At Bhutanese archery events, songs and dances are an essential and vibrant part of the tradition — they’re not just entertainment but are deeply tied to cultural identity, sportsmanship, and even subtle psychological warfare.
15may2025
Tag: Bhutan
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: A FOREIGNER GETTING A HAIRCUT…AT THE salOOn…
15may2025
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: FAMILIARITY AND DETACHMENT
There’s a kind of limbo I’ve been carrying. Not dramatic, not heavy—just persistent. It’s the space between familiarity and detachment, between belonging and moving on. It settles in quietly, like fog, and I often don’t notice it until I pause long enough to feel it.
As a nomad, you get used to packing light, not just with things but with attachments. You learn to let places go before they ask you to. You say goodbye so often that arrival and departure start to feel like the same act—just viewed from different ends of time.
And yet, in the quiet moments, there’s a subtle disorientation. I know how to navigate cities I no longer live in better than the ones I’m in. My memories feel more like postcards than personal history. Even the word home feels too fixed for what I’ve lived.
This limbo isn’t about being lost—it’s about being suspended. Not stuck, just untethered. And maybe there’s freedom in that. Or maybe there’s something else I haven’t named yet.
May2025
THIMPHU, BHUTAN 🇧🇹: SINCE BUDDHA WAS A BEATNIK…
The isolation up here – it’s not that crushing Saigon alone-in-a-crowd scene. It’s pure. Clean. Like taking a deep breath after being underwater too long. While the rest of the world’s having some kind of speed-freak freakout, Thimphu’s just sitting here in the palm of the Himalayas, grooving to its own cosmic drummer.
And here I am, watching clouds play tag with mountain peaks, feeling the ancient pulse of prayer wheels spinning out their eternal rhythm. In this high holy place where the air’s too thin for lies and the truth comes down pure as mountain snow, I’m finally hearing that sweet sound of silence that’s been drowned out everywhere else by humanity’s mad chorus.
This is THE IT that we’re all chasing. Right here in this Himalayan groove where the old and new do their eternal dance and even time has to slow down and catch its breath. Everything’s connected but nothing’s tied down, everything’s moving but nothing’s lost.
2025
THIMPHU, BHUTAN 🇧🇹: BLUE CURTAIN
The whole house is like a perfect accident – these weathered walls telling stories in peeling paint, little splashes of life in those rainbow flower pots. Number 22 up there, same as my years wandering, ain’t that a wild cosmic wink from the universe?
Been teaching here a year but really, who’s teaching who? These Bhutanese walls with their fading mandalas and worn wooden frames, they’re schooling me in the art of staying put while everything moves. The laundry dancing on the line like prayer flags, that yellow cloth next to that mystical blue curtain – it’s all poetry.
Twenty-two years I’ve been chasing something across continents, through cities and deserts and mountain ranges, and here’s this simple doorway in the Himalayas showing me maybe what we’re all looking for is right here in the way light hits worn wood, in the quiet dignity of someone’s potted plants reaching for Asian sky.
The thing about being a nomad is you start seeing home everywhere and nowhere – in Bangkok alleys, Beirut streets, Amsterdam canals – but this place, this ancient-modern, sacred-ordinary slice of Thimphu life, it’s doing something different to my wandering soul. Maybe searching isn’t about finding. Maybe it’s about learning to see what’s always been there, like these wooden beams holding up centuries of stories, these humble flowers blooming in borrowed pots.
Still don’t know what I’m looking for, but for now, this blue curtain moving in the mountain breeze feels like enough. Maybe that’s the whole point – not the knowing, but the being here, really HERE, where the ancient and everyday dance together on weathered wooden stages, and every doorway holds the promise of both shelter and escape.
Sometimes you gotta circle the whole world just to find yourself staring at a blue curtain in Bhutan, feeling like maybe, just maybe, you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be – even if you’re still moving, still searching, still riding that crazy cosmic wave to wherever it breaks.
4jan25
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: SHILAJIT from “MENJONG”
An ecological name often invoked for Bhutan is Menjong (སྨན་ལྗོངས་), ‘the land of medicinal herbs.’
SHILAJIT is a natural resin packed with minerals and fulvic acid, known for its energy-boosting, anti-aging, and cognitive-enhancing properties. It supports stamina, immunity, and overall vitality, making it a powerful supplement for wellness and longevity.
8March2025
*clarification* the water is the same temperature as you would have for your tea or coffee. 😊
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: STILLNESS IN PASSING
“Stillness in Passing: A Moment with a Monk in Thimphu”
It was just a moment.
A curve in the road, a concrete block, and a young monk in deep red robes. The midday sun laid itself gently over Thimphu, and the weeping willows behind him moved as if breathing slowly.
There was something about the way he sat—neither waiting nor hurrying. One hand gripped a simple wooden stick, the other rested calmly. His gaze was soft, turned away slightly, as though in conversation with the trees or his own breath. The world moved past him: cars, wind, a foreigner like me. And yet, he seemed untouched.
As someone who’s been a nomad for over two decades, I often find myself between places and people. Always arriving, always leaving. That day, in the stillness of his presence, I felt the kind of rootedness I rarely touch. The kind that doesn’t cling to place or permanence, but radiates from within.
Bhutan’s Buddhist philosophy teaches that peace isn’t found by avoiding the world, but by observing it without grasping. Letting thoughts pass like clouds. This young monk didn’t preach it. He lived it—in posture, in pause.
And for just a few breaths, I let myself sit inside that silence. No destination. No story to tell. Just sunlight, red robes, and a breeze through the leaves.
Then, I moved on. But something in me stayed behind.
April 2025
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: ARIES MOON
In Thimphu, a full moon isn’t just a sight—it’s a feeling. An Aries moon rises bold and bright—fiery, fearless, and full of forward energy. In the stillness of night, it stirs the soul to act, to begin, to break free. In Thimphu’s calm glow, this moon doesn’t whisper; it dares. A quiet city under a restless sky.
April2025
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: EVEN SOLITUDE FEELS CONNECTED
Alone, yet not lonely—he sits in stillness while life flows gently around him. In Bhutan, even solitude feels connected.
April 2025
THIMPHU, BHUTAN: TIMELESS AND PRESENT
Two paths, one frame:
A monk in quiet robes, a Bhutanese man in a vibrant gho—each carrying a different thread of the same cultural tapestry. One rooted in spiritual stillness, the other in everyday tradition. Together, they reflect the harmony of Bhutan: sacred and lived, timeless and present.
April 2025