So Close to Heaven (45 page)

dzongrab
deputy district administrator in Bhutan

dzonkhag
administrative district in Bhutan

gho
national dress for men in Bhutan

gomchen
lay religious leader in Bhutanese villages

gompa
monastery

je khenpo
Buddhist head abbot in Bhutan

kabne
scarf showing rank in Bhutan

khenpo
Buddhist abbot

kira
national dress for women in Bhutan

la
mountain pass

lam
road or street

lama
religious teacher who may or may not be a monk

lhakhang
temple

ngultrum
Bhutanese monetary unit, worth about 3.3 cents

penlop
regional governor in Bhutan

rinpoche
religious teacher or scholar

sadhu
Hindu mendicant holy man

terton
discoverer or revealer of Buddhist treasures or writings

thangka
religious painting mounted on a silk or brocaded scroll

thrimpon
magistrate in Bhutan

torma
flour-and-butter cake left as a temple offering

tshechu
religious festival held in a dzong

tsho
lake or other body of water

tulku
a reincarnate lama

M
ANY
PEOPLE
in the Himalayas helped and inspired me in the writing of this book, and an exhaustive list would be impossible to compile, since countless men and women and lots of children whose names I never knew—monks, novices, students, householders, shopkeepers, artisans, practitioners of traditional medicine, and farmers among them—all contributed something to my impressions and understanding, if only in fleeting encounters. In Bhutan, the last country in the world where Himalayan Buddhism and a Tibetan-based language have official status, a number of government officials, initially wary of journalists, gave hours of their time in conversations about their country and its policies. Two of them, Foreign Minister Dawa Tsering and Home Minister Dago Tshering, also apparently smoothed the way for lengthy interviews with His Majesty, King Jigme Singye Wangchuck. Dzongdas, governors of the country’s geopolitical districts, were unfailingly hospitable and made it possible for me to spend many hours in monasteries and temples normally closed to foreigners. In particular, I would like to thank Dasho Lhakpa Dorji, Dasho Pem Dorji, Dasho Phub Dorji, and Dasho Rinzin Gyetsin.

Sonam Tobgay, chief justice of the Bhutanese High Court, not only explained the functioning of a unique justice system that starts with the teachings of the Lord Buddha but also introduced me to a rich secular folklore. In matters of religion and culture, I owe much to Sangay Wangchuck, now director of Bhutan’s National Library, and to Dasho
Rigzin Dorji of the Special Commission on Cultural Affairs. Sadly, Rigzin Dorji, a man of great verve and spirit, died as I was writing this book. Kinley Dorji, editor of
Kuensel
and the person who knows more than just about anyone about the stories and trends behind the news, has been both a source of information and the object of admiration as he steadily builds his newspaper into an independent voice in all of the nation’s three official languages. During my years of reporting from Delhi, I was helped in understanding Tibetan Buddhism and its organizations in exile by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and his staff, especially Tashi Wangdi.

In New York, Ambassador Ugyen Tshering, head of Bhutan’s United Nations mission, gave me many useful tips about the Bhutanese, and also helped me arrange trips to the country as an independent researcher with considerable freedom to travel. Robert A. F. Thurman, a Buddhist and scholar who at this writing is Jey Tsong Khapa Professor of Indo-Tibetan Studies at Columbia University, was willing to answer questions and give encouragement, although I certainly would not qualify as a student of Tibetology. Leo Rose of the University of California at Berkeley, a lifelong scholar of the mountain kingdoms and the author of several valuable books, provided me with introductions to Nepali experts, including Purna Harsha Bajracharya, a Newari Buddhist from a long lineage of scholars and the former head of Nepal’s Archaeology Department. Purna Harsha was among those who initiated the excavations at Buddha’s birthplace in Lumbini. In Kathmandu I was also helped by Charles Ramble, a British anthropologist and Tibetologist who has amassed a store of knowledge about the daily lives and prospects of Himalayan Buddhist communities, and by Kesang Tseten, a writer born in Tibet, who had many useful ideas and suggestions to share. Thanks also to Kanak Mani Dixit, founder and editor of
Himal
, for creating a magazine that—however controversial—is setting the agenda for intellectual debate across the region.

Everyone who travels in the Buddhist Himalayas owes an enormous debt to a small number of fine Western scholars who have devoted their lives to the difficult work of sorting legend from historical fact in a region replete with mysteries. David L. Snellgrove and Michael Axis are two on whose discoveries and analyses I relied most. Françoise Pommaret, a French expert in Tibetan Buddhism and author of the only cultural guide to Bhutan, was generous with her knowledge of the Himalayan kingdoms accumulated over years of travel and living in the region. I still
have the rough family tree of Bhutan’s Wangchuck dynasty that she sketched on the back of some scrap paper during an evening we spent in the restaurant of the Tushita Guesthouse in Kathmandu. Her
Illustrated Guide to Bhutan
, academically researched yet attuned to village life, filled an unusually wide gap in a country with few explanatory publications. With its glossaries and sensible standardizations of Bhutanese spellings, it became an encyclopedia.

In Ladakh, Helena Norberg-Hodge provided insights from more than a decade of work in a former kingdom trying to retain its identity. Several prominent Sikkimese, including some connected to the last chogyal and his family, spoke candidly to me about the sad history of that realm. They do not want to be identified, but they know who they are.

On a personal level, I owe thanks to Steven Powers, a family friend who at a still-youthful age has trekked over large areas of Nepal, Bhutan, Ladakh, and Sikkim in his years in the Himalayas. In Kathmandu, he provided many books I would not have found myself, along with names and phone numbers of people to meet, from rinpoches to some of the businessmen who are Buddhism’s patrons. As always, I would never have been able to write this book without the encouragement and critical interest of my husband, David Wigg, who dissuaded me more than once from abandoning the project.