23 and 24 August – Bumthang (Bhutan)

Various mushrooms

Please can I have more

The big pot of soup

 It was an early start this morning as I was to go to the Ura Valley Matsutake Festival. I have looked up the meaning of thee word ‘matsutake’ and will stick with the simple definition of an edible fungus. Locally it is just called the Mushroom Festival. This was a village festival with some traditional dancing by parents and school children but what interested me most was that they were all dressed in school uniform (which is the traditional costume worn to school every day) or in their best clothes for the occasion. There was also a huge pot of mixed mushroom soup of which everyone had a cup including myself and a display of various fungi  which included poisonous, edible, unknown and magic mushrooms. I did ask how the effect of the fungi was determined and was told that local folklore and use was used together with various books on the subject but there was no test carried out on a fungi in Bhutan as they did not know what toxin was in a specific unknown fungi. Some fungi were poisonous but still eaten by some villagers when the fungi was young and some of thee fungi, though poisonous, could be prepared in various ways and used as an ointment to cure various ailments. The magic mushrooms were marked as poisonous but in the 60’s with Bhutan being part of the ‘hippy trail’ they were used to ‘take one into another space’ as always believed.

The village 'square'

Traditional dancer

Traditional dancer

Views of the people

Local people dancing

Full traditional dress

School Teachers

The Head Teacher

Cool students

Burning Lake

Anil (the driver) at the pool

The pool caretaker

I was lucky that day as it stayed fine, the following day it rained and the festival was called off. On the way back to Bumthang we stopped at the Mebar Tsho Burning Lake. This was not actually a lake but a pool on a fast flowing river where it is said that Terton Pema Lingpa, a Buddhist saint who went round the country discovering sacred treasures, jumped  in the pool in 1474 with a lighted lamp and came out of the pool with the lamp still lit and carrying a statue, documents and a ritual skull. Since then anyone who has fallen into the pool has not survived and it is believed that they did not fall but that the spirit of the pool pulled them in (I came across exactly the same thing in Papua New Guinea!). The guide did say that he and the driver would be too frightened to go down to the pool by themselves!

Views of the Janbay Lhakhang Temple

On the following day I visited the 7th century Janbay Lhakhang Temple. Once again no photos were allowed to be taken inside the buildings.

The Kurjey Lhakhang Monastery is reputed to have the imprint of the back of Guru Rinpoche in a cave inside this monastery after he he meditated outside the cave for three months with evil deities inside. The main temple was built in 1652, the second part in 1900 and the third in 1990’s. This monastery is also the burial place of the first three kings of Bhutan. A cypress tree, the national tree of Bhutan, growing in-front of the first temple is said to have grown out of the walking stick of Guru Rinpoche about 1652.

Views of the Kurjey Lhakhang Monastery

Views of the Tamshing Lhakang Temple

Frescos, not taken by me.

The Tamshing Lhakang Temple, built in 1501, was visited next. It is the most important Nyingmapa (Buddhist sect) temple in Bhutan die to its connection to the Bhutanese saint Pema Lingpa, very old wall paintings, unique statues and cultural relics. It consists of a deteriorating temple and cramped monks quarters for about 95 monks. There was also a lovely chain mail coat with axes and spears on display, a reminder that in the past monks did go to battle for various reasons.

The Kharchu Dratsha Monastery 

Views of the Kharchu Dratsha Monastery

Monks being called to prayer

The monks quarters

Volunteers preparing the next meal

New building

Monks convention

After lunch it was a visit to Kharchu Dratsha Monastery which is a Buddhist monastic school established in 1963 by the Buddhist teacher to the Royal Family and home to about 300 monks. It is well supported with donations such that, unlike other monasteries where the monks are given two meals a day, here they have three meals a day.

Finished sightseeing for the day and on the way back to the hotel I asked to be let out of the car to look at anew house being built and to see how much wood was used. The house was being built by a farmer on family land which saved him money and a lot of problems with the local government, so he said. It had to be built in a traditional style as did all new building in Bhutan. This meant that windows, doors and all dimensions had to conform to the same standard, even hotels and multi-storey blocks of flats. Some stonework was being built with all the pieces of stone broken with a sledge hammer from a large rock and then cut by hand to fit. Concrete was not used between the stones but clay from the bank near the house. Using clay was the traditional way especially as this clay hardened and lasted 100 years while concrete would not last 30 years. He did say that the clay, mixed with chopped corn stalks, was used for earth rammed houses and some were still standing after 400 years with monasteries, forts and temples being even older where this method of building had been used.

New house being built

The 400 year old house

Fresco

An old house next door

I had also noticed an old house further up the hill from the hotel so wandered up there to have a look at the house. As I was taking photographs of the outside a young girl from the house asked me if I would like to look inside, which I did. She explained that it was a family house given to her great grandfather by the Third King of Bhutan for services rendered and at one time had been lived in by the King. It was 400 years old and still had the original frescos on the walls of the top floor (which I asked to photograph) and an original private chapel which I saw but did not ask to photograph as I thought that it was too private a place. The house (or old palace) had small dark rooms with high ceilings and beautiful old wooded floors. I learnt later that the present Queen Mother had paid f or a house in the town for the family to move into and that the old house was to be turned into a museum. The hotel manager and my guide were astonished that i had seen inside the house as it was not open to the public and said that I was very lucky to have been inside. I felt that i was more privileged than lucky as once the house is changed into a museum the character of the place will change and something will be lost.