My Mother is Back in Village

I was very happy when my mother went to Thimphu to live with my sister. I always wanted her to lead easy life once we grew up, because she had suffered enough of rural hardship in brining me and my four siblings up. The time had come for her to hang her spades. She could live with me but she chose to live with my sister because she found herself more useful there because my office going sister needed a helping hand in babysitting her two children.

My mother, proud as she should be, gave away our cows and hens, left the fields fellow, locked our home and came to Thimphu to live with her daughter, along with our baby sister. In Thimphu, the sunburn on her face soon faded, her rough fingers softened and she gained weight. It was the beginning of a happy chapter in her life. She was the queen of the family with a loving brother inlaw.

She would visit me briefly from time to time, and we would talk of our village and people there. Soon we had very less subjects to talk about, because she didn't have anything more to talk about our village. I could sense a subtle longing in her during the long hours we spent near the TV in silence. She would sleep in the afternoon like a baby and mostly grumble about petty thing. My once confident mother who was a leader of kind in our village sounded so subdued over time.

How can her life be so wonderful in Thimphu when she personally had nothing significant to aspire to in life, given the kind of person she has always been. She would wake up in the morning and help prepare my little sister and niece for school, then after my brother inlaw and sister left she would take my nephew out to play. When the little boy would get tired of play she would put him to sleep and fall asleep alongside. She had managed a few friends in the neighbourhood with whom she would spend her long lonely afternoons.

In the evening when everybody returned home she would make them tea and spend the next hours running after the kids. Over dinner they would watch TV and there she would have no common topic with school going and office going people. If some guest showed up she would help with tea and snacks but if the guest was not a family member she knew, then she would take the kids into another room and wait till they left. This was her daily routine. It could have been so beautiful if it was just for a week or month but it went on for years. It was like she was waiting for the end purposelessly.

With My Ashim and our children on the way home

My mother had put on a visible amount of weight, lost her frontal teeth, complained about illnesses and had become so emotional. Every time I met her I felt little more guilty and when she nagged about petty thing I would even give her advices but deep inside I asked myself -what have we done? We were loving her in a wrong way. We took her away from home, leave her in urban isolation, make her so vulnerable to lifestyle diseases and proudly thought we were giving her our best.

Even when I thought of my village, I would first see the lock on our door, then I would see the faces of all the people who dies in last few years and even in my dreams I see my villages in gloomy weather. My villages without my mother wasn't quite the place I would want to think of. All the beautiful memories of village seemed somehow dimmed.

Toward the end of last year my mother expressed he wishes to return home because my little nephew has come of age to go to nursery school. Along with her our little sister would return too because the two of them were inseparable. Though we were worried about our little sister's education for long time we respected her decision this time.

My little Sister and Mother in the Village

Now my mother is back to the village and my sister goes to Chundu Middle Secondary School, which is just over ten minutes walk from our village. Our fields are green again, house is dusted and our chimney is smoking again. Sunburn has darkened my mother's face again but I can see a broad smile on her dark face. There are endless things in village that keeps her busy and during auspicious days she goes to village temple where elders would gather to sing Mani and chat about life.

My Happy mother with her children and Grandchildren

When I visited home last month she looked very happy and busy. I don't have to worry about lifestyle diseases anymore because she is physically engaged in some many village activities. And during the lazy afternoons she spends time with neighbours and chat endlessly over tea. She has gotten rid of her nap habits too. Her confidence is back and she is everybody's Aum Gaki in the village. I hope she will soon get back her posts as Village Health Worker, Manager of Milk Booth, Member of Women Association of Haa...

And Remember, last time during the Royal Visit she was chosen to offer Tshogchhang and that's when she was blessed with the photograph of her life with His Majesty, Her Majesty and the prime minister.

The Photograph of Her life, and ours!

Now when I think of my village I first see my happy mother's face and then our green fields. I have good dreams of my village and I once again feel like a hostel student longing to go home. Home is where mother is happy. 

Disclaimer: My village has road, electricity, etc. and is only 4 km from the town. It has three high school high schools and a junior school within five km radius. Therefore the village I am talking about cannot be related to many difficult ones across the country. I am only talking about life in my village. There are many other villages in which I won't imagine people leaving their parents for whatever reasons. 

Life in Prison

When police announced their intention to frisk youth in Thimphu, I smiled with approval because it came right after I read a piece on two parking fee collectors being robbed by a group of boys. Perhaps police grew desperate because of the similar incidences, which I am sure they must be encountering everyday. But desperate measures are often clouded and shortsighted as this was.

A Moment from Camp RUF, Dagana. Youth in action

At the TEDx talk, my 22 year old colleague Tim Huang opened his presentation with a slideful of recent headlines from Bhutanese newspapers, which more or less told the world that Bhutan is plagued with youth problems. He goes on to justify "Bhutan don't have youth problem". (I will share the link when it's available on YouTube) And now the new headline will scare the world.

At this point it will be interesting to compare the number of youth with drug problem with number of adult with alcohol problem, youth involved in fights with adults involved in domestic violence, theft cases involving youth with theft cases involving adults, youth fraud with adult frauds, corrupt youth with corrupt adults, and I sometimes find it funny how we the minority adults decide what, how and when to do everything for the majority youth population. We are playing god with them.

I know a boy who went to prison one too many times. He was first caught breaking into a grocery store at night. He cried, begged, he promised, and did everything to avoid going behind the bars. He is now a regular. He doesn't cry or beg anymore. He rather goes in and brings out best prison stories. He gets into all sorts of problems just to get arrested. He likes getting arrested when the dinner menu in the prison is chicken. Prisoners get three confirmed meals each day with strong roof over their head. Their diet consists of nutrition that majority of Bhutanese living freely don't have the luxury to enjoy. How many families are lucky enough have meat on their plates twice a week?

Only thing that they are deprived of is freedom, which is quite subjective though. Because what's freedom without the means to make a decent living. Therefore the boy I know loves to remain in prison more than anywhere else. Life in prison makes more sense to him when on the contrary life outside should.

Now the question is how do we make life outside prison better for youth? How do we guarantee them freedom in real sense? Or may be who are we to think and decide for them? They are not our future, they are our present. Give them the chance.

Thank You For The Free Advice

Tonight I met a man at Karaoke Bar who gave me free advice. He sounded like a senior officer, which I found out he was. He approached me gently after I finished singing a duet with my wife and said, "I hope you don't mind me saying-"

I thought he didn't like my voice. My daughter wanted to sit on my lap, I adjusted her comfortably and extended my neck to let him finish. He continued, "I hope you don't mind me saying, you should not bring your daughter to such place. You know, it will impact her mentality. Please don't mind me saying this."
I replied even gently, " Not at all sir, in fact I thank you for your kindness. Any sensible person would say the same about it. I will try not to do that again."

If he could recollect it he said the same to me last year but I am such a bad father that I brought her again. Well I take my daughter along with my wife everywhere I go. They have been to all the places I have ever been to- workshop in Phuntsholing, meeting in Thimphu, Picnic in Gelephu, interview in Paro, lochay in Haa, outing by the river, hiking by the hills, hangout in Karaoke...

I am a young father and I don't want to waste any time away from my family, I have chosen my wife over any women I ever met with the promise that I will be with her and love her the best. Two of us decided to have our daughter out of our love and give her our everything. We are very excited parents, we are trying to give her everything. Yes we have read a lot about child raising but we have also seen the world of reality to agree to so many good things written in books. So we decided to raise our child in our own way to see if she goes wrong after all the love we gave. After all I haven't seen a perfectly raised child living a perfect life, I rather read so much about great people who had terrible childhood.

Let me be with her when I can- whenever, wherever!

Two of us are selfishly forcing our daughter to be with us every moment possible. We want to see her every moment, to hear every word she utters and to see every move she makes. If tomorrow something happens to us she should know we were with her when we could.

See,
I was a good son who loved his mother dearly but I went to hostel all my life. If I calculate I would have been with my mother for only five year in total including the hours we were asleep. Eight years ago I got married and I also got employed, then I belonged to my wife and my job. This will happen between our daughter and us. If everything goes well our daughter belongs to us for twenty years, and twenty years is too short to give her all the love we have. We want to give it every day.

But every now and then when I take my daughter to Karaoke I had that fear of someone kindly coming over and telling me about how bad it is to bring my daughter there- someone who must have read some western books on parenting. This happened tonight. I know he is being very professional, sensible, and doing his social duty as an elder. And I know many of you reading this will find him on the right.

But if you were in that room looking around like I did you would find many couples without their children, many fathers with young girls, some mothers with other's husbands and many drunk youth- whom I supposed didn't go to karaoke with their parents when they were young- now tell me how wrong am I in bringing my wife and daughter to celebrate our weekend?

Dasho, Stop drinking, go home and be by your family. Weekend is for family because all week your were in office and your kids in school. By the way, that girl could be your daughter's age.

Ocean is deep and salty, but I took her there too.

Gelephu Tshachu

I have heard badly about Gelephu Tshachu, and the images of it on media made it worse, but I didn't want to go back without seeing this infamous place. So a week ago I took my family there. It was about to be 6PM when we reached there and men were crowding at the gate for their turn. It was already dark and the place was depressing without proper lighting. I was yet to see the tshachu pools when men started gatecrashing and invading the women's turn. There was nobody at the gate to see to it. 

When all men have climbed over the gate and wall then came a young man who open the gate for me. He blew the whistle as if there was anybody left at all. At the pool the scene was very ugly, men were rushing in and women were trying to escape. I thought that was it. I had seen enough already.

I couldn't agree to myself. Am I going to leave Gelephu without experiencing Tshachu? Am a going to deprive myself of a lifetime experience? Am I going to live with that bad impression of that place forever? 

So last weekend I joined four of my training mates who are regular Tshachu visitors. We made it there before 8PM. There were hardly any people at the gate, which was already open. The ponds were packed and surprisingly there were a few men among the ladies. The whistle blew but the ladies showed no sign of coming out. So we readied ourselves and waited at the mouth of the pond that's reputed to be the hottest. There were over 13 people staring at us from the pond and I could hardly see any space to breath. Five of us were waiting in shorts. Then a man brushed across us and went in. I was annoyed at first but after watching him adjust himself among the ladies with good humor I began to like him.

My friends who were already senior visitors told me that we should subtly slip in like the man. One by one we joked our way into the pond and to my amazement the population in the pond increased to 18 and we were still comfortable. Everybody was so welcoming that I could think of no other people in the world who can be as accommodating and forgiving. I spend the next one hour enjoy the hot smelly water and funny company. There were different types of people coming in and going out, and the friendly atmosphere in the pond remained throughout. Every time a new member came in everybody moved a little bit to make room, and every time someone walks out everybody stood up to give way. 

Seriously I have no faith in the healing power of tshachu, I feel any hot water can have so much healing power if we can soak for so long. But what make Tshachu special to me is the social aspect of it. People from different places gather here and indulge in a very rustic and yet so Bhutanese form of social activity. Where in the world would stranger share a tiny bathtub in minimum cloth for hours? This should be one place to visit before you die.

Health Tips: Tshachu is mostly visited by people with different kinds of diseases, and therefore some caution has to be taken.