a goal that stands as a separate value while representing as well, the sum total outcome of the other eight. Its relevance goes beyond the poor and developing member states to bind all of humanity, rich and poor, to a timeless common vision.”

Commenting on the pursuit of military superiority: 

 “It is possible for us to realize that it is not security but insecurity we create by the spread of arms and the expansion of armies.”

On the transition to democracy: 

“The biggest challenge my country is faced with is how do you create democrats among a people who never wanted democracy in the first place.We’re faced with how to develop a democratic culture among the people so that the power they have can be exercised responsibly and effectively, so that even the most popular leaders—though they may have come through the electoral process—do not manifest tendencies and succeed in becoming authoritarian."

 On materialism: 

"It does not demand much imagination intelligence, to understand that the endless pursuit of material growth in a world with limited natural resources, within a delicately balanced ecology is just not sustainable - that it is dangerous and stupid." 

"As people rise above the threats of basic survival, what will our collective endeavour be as a progressive society? Must we continue to believe that human life is to be spent labouring for higher income so as to be able to consume more at the cost of relationships, peace and ecological stability? Are the causes of depression, suicide, community disintegration, and rising crime to be accepted as inevitable? Could we not find a way to steer ourselves from the self consuming fire of greed that is fuelled by the media and paid for by industry and commerce which thrive on reckless consumerism"

"One cannot imagine, even as China and India aspire to compete in consumption with the USA, what would become of earth if every global citizen acquired the same voracious capacity"

I wonder what the delegates from India and China made of this comment? 

Welcome to the 'Land of the Thunder Dragon

Relaxing in the business class lounge!

From steamy Bangkok to the crisp cool air of the Himalayas ... right now I'm making myself at home in my new apartment in Thimphu, Bhutan! I was lucky enough to get upgraded to business class on my flight from Bangkok to Paro after I was originally checked into the wrong flight. I thoroughly enjoyed taking in the scenery from my comfy leather business class chair as the plane weaved in and out of the mountains of Paro.

Welcome to Bhutan!

The drive from the airport to Thimpu takes about 40 minutes but I completely lost track of time as I was caught up in absorbing everything around me. Unlike most countries, where the drive from the airport to your destination reveals everything that the tourist brochures don’t, Bhutan has yet to disappoint. Beauty is everywhere. Everything from the rickety trucks that traverse the dangerous roads, to the petrol stations, to the gates at immigration are adorned with colourful and elaborate traditional Bhutanese designs.

I was met at my apartment by Phuntsho Wangmo, who is the Head of Operations at The Bhutan Observer. She is a remarkable woman who’s passionate about the future of Bhutan and the Bhutanese media. Not only is Madame Phuntsho the Head of Operations at The Bhutan Observer, she’s also involved in a pilot project creating a society completely based on the principles of Gross National Happiness (GNH).   

Rabten Apartments - my new home!

Madame Phuntsho explained that the project would be trialed in a village in Eastern Bhutan. The project aims to bring jobs back to the village as there is currently a crisis of graduates moving away from rural areas after they finish college. It also would focus on revolutionizing education in alignment with the principles of GNH and the spiritual fulfillment of the people.  Meanwhile, the intention is for the village to become self sufficient with all food being grown organically. 

Before you dismiss the project as being completely unrealistic, be aware that Phuntsho herself is quick to acknowledge the difficult reality of implementing the program and its likelihood of failure. While her goals may seem naive and idealistic, she recognizes the harsh reality of the situation but is committed to doing her best to make it succeed. If the project DOES successful it will be fantastic for the country so I sincerely hope that the project paves the way for similar ventures in the future!

Kuzuzangpola!

This blog will follow my adventures as I travel from my hometown of Sydney (a bustling cosmopolitan city considered to be one of the world’s economic powerhouses)  to the Kingdom of Bhutan (a tiny mountainous country nestled in the Himalayas, with fewer than a million people and where ‘Gross National Happiness’ is measured in place of gross domestic product).

“Why?” you might ask, would I leave my comfortable life in Sydney to travel to a country that hardly anyone seems to have ever heard of? Many of my friends asked me the same question and rumours spread rapidly regarding the true reason for my departure. The more outrageous of these included that I had received a job tutoring the children of the royal family while another friend congratulated me for my arranged marriage in China. The newsletter at my work announced that I would be travelling to an ‘Aladdinesque’ country in the Middle East - and I can’t even begin to count how many times I was asked which country Bhutan is in.

The real story is far less glamorous  - but just as exciting! For the next 3 months I will be working as an intern at The Bhutan Observer, one of the country’s six national newspapers. The internship was organised and supported by the media department at Macquarie University and will be counted as one subject towards my final degree.

It is an exciting and crucial time in the development of the Bhutanese media. In 2006 Bhutan began the peaceful transition from a monarchical rule to a parliamentary democracy. The media, which had previously been completely under government control, was now free. The call was put out for the establishment of an independent newspaper and The Bhutan Observer  responded with a noble vision to act as the “independent voice” of the Bhutanese people. Since then the independent media has grown slowly and steadily and been instrumental in developing democratic debate.

But, with growth inevitably comes challenge, and at this crucial point in time the Bhutanese media industry is being tested on a range of issues including ownership, financial sustainability, journalistic ethics and quality of content. It is during this crucial period of development that important decisions will be made about privacy, freedom of the press, censorship and political influence. The results of these decisions will form the backbone of the Bhutanese media for many years to come.

The difficulty of dealing with these problems is exacerbated in Bhutan where there is no tradition of free media and where the population lacks a culture of interacting with media. So while it is essential that the media maintain a strong independent voice to ensure political transparency, the importance of the media is continually being overlooked by the public and by politicians. While The Bhutan Observer has largely maintained its original vision it is struggling against the inevitable pressures of commercialisation.

I will use this blog to record my experiences living in Bhutan and working at the Bhutan Observer.