The other side of smile

Dema (name changed) lives in the heart of Thimphu with her husband along with two beautiful kids. She is a house wife, but weaves all day long after she sends off her kids to school and husband to office who is driver in one of the ministry. Thimphu is an expensive city for people like Dema whose husband’s salary is too low to survive. She has therefore resorted to weaving Bhutanese clothes to sell and supplement the expenses of their survival in capital. For now she has been doing well. She is uneducated; life has been cruel for her that when other siblings of her got education, she couldn’t because she is the eldest and had to help her parents.

Dema is from eastern Bhutan, from a large number of families. Her parents are both peasants. Everyone knows eastern parts of Bhutan are famous for producing baby-sitters and so was her village. At the age of 10 she was also taken to Thimphu as a babysitter with the hope that someday she will be able to help the family. The family with whom she stayed wasn’t welcoming. It was not just the babysitting but also all other house hold chores like cooking and laundry. The head of family- father who was like her second father began to treat her different after she became young adult, teasing and waiting for any good opportune moment to take advantage of her. His wife witness and catches this on the spot one day and the fate of Dema is then changed forever. She was chase out of the house. Luckily, as the fate has it, she comes across a boy, her present husband whom they fall in love instantly and decides to marry.

Since then the sun of happiness although dim started to shine on her life. This is blessing in disguise for her she now at least can shed tears of smile, although behind that, she does have a dark shadow that haunts her every now and then. Not all smiles come from that genuine happiness, some are just forced, the fake ones while some are just the reflection of pain inside. For Dema, her smile is not just her acknowledgements to the above for sparing and knowing her plight, but also the reflection of her past, hardships and struggles.

So you see there is nothing as free lunch in life, everything comes with price tag and some day or other we ought to balance or the nature will do for sure. A clear and clean atmosphere is always waiting after horrible hurricane. Happy day folks…..

Inspiring Blog award

First of all I would like to thank Langa Tenzin, Ugyen Tenzin and Jigme Zangpo and Sherab Pelmo for nominating me, it is such an inspiration for me. I am really sorry for the late response though. I will directly go to the seven facts about me.

1. I am originally from lauri, under Samdrup Jongkhar Dzongkhag which is one of the most remote place in the country. And I am the first to do engineering from my village. As a kid, I wanted to become teacher but after twelfth standard it got change after securing scholarship. I opted engineering and surprisingly ended up working in aviation company (Drukair Corporation Ltd) where I have to start right from the beginning. The fact is in Bhutan it is very rare where an individual chases and chooses the profession out of sole interest’ it very much depends upon the availability of opportunities!
2. I am most of the time silent but I talk too fast seriously, all my colleagues and friends advise me to talk slowly. I am bit introvert kind of person and I hardly start conversation with strangers and that is why friends have often said that I am too serious; it is just that I need more time get familiar with. 
3.  I started reading only after twelfth standard and was inspired by a teacher who always talked about language rather than his subject-science; but sadly I haven’t been able to keep aglow. I maintain diary as well and the funny thing is that if you read, you will see the most repeated word I use is ‘any way’. I noticed while I was once checking how I wrote in the previous years to save my boredom. Perhaps this is because the word consoles me somehow, don’t ask me how? 
4. I am too bad with kids. I mean I can never be friend and play around with little kids, and for the record, there is a nine months old child of my friend, who seem to have known me by the face; maybe I look so terrible that whenever I lend my hand or try to play with him, he just starts crying terribly. 
5. I also like watching English television series and my all-time favorite is “The Lost” and “The Friends” which I would watch again and again during college days. Now also I try to find time for these but life changes you know with time and with it your habits as well. 
6. I don’t drink much but whenever I am drunk, which is so very rare, I tend to become talkative and courageous revealing all the secrets. Onetime I was too drunk (during college days) that the next day was an embarrassing one for me to hear from friends about how acted and even confessed a girl of my crush! Since then I have never been drunk, and I wish never to be henceforth.
7. People say forget and forgive but unfortunately for me it is bit difficult. I don’t get hurt too easily but once I get, it becomes very hard to forget as well. This is where I try hard to change; I hope i can change with age.

well, about the nomination I don't think even one is left without being nominated for I think I am late, yet as a norm, i would like to derive inspirations from following who are not so frequent in the world of blogging and this is just to say that i enjoy every bit of your writings, please continue writing. 

1. Penstar 
2. Rekha Monger
3. Tempa Gyeltshen
4. Namgang chejey
5. Pema Wangchuk
6. Gyembo Namgyal
7. Maid of Astolat
8. Yeesi7
9. Ram Bahadur 
10. KK wangdi
11. Leythro's Journey
12. Symphony
13. Novice pen
14. My Page
15. Dechen

Happy blogging folks.......

Marriage

Marriage is an important stage in one’s life. It determines not just the point where one is matured enough to take care of him/herself, but also make a living of his/her own. If we consider the life as geography, then marriage is an equator where one climbs from the bottom Antarctic pole to northern arctic pole. It is an important episode of one’s life, where one finds another soul to depend up on to sail through thick and thins of life, to celebrate every bit of good moments and tackle together every bit of hard and difficult times. For parents, the marriage for their son or daughter is a happy time for it means they are aged enough to resign from the busy life and witness and relax.

However not every marriage is successful in life. The happiest moments are short lived, the oath and promises that are kept in that very moment of every-thing-is- perfect gets broken and eventually the force of hard times and problem takes over and divides you apart; suddenly the good moments vanishes in the thin air. What is perfect in life anyway? I have long wanted to write about this; about how suddenly the life of an individual seems to change after so-called marriage. Well, I may be wrong and one-sided, but these are what I have noticed; People suddenly seem to become self-centered and narrow on everything; the way you see your life, friends, relatives and even your own parents. And did you notice that in life most of the parents prefer daughter over son to stay with? The reason is obvious, the daughters know how to show love, they have this natural trick of attraction, it is mostly the women who are head at home, she manages everything at home and deals with the matters inside the house and hence parents are comfortable with their daughters instead of a son. And to me this notion is where the problems starts. Most of the parents feel sidelined and burden to their children once they have their own children (grand children)

And one that wonders me is why a daughter in-law can’t show equal love to her in-law parents as she does to her own parents? Why can’t she treat same irrespective of hers or others? It’s not a blame game here, but just that whenever we hear or see about such stories; it is mostly about the bride doing that or this. Did you hear of an incident where husband is rude and is treating his wife’s parents or siblings so coldly? Well, very rarely! Of course there are some bride who are so very good irrespective of their or others. But frankly and unfortunately up till now I have only heard and knew of stories where the bride isn’t being good to groom’s people.

Just recently I got call from a cousin who talked sympathetically and was almost to tears in phone. I felt pity and even annoyed after hearing his part of history.  He has met an accident and is left almost paralyzed (he can’t walk for his half of body is smashed by accident). He was driver by profession and after accident, he started to lose everything, even his own brother (on ear to his wife) whom he supported with sweats during the school times started to shun him. His brother’s wife started to show her real color after a month of their stay together during his treatment until recently when he started to leave them back to home. Is this really the price for a happily-ever-after kind of marriage?

And my fear is what if I also meet something like this and become victim? What if I can’t live up to the expectations parents just because I am married? What if marriage change me into different one? This is something I have been thinking seriously but I wish to write my own story later in my life; a story that is not just readable but pleasing as well.

Update for 2015

Blogging has been very much part of my life during college days. There was time when I had ample time to read interesting and insightful posts of fellow blogger friends; when I had lot of time to learn even though it was just the beginning for me. To me blogging isn’t really about writing myself, it is about getting to know, to learn from other friends, and make new friends. But not everything in life comes as you wish. So many things come up and ultimately it all boils down to priorities. Keep aside writing, I haven’t even been able to read what others write. Once you change the phases of so-called life, you get entangled into the web of so many things which are often unfathomable and life isn’t simple as yet.

Anyway the past few days have kept me quite busy not just by the work, but also domestically and personally. 12 and 13^th of the month was one of the most important days of my life; some very important life decisions were made and I hope that I will be able to live up to it.  I wrote my first examination of the exams that are on the way of my career (for ab-initio training). My career is really full of examinations; I don’t know how but yes our brain can become so dull if we don’t make use of it time to time. Those concepts even the basics which were once on finger tips get vanished nowhere and it is funny that we can’t even solve some basic mathematical problems. Anyway it was all the more a lesson for the time to come and I only wish that I learn along the way.

For two days I had to visit Dzongkhag administration for some work and interestingly it was full of surprises.  One incident caught my attention so much so that I am sharing here. I was on queue to receive some forms and instructions; there was this elderly woman, perhaps at her sixties who was near a guy probably some assistant. By the look of that woman, she was bit tensed and hurried perhaps she had other works to do, but the guy was too busy with his computer.  The time was just past nine in the morning. The woman insisted him to do her work and he was telling her to wait, that he was busy while in the reality he was busy chatting (perhaps flirting!) on Face book. I felt pity for her lack of reading and writing, he was busy conversing and there were three pop-out chats on the screen of his computer.  I don’t know how much time he made that woman wait, but by the time I finished my work, she was gone. Hope she got what she wanted. That was when I thought how typical an office-goer can sometime be and fool someone little educated and how social media is a nuisance at times. I thought that the middle bureaucratic are not just productive, but also the ones where delays and problems for commoners like us are created, it is in the middle where the flow of work seem to get struck and missed at times which is but a bitter truth.

These days my dad is also with me and I have been trying hard to find time to spent with him and take him visits to important places around Paro and the capital. So far he has visited some important sites and I wish to take him more. Being for the first time, he seems amazed by so called modern life yet doesn’t seem to like much kind of life at here. For him, the days are too long and too difficult to end without something to do and he has already set a date to return back home. You see such is the nature of rural people they are never peaceful without something at hand or mind to engage with.

Still then until next time; have a good day folks…

Good bye 2014, welcome 2015

Time and tide waits for none, that’s an old adage which is but true. Just like a morning dew, the year 2014 is already perspired and a new year 2015 is already on its way. So this is life? It is too fast don’t you think? Rewinding back, it is indeed a nostalgic moment, right? A lot has happened and I would like to believe myself that every moment and day has only taught me a lesson and that I have only become wiser and older, only things to cherish and celebrate about no matter how different, hard or depressing at times it was.

I would like to believe myself that 2014 was a good, in fact a glorious year to prepare ahead. 2013 was just the beginning of  the experience of my real life, I mean my own living, that is when you have to walk yourself, live yourself, love yourself and be yourself and 2014 just been a good experience all of these. Though I have nothing concrete to show as an evidence I still believe that I have done what was required of, there were hard times though not being able to balance between the thoughts and actions. My health had been pretty good throughout although I have never been able to increase my weight and even did checkup doubting if I was suffering from Tuberculosis which it wasn’t and god! That was a big relief. I still try hard to increase bit of my weight, because everybody says I am too slim and underweight for my height, I also feel that I am too thin and weak, so let’s see what 2015 will give? Financially it was OK, who has enough and are contended anyway when it comes to money? Though I have not been able to save which everybody talks about this shitty future, I like to believe that I have done my part to help my family and relatives enough that it brings me smile. When some of my friends chose fancy cars and marriages, I chose to ignore (for time being though :P) for other way to those simple things, and I don’t think I am wrong at all.

Professionally it was kind of consolidation period, although I missed the very good opportunity for ten months training to enhance and advance my career prospects, i think it wasn’t best time for me. I maybe one step behind some of my batch mates, but I am OK for as long as you have that will, i think every time or a place is but a learning after all. I believe that a yearlong work on the line in a bossy environment has only made me more humble and proactive. The smelly grease stained uniforms have taught me enough as to what engineers are meant for and I only wish to further and continue it. Every day was but a lesson not just for career but about the life ultimately and I thank all those who have somehow been part of it.

And eventually I look forward for even more glorious and eventful year 2015 and I resolute myself to read more honoring the reading year!

Happy New Year folks…!

The Truth

The truth about your boss is that they are always right no matter what, so don’t ever argue with. The best is to nod yes all the time.

The truth about a teacher is that it is the only profession where one prepares the whole night and boasts about his knowledge the next day. (No offense to fellow teachers, this is just the truth told by my own teacher once in school)

The truth of doctor is that he advises others that drinking or smoking is injurious to health but if you live with him, you shall know that drinking and smoking are very much part of their life.

The truth about politician is that he is a very good lair. He doesn’t; think about what he can actually do or something is under his capability, he is too blinded by the rewards aftermath of election and promises blindly just to gain vote; after his desire and dreams are fulfilled finally, his promises are nowhere to be found. Even a paper decays right?

The truth of an engineer is that to a society, he is earning so much but don’t envy because not all are same, and he owes too much to banks and friends!

The truth about a girl is that she is very much unpredictable; she says she can do anything for her love until she meets a wealthy man and marries him irrespective of age. Of course money (wealth) is almost everything in this world.

The truth about a choespa (dharma practitioner) is that he preaches not to kill, be vegetarian and don’t tell lies, but you know what? He eats non-veg in the name of offering and lifting their soul, who saw this anyway in the real world? And will show a frown face if you don’t pay well for their day’s ritual.

The truth about a shopkeeper is that he is poorer than one really thinks, just like a women who weaves to sell clothes doesn’t have good clothes to wear for herself as she has to sell so is shopkeeper.

The truth about long distance relationship isn’t best as some says so and life isn’t fairy-tale, before this requires hell lot of patience, trust, understanding and loyalty.

The truth about trust is that it is very difficult to develop and too very easy to lose and once you lose, don’t expect you will find it again.

The truth about reconciliation or repair is that something is still missing and not all is right, just as the scar is left behind after you take out a nail from the board.

The truth about one’s life is that if you are able, meet some good fortunes, every kith and kin looks upon you with an eye of expectation; meet some misfortunes or failures and the same people shun you as if you are but strangers.

The truth in truth itself is that it is invisible often and by the time it becomes visible, it is already under the bridge and part of it is already damaged.

Of Choe and sii

Wangchuk and Tshewang are cousin brothers from same tiny remote village of the country. They were enrolled to school in the same year. Wangchuk is a year older than Tshewang. They were brilliant students in their own way; it was two of them who would never give the first and second positions of the class every year. Unfortunately during their primary school years, Wangchuk had an accident while herding cattle on vacation which had his hand almost broken. After rigorous local treatments, he was alright. But he couldn't continue his studies and became a year junior to his brother. Wangchuk therefore decides to remain at home helping his parents in field with animals. Tshewang continues to study, although his very good friend has left him. But the road ahead isn't easy for both of them. When one toils in the field in the sun and rain, the other endures the cruel boarder life. But what kind of life is easy anyway?

Life continues as such for years until suddenly when Wangchuk decides to join monk-hood after several years as farmer. He joins prestigious shedra in India (Mindrolling shedra) as a monk, where he once again experiences and recalls his early school days as a little kid. By this time, Tshewang was in the high school. After twelfth standard, Tshewang secures government scholarship to pursue higher studies at a college in India. This is the second time two of them get to meet once again. But this is different from their usual meetings, it’s more dignified and elderly, perhaps both are grown-ups?

At present Tshewang works in a government organization, he is ambitious and arrogant, the meager salary he get at the end of a month is just enough for him to make ends meet, he is often troubled by the day’s work, by his family at home and he has too many obligations; while Wangchuk, who also completed his years of studies teach small kids back at village who have decided to give up material world for monk-hood like him. He is calm and contended. He looks young and peaceful unlike Tshewang who is ruined by the greed for power and wealth.

So this is it I wonder, the difference in power of Choe and sii, the difference between the Nangpai education and modern education? It seems like more the modern education, more the greed and arrogance, more ambitious and materialistic, in short more trouble, just the opposite for Choe.

If only Wangchuk and Tshewang are equally blessed by the road they took although different!