Oh What A Night

Tonight I went to Pema Udon's house - my very dear female work colleague - for dinner. I arrived at 6.45pm and was served ara (the ara with fried egg and butter) and proceeded to join in the fun and get merry!

She had arranged to have a dinner at her house and had invited many women to her house to join in. She joked saying that it was the night she was going to announce the name of her second husband, but it was all for a laugh. I think in reality it was her housewarming.

Her sister from Trashigang (the far, far east) was there. She was the eldest sister in the family and stayed in the village as a child, so she was never educated and does not know any English.

Despite this she does know a few words - broken english - and I was encouraging her, so after she had a few whiskys she was chatting away in her broken english and having a wonderful time talking to me and making everyone laugh. It was brilliant.

Pema's cousin Sonam was also there and he has just released a big hit on the Bhutan music scene. He has written a song that is sung with both English and Dzongkha words, he does have a good voice, and all the girls were swooning over him. It was good fun. We sang the obligatory 'Say Nothing At All', by Ronan Keating, 'Country Road', and a couple of other Backstreet Boys songs after he did his songs.

I really don't know why these are the biggest English songs here but they are. EVERYONE knows them - and sings them. It's almost as if there was a compilation tape of Bryan Adams and Backsteet Boys distributed to every person in Bhutan at some stage a few years ago so they all know the words. It's quite funny. I can't wait till someone I know arrives just to experience the same thing.

Amongst all this frivolity I heard quite an interesting story tonight. I heard the story of how Pema's mother who died 13 years ago, has been reincarnated into a girl that was adopted by her sister. It sounds strange, but let me explain. I just had to write this down.

Basically, being Bhuddist everyone believes in reincarnation. Tulkus - which are young reincarnate lamas (high priests) - are discovered when suddenly out of nowhere when they are about 4 or 5 years old (or even younger) they start to say things that are very odd and should not come from the mouth of a person that age.

For example, they may start refering to their husband who is away or that the place they are living is not their home or some such. Anyway.. usually the parents of the child will suspect something and will take them to a lama. They are then given a series of tests to identify the objects of the previous lama and if he identifies them all, and things that he has said match up with the previous lama then he is announced the reincarnate lama and whisked away to a monestary to live the life of a Rinpoche (High Priest).

So armed with that background information I'll start the story..and this by the way is all true.

About five years ago, Pema's younger brother was in Trashiyangtse - the neighbouring district to Trashigang where the family's village is located.

A woman in this village in Trashiyangtse had died during childbirth, however the child had survived. He just happened to be in this village and had heard that the woman's sisters were going to burn the woman's body and the girl child alive as they thought the child had caused the death of the mother.

They thought the child was an evil spirit, and should also die along with the mother. Pema's brother had overheard this and talked to the women about giving the child to her sister Pema who had two sons but no daughter.

Anyway.. to cut a long story short, he rescued the child - which incidentally was still attached to the mothers body by the umbilical cord and was discarded in the bushes. This was about 24 hours after the birth. The child was still alive and he cut the child free, took her and saved its life.

Pema thought it would be best to give the little baby girl to her sister who did not have any children (the one I have mentioned above) who then became the mother of the child in Trashigang.

Suddenly when the child was three, she started saying really strange things. She was saying things like 'My husband is so tired, I think he needs some ara', and 'Where is my sister, she lives near here' and most miraculously she named all of her cousins - which were not actually her cousins but that of Pema's mother.

So to cut a long story short, they are all convinced that this little girl is actually the reincarnation of Pema's mother.

They think the adopted mother (Pema's sister) is actually mothering and nuturing her mother's spirit. If that makes any sense. What a spin out. They are absolutely convinced of it. When you are told this, you just spin out at how absolutely seriously they are about this. Reincarnations are amazing they say, but one thing is for sure they are real!

So I had a great night listening to all of this, singing, dancing, eating and even dancing with the non english speaking Pema's sister. She was a hoot and got so drunk. She was dancing in front of all of us, and kept saying 'I am from a village and you are from Australia, and tonight we meet - I am so happy!'. So how is that for hospitality huh?

At the end of the evening we danced a few Bhutanese dances and she even blessed me and said prayers for me in front of everyone. I had to be told what she was doing as I had no bloody idea.. but it was still an honour. For some reason after the prayers I had to scull a glass of ara (POTENT STUFF), hence I have come home to write this in a glowing ara mood.

So what a night. I kinda went away thinking I love Bhutanese parties. They are so fun, loving, happy and everyone gets into it. Everyone dances, some drink, everyone chats and even though they speak dzongkha about 80% of the time, people do translate for you, and you do get what's going on. The best thing is breaking the cultural divide by dancing and hugging and having fun. It's brilliant.

I think one of the last things I am going to do before I go is have a big party and put on heaps of food and drink and get everyone to come and have a fun time. I just want drinking, eating and dancing bhutanese style and have everyone I have known here to come and join in. I reckon it would be a hoot and one way of giving back to them. To say thank you for everything. I think I'm going to budget for that one.

Tashi Delek