After brief stopovers in Qatar and Thailand, we arrived in the eastern Himalayas for a stay in the tiny landlocked Kingdom of Bhutan.
Random stuff
- The total population numbers about 750,000
- It feels like there are as many street/feral dogs as people. There are dogs everywhere
- The street dogs are very well fed by restaurants and local people
- The national animal is the Takin, Budorcas taxicolor. Created, so the story goes, by the Divine Madman who ate a whole goat and a whole cow and then, using the leftover bones, stuck the goat’s head on the cow’s body and, tadah! - the Takin
- Bhutan is a constitutional monarchy
- The current king is the country's fifth, referred to as K5
- The current king's dad, K4, married four sisters in the same ceremony
- Bhutan is the world's only officially Buddhist country
- There are monastic orders throughout Bhutan with boys as young as seven, usually from poor families, entering monasteries
- Usually associated with a spartan lifestyle, Bhutan's strand of Buddhism allows monks to own a range of possessions and they are frequently seen using mobile phones and iPads
- Most people enjoy eating meat and fish but there are two meat free 'auspicious' months
- Chillies are regarded as a vegetable rather than a seasoning and red patches of drying chillies can be spotted in every village
- The national dish is chillies and cheese
- Bhutan has the world’s highest unclimbed peak, Gangkhar Puensum (7570metres/24,836 feet)
- Mountaineering on any peak above 6,000 metres (19,685 feet) is banned
- The cost to visit Bhutan is set very high to discourage influence from outside and to protect national culture and the environment
- Travelling the country independently is not allowed
- Television and internet access have only been available since 1999
- The national sport is archery. The target is small which the archers aim at from a distance of 120 metres
- Tall visitors, like the mister, attract attention. 'How high you?' 'He look very good'
- The selling of tobacco is banned
- Bhutan is the only country whose largest export is renewable energy (hydroelectric power)
- Progress and the success of governmental strategy and policy is measured by happiness - Gross National Happiness rather than GDP
- Thimphu is the only capital in the world with no traffic lights
- Every Tuesday is dry day and alcohol sales are forbidden
- As part of the effort to preserve its culture, citizens are required to wear national dress in public, men wearing something resembling a knee length dressing gown with long socks, and women a full length skirt and short jacket
- About two thirds of the population work in agriculture, the majority as subsistence farmers, and the aim is to be the first organic country
- One of the largest statues of Buddha in the world is being constructed on a hillside overlooking the capital, Thimphu