I went to bed early last night after watching some of Bucky’s DVD’s about depleted uranium. Can someone remind me to take some less intense movies with me next time I go away? My plans to do my Pilates DVD were thwarted this morning, when my DVD would not work in my laptop. I was quite disappointed, and hopefully it can be resolved tomorrow at work. So I had to do those boring physio exercises I was doing about six months back.

I need to sort this DVD out and also suss out what is wrong with my Ipod Shuffle. I was only given it by my brother Mark the day I left Perth, and so far I have managed to wipe all the songs from it (intentionally) and now I can’t seem to upload anything from my iTunes. It’s driving me nuts. I should have scoped it all out before I left Perth. Oh well there is never enough time to do everything. At least I have some music on my laptop and can listen to something.

I don’t have a TV yet, and it is something I am going to need if I am going to get a handle on their media. A TV and a radio - I need both. Hopefully I can borrow them from the (Ministry of Health) MoH, but I am not too sure. I will check with Sonam tomorrow.

Apologies for the lack of emails, or any blog action. Email has been driving me ABSOLUTELY NUTS as everything is on dial up and is SOOOOO SSSLLLOOOOWWWW. Honestly it is mind-numbingly boring to wait for a webpage to upload. I had forgotten all about it. I guess it is going to teach me patience.

The other thing with learning patience is I am slowing learning how things work around here. I was a little surprised to have both Rinchen and Wanchuck in my office until about 10.30 this morning. They were honestly just ginning around. Admittedly Wanchuck has given me his son’s mobile on loan until I can get mine working again and we spent about twenty minutes doing that.. but honestly.. I wanted to get some work done and they were just hanging out. I felt like kicking them out. Sonam is back tomorrow and will be back in his office, so I have no idea how I am going to operate in an open plan office.

I met with Megan after work this evening to go through some things and she gave me some very interesting insights into working with the Bhutanese. Firstly she told me that when you are in the Royal Civil Service, you have a job for life, and get this.. you are not allowed to resign. They simply will not let you. For example Rinchen’s wife is currently working in Washington as she was offered an amazing job there, and so she left Bhutan to work and took their children. Rinchen, because of his job, he cannot join them.

In the Civil Service there is absolutely no incentive to do any work or to want to get promoted, as you just get moved around. Rinchen told me today he came from the Ministry of Finance before the Ministry of Health. So here was I thinking he was a ‘public health man’ and really he probably knows more about figures than I’ll ever know. Don’t quote me on that!

Basically every year, they get an increment and you just move up the ranks. From what I am told not a whole lot of work gets done either. So it doesn’t sound like you have to be particularly good at what you do to move up the ranks. How it functions puzzles me. Or does it? Is that similar to the Department of Health? No comment.

Megan mentioned that she has been here two years, and what she has managed to do in this time, is the equivalent to what she has been able to do in two months in the West. GREAT. I see many many frustrations ahead.

I’m thinking if I am here to ‘build capacity’ within the MoH, how does one do it when there is no incentive to learn in the first place? Hmm.. perhaps this is the eternal question managers who are civil servants face across the world. Ha – from my own experience I know it is.

Rinchen seems pretty switched on as he mentioned yesterday that Bhutanese don’t really show much initiative. They don’t know how to. They liked to be told what to do, and then they will do it. Hmm this is going to make the creative process for my work an interesting one.

There is one girl within the office who shows promise, and that is Pema. She has just returned form Thailand where she has completed a Bsc in Nursing. She has done a health promotion unit as part of her studies, so perhaps I can talk with Sonam about recruiting her to assist me with my work. I’ll find out tomorrow.

Other than that, my diet has been decidedly boring, and I have got to admit I am eating particularly badly. Last night I two rounds of vegemite with cheese sandwiches and for lunch today I had a packet of chips. Hmm.. no gastronomic adventure here.

While I have been shopping I haven’t managed to find all the bits and pieces that you need to make a meal. For example I have bought rice, chickpeas, a tin of tomato puree, salt and pepper but nothing else.. I don’t have any spices etc. or vegies for that matter.

The lack of vegies is driving me nuts and I can’t wait until the weekend markets to buy some. There is no other place to buy them. It is visiting the weekend markets or buying very expensive tinned stuff. I did buy a tin of baked beans the other day, I think I’ll have them for dinner tomorrow night. Poor Christina – I’m not really neglecting the premise of the Go for 2 & 5 campaign, it’s just a temporary thing.. really ;-).

I can’t believe I am writing this about food, but anyone who knows me knows I like to cook, so the lack of creativity in the kitchen is frustrating. I think I just need to go for a run and let off some steam.

I felt okay this morning, although my pulse rate had risen. It was around 59 beats per minute. I’m not sure what that is all about. I’m a little less puffy and my headache has gone. I’ll probably go for a run on Friday morning.

The other thing about this place is the amount of stairs around. It’s no surprise really considering how hilly it is, but it is taking a bit to get used to. Honestly I consider myself reasonably fit, yet I’m a little puffed when I reach the top of a few flights of stairs. I’m wondering how seriously unfit people do it.

Anyway back to all things Bhutan, another funky thing happened today. When I bought my packet of chips for lunch (and NO it was not intentional to eat chips for lunch, it’s just that I wanted to get back to the office to actually do some work and the closest place was a grocer with dried noodles, chips and cracker biscuits. So I bought the cracker biscuits for dinner and the chips for lunch.), the packet was a really really puffed packet of chips. I’ll get a photo so you know what I mean.

Basically the chips are made in India and when they are bought up here, the air expands and the packet puffs out! How cool is that!! They are a bit of a bugger to open too, particularly when you don’t want the people in the next office to know you are having chips for lunch.

Now another expose into Bhutanese culture, I have just been reading a research report about the sexual behaviour of youth. Well from what I have read they are a promiscuous society and they don’t deny that, so in a nutshell they like to shag a lot.

This report outlined that of those interviewed the males (aged 15 – 25) had on average nine partners since their sexual debut which was average age 16. Now get this – the girls had on equivalent one partner since their sexual debut which was average age 18. Hmm… methinks those figures don’t add up. Methinks the ladies are holding back on the real figures. Anyway, I was alert to this then I had a conversation with Megan.

Megan said the Bhutanese talk about sex all the time (again in conflict to the report and what Rinchen said) and that yes they all do shag a lot. Men have more than one wife, and women have more than one husband, and infidelity is rife. I’m sorry, but that’s pretty confusing to me. How do they manage it all and keep up with everything? I have no idea. I have trouble managing one relationship let alone four!! HA! I’m going to have to get clarification on this, as one of the key messages with HIV/AIDS education is ‘be faithful’. So the question is do I localise the message so it is ‘Be Faithful…… to all of your four wives/husbands’? Hmm.. I’m thinking it probably is.

I’m going to have to go into the regional areas to get a better handle on the message communication and to see how it really is for 80% of the inhabitants. I kinda get the feeling that all these reports, and the city of Thimphu is quite different from what is really going on in regional areas. There is only one way to find out.

I was hoping to go to Phobjoka Valley next week to see the Black Necked Cranes before they migrate back to Tibet. So maybe this can be my first foray into the regional areas. The cranes are an endangered species, and supposedly seeing them is on the list of things to do in Bhutan. They fly back in March so I only have a few days left. Next Tuesday and Wednesday is Losar – the Buddhist new year, and there is two days off work, so I’ll look to do it then. I just need to get organised for it.