Cleaning up, football game and prayer flags

Last weekend was about physical exercise. Saturday morning, I joined around 100 volunteers from the Royal Society for Protection of Nature, the Bhutan Olympic Committee, and one local recycling business, Greener Way. With the support of  the City, we cleaned up parts of the town alongside main roads for an upcoming international SAARC meeting. People agreed that it is not good practice to clean up the town for important meetings only and Thimphu urgently needs a waste management strategy to efficiently deal with its increasing solid waste that is becoming quite visible all over the place.

Passionate young entrepreneur, Karma Yonten, who started Greener Way together with his wife using a start up loan from the Loden Foundation is well aware of this emerging issue. He has not only started his unique and innovative business collecting and recycling solid waste, but his mission also includes advocating for change at all levels of society and the government. It seems to be timely for Bhutan to implement a waste management program with no delay before the garbage in the streets becomes a major concern for citizens and tourists alike. Community-based organizations like Greener Way are great partners for this endeavor.

Saturday afternoon, I joined a team of friends to play football against a team of policemen at the Police Camp. It was a serious game on a very rough, rocky pitch with referee and two assistants. I really enjoyed playing, although it was tough for me ! 90 minutes played in  midfield at this altitude with strong sun first and then with sudden cold was a challenge. I survived, but our team lost. Actually, they have never won against the police yet. Next time !

Sunday I walked up to a nearby peak from 2400m to 3000m altitude. The view was great, I could see the whole valley. Along the road, playful blue, red, green, yellow and white prayer flags in the wind cheered me up whenever I got tired.



Thimphu center from the Telecom Tower hill



Prayer flags blessing Thimphu and hopefully the hikers

There are two basic types of flags: horizontal ones on ropes and vertical ones on poles

Prayer flags are also blessing street dogs who wanted my food

 

DAY 2-4: Super strong chilli and super strong beer

One has to eat to survive. So over the weekend I started discovering what Bhutan has to offer food-wise. First, I went to a safe place: a nearby store where almost every product seemed to be a well-known brand made in neighboring India. I got my cornflakes, rice, milk, tea, instant coffee, and lots of local bottled water. One of the Bhutanese mineral waters is called Kurje Drupchu and its label celebrates the SAARC Summit (South Asia Association for Regional Cooperation) which was last year held, for the first time, in Bhutan. Imagine your favorite Evian bottle promoting the last G8 meeting held in your country and you immediately feel why Bhutan is a unique place.

Currently, I drink, cook, and wash my teeth only with this bottled water. It may be an exaggerated measure to avoid bacteria, but I can't afford becoming ill. I still have a lot to do.

On Saturday, I went to the weekend food market which is in a two-storey building in Thimphu center. Downstairs, again, every vegetable and fruit is imported from India and they are far from being organic. Upstairs, you find more or less the same products - except most fruits - from local farms with no chemicals in them.

In the evening, I had dinner at the Druk Hotel where I was the only guest due to off-season and renovation. I paid 400 Ngultrum ($10) for two great vegetarian dishes with Indian garlic nan bread and a bottle of 8% local beer labelled as Super Strong Beer. And I had an excellent conversation with two very friendly waiters, one of whom used to play football at school as a right winger and earns 5000 Ngultrum ($25) a month without tips.

If you wish, you can buy the original Druk 11000 label on Ebay for $4.

On Sunday, I stayed at home and tried to cook what I ate at the hotel: Kewa Datsi, the traditional Bhutanese potato, cheese and chilli meal.  Deviating from the hotel recipe designed for Western tourists, I decided to use local cheese, not Indian, and put a bit more chilli in it to make it HOT. I'm not sure if I followed the original recipe, but it was REALLY hot and I didn't have any super strong beer at home to kill the fire...