Hello friends, welcome to session 2012! It has nearly been two months since anything came out from my mind to pen it down but you know it all, no news is a good news?!
As i talked earlier, i and my parents embarked on a small-scale visits that we passionately called Neykhor. It was first at Phuntsoling where Namkhai Nyingpo Rinpoche read out holy texts(sorry, i couldnt understand half of anything! lol). If it wasnt for the financial reasons, we could have prolonged our stay for about a month. I found out the hard fact that staying in a hotel and attending to a religious congregration would tear down most of your yearly savings if you didnt care to be thrifty. Despite, i dont believe in austerities while i am on anything but pilgrimage. My parents wouldnt even eat an egg in phuntsholing. I often had to explain my science to counter their concept of balanced diet. For me it is all about healthy food habits with lots of meat, i mean protein(aint it necessary?) and a bottle of beer to relax after a tiring session of cross-legged Mantra chanting during the day! That is easy and wholesome NEykhor. He he.
A week later, much to the surprise of the nearby mates that we befriended during our stay there, we bid them good byes. Hmm..not without a donation!! You can see that? I wont tell how much which is not even necessary but i give you hint: that small coin could repair the whole of Lhodrak Kharchu dratsang both in BUmthang and Tibet...that was an ambitious donation.:)
For others who could afford to remain back, we werent lucky enough to listen to more dharma teachings than thier holier "karma" but who cares, i was more worried about my monthly pay that went dry after those expensive affairs!
From there, we went to Paro, another destination. Not that i could afford to but in Paro we could easily survive since dear sister stays there despite if she ran her shop for more hours than the normal time, she might be able to donate us. I was almost bankrupt by then!
As i wrote earlier, the trip to Taksang was made finally. Thirteen years had elapsed since i made my first visit there, as a student in Drukgyel. I woul have loved to carry both my parents on my own back if they willed but they thought their bones could do more justice than my fragile(??) ones. Afterall, Neykhor are never meant to be holiday. Things have changed there too. Footpaths had widened. Steps had been built. Lhakhangs built more precariously than ever and few more still coming up...hmm a donation there too! No worries about it since my next visit(if i lived long) would be after another 13 years not that i am into numerology but by that time i would have to find answers to my own suffering. MEDITATE and find answers. Life has become easy. If u aint happy, meditate and find answers!!! And if you can, leave all your finger prints or footprints or butt prints or whatever..lesser mortals like you and i would put up some butterlamps as a mark of respect. Ha ha ha.
We would have loved to visit many places in Paro but for the timebeing we bid goodbye to Paro also.
Back to Gelephu, nah i mean Norbuling. The name is a good hyperbole, i guess. There is no treasure at Norbuling, i tell you! Nothing at all! Not even a bridge to link 4 gewogs to the other side of Maukhola! In winters when the riverbeds dry up, people put up bamboos and call it a bridge. Hail Dasho Prem Kumar G!! Ironic that he graduated from an Engineering college(Allabad) way back in 1985. People joke there these days: they lay down a long bamboo across Maukhola and utter "Thank you, Dasho Premji for the bridge!"
Hmm..the other side of Maukhola is a stark cousin of Gelephu town. It has never seen the lights of modern development. 4 large gewogs and not even a peace road?! The farm roads that had gone old with agony were the same roads while i spent my childhood there. Those roads according to the old folks, date back to early 1970s, it is same still! The bumps get filled temporarily for the entourage of Lyonpo Nandalal. Early February he made a visit once, only to disappear as fast as his visit!
The only thing that you can boast there as a villager is free treated mosquito nets that health people give away to ward off malaria!!
I think i need to save more for future, good day people!!
