Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Tantric Buddhism and the search for Emptiness

So here I am in Bumthang, Central Bhutan. High in the eastern Himalayan mountains and loving it. Although i have been threatened to be droped off in a far eastern Bhutanese Nunnery, apparently that is the punnishment for a single woman travelling in Bhutan alone. I think I could manage apart from having to shave my head....
Two days ago we spent the day at a local festival which was fantastic, although the foreign tourists nearly out numbered the locals which was a bit sad, but it was amazing to see the beautiful dancing they do at such religious festivals. Yesterday we headed off to another valley nearby, driving over one of the highest passes on our journey at somewhere around 3500m. It is amazing traveling around here, Ura, the town we visited was about 50km from where we are staying, but it took us 2.5 hrs to get there, the roads in this part of the world are very special, considering that we were on the main East West highway of Bhutan!!!! We were so lucky to visit Ura as we were able to have a wonderful luch with the family of our Lecturer and guide, it was such a beautiful experience to see a local house and to meet his family.
Today we headed off to yet another valley in the area, this time the Tang Valley, the road out to this valley was only 38km and took 1.5 hrs to get there, and then we still had to walk the last km or so as the bus could not go along the road any further. We visited a museum on the top of a hill and had a picnic lunch over looking the valley. Really you can't get much better than this.
Although it is a very sad day for the local community today. There was a fire in town overnight and wiped out the livelihoods of around 22 families in the village. The fire started around 2:30 and by 3am all of our guides were down in town trying to help, by 7am Karma had begun collecting money for the local villages. Apparently this is a national tragedy and the former King is coming to visit the village either today or tomorrow. They think that 1 person was killed and it is amazing that there were not more as all the buildings are timber.
Anyway, the power has already gone out once tonight so I am not going to push my luck, speak again soon.

And about the title, I am still too confused to explain.......

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