Buttertea at Sunrise (30 page)

T H E D A N C E S O F L I G H T

but the two have long since disappeared in the endless line approaching the altars. Judging from the number of people waiting their turns, the blessing ceremony will take several more hours, and I decide to head back to my quarters to fill my empty stomach.

At the gate to the dzong, leaning on a stone pillar so as not to get pushed over by the crowd pouring in for wang, Ugyen’s little sister Karma Dema is playing with some friends. For a while, I stand on my tiptoes, trying to catch a glimpse of Ugyen’s telltale wooden crutches, but there is no sign of them anywhere.

‘Karma Dema! Where is Ugyen?’ I call to her.

‘Home,’ Karma Dema answers with a shy smile.

‘Ugyen did not want to come?’

‘Ugyen busy cooking,’ Karma Dema says.

‘Are you having fun, Karma Dema?’ I ask, trying to reassure the timid little girl.

‘Yes, madam.’

Yes, madam
. Karma Dema is having fun, but Ugyen is at home. Why is Ugyen not here to receive her blessing? Did she feel, like Lhamo, too shy to come to tshechu? Or is she afraid that she will get pushed over with her crutches? For a moment, I have the urge to walk over to Ugyen’s house and bring her to the dzong too, but then I decide against it. Ugyen is a smart kid, and, unlike Lhamo, she is at home in Mongar. She will take care of herself. With the firm resolution not to meddle too much, I turn around to wave goodbye to Karma Dema, but she has already disappeared in the crowd.

‘Madam! Oieehhh! Madam!’ On my way home, someone

roars loudly over the hubbub of the road lined with eating stalls and gambling huts. I cannot recognise the voice and 229

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continue marching past the flimsy tarpaulin booths filled with cheering and drinking people.

A girl in a yellow and orange kira pours drinks for a few men sitting around a table. Not much taller than Lhamo, the stubborn look in her eyes reminds me a lot of my little patient who is now standing inside the dzong waiting to receive her wang. At this very moment, I am filled with an immense satisfaction, I am so proud of Lhamo. After all, she found the courage to lumber past the hundreds of watching people, pulling her fused straight leg behind her.

Despite her see-sawing gait and the cumbersome walker, she made her way to the courtyard where the dancers were twirling to receive her blessings and merit from the cham.

It could not have been easy for her, yet, to me, Lhamo’s efforts represent hope for what Tobgay saw as a generation in moral and spiritual decine; the hope that even Bhutan’s younger people – some of whom have been dazzled with pictures and ideas from the modern West – will continue to seek the light of the dances.

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C H A P T E R T W E N T Y  F I V E

A Midnight

Prayer

Doctor, will you bring some blessings for Apa from tshechu?’ Norbu Ama looks with questioning

eyes at Bikul who is feeling the pulse of a frail, dehydrated man lying with hepatic coma in the ICU

room.

‘How can I do that, Ama?’ Bikul places the pale wasted hand of his patient onto the blanket and makes a note in his chart.

‘We heard that you always go to the prayer early in the morning. Please ask Lam Neten for a blessing for my uncle.’

Bikul nods and turns to his patient. Behind protruding cheekbones, the man’s eyes are closed and have sunk into the deep hollows of his skull. Months of struggle with a deadly disease have left a haunted expression on the high brows, and his skin is waxy and yellow.

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Absent-mindedly, Bikul strokes a few limp hairs off the lifeless face. There is not much hope left for Tshering.

Several weeks ago, the carpenter from Trashigang contracted hepatitis B, and now the virus is close to winning the fight over his weakened body. In Mongar, the doctors neither have the necessary equipment for analysing the biochemical parameters of the disease state nor the appropriate methods to keep the body fluid sufficiently balanced. Bikul knows that the man’s chances of survival are slim.

‘I will go to tshechu tonight, Tshering,’ Bikul gently addresses the unconscious man. ‘And I will bring blessings for you. Do not worry.’

As if he had heard him, the thin, chapped lips of the comatose patient seem drawn into the fine line of a smile.

‘But, Ama, he still needs to take these, OK?’ Bikul chides Norbu Ama who has taken it upon herself to wheel the hanging IV bottle away from the bed.

Smiling, Norbu Ama shakes her head. ‘If he gets blessings from Guru Rinpoche, no medicine is needed. We will hold puja tonight.’

‘Ama, please!’ Bikul looks at Norbu Ama with pleading eyes. It is her turn to stay at Tshering’s bedside today while Tshering’s wife and children have gone to bring food and supplies from home. But Bikul worries that Norbu Ama will take things into her own hands. Today, any interference could push Tshering past any hope of recovery. Due to severe bacterial sepsis, Tshering needs at least the steady supply of fluids. With despair Bikul reaches for a syringe containing the last dose of ampicillin. After he administers this dose, there will be no more left. The hospital has run out of the necessary antibiotic, and the bacteria invading Tshering’s body have shown to be resistant to all other treatments. Sighing, Bikul starts to inject the remaining medication into the IV drip and watches while the

transparent medicine slowly flows through the syringe.

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A M I D N I G H T P R A Y E R

Then he holds the patient’s cold hand and the room is silent but for Tshering’s laboured breathing.

Norbu Ama hesitantly clears her throat. Her lips are quivering. ‘Doctor, will you bring blessing from the dzong?’

Of course he will bring offerings from tshechu, but in Bikul’s mind it is less for Tshering’s recovery than to make it easier for the family. In truth, there is not much left to do for Tshering, but his wife and children will need strength to face life without him. Perhaps the Guru’s blessings will help them to believe in the future.

‘I will go tonight,’ Bikul reassures Norbu Ama again while he uses a piece of cord to tie the IV bottle to the bed.

Then he checks the flow of the liquid and counts out the seconds. Drip… drip… drip… one drop every two seconds, the medication enters Tshering’s body, fighting against all odds for survival.

On the last day of tshechu, the clock shows 2 a.m. when, with chattering teeth and clumsy hands, Bikul and I peel ourselves out of bed and into kira and gho. Forty-five minutes later, we slowly climb up to the dzong. The night is clear and the faint light of the distant universe underlines the peaceful silence. We walk hand in hand, grateful for the night’s shelter, content in each other’s touch.

The dzong lies majestically before us, the whitewashed walls taking their solemn stance in the moonlight. No sound is heard until we reach the gate where dim lights humour the few drunken card players still trying their luck. Inside the courtyard, we hear the echo of drums and horns. Out of a few windows on the middle floor of the central tower shines a faint light.

The Guru Rinpoche lhakhang is filled with the sounds of prayer, the smell of incense, and colourful decorations honour the festivities. Brilliant banners and ornaments 233

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hang from the ceiling. The back of the shrine is hidden by fantastic buildings of coloured dough and butter, rich paintings and glowing butterlamps. Many offering bowls

– the tallest ones filled with pineapples, bananas, guavas, oranges, sugarcane and packages of glucose – line the altar.

Prayers are chanted. Music moves the air.

We are ushered to the far side of the room and settle beside the empty seat of honour. Lam Neten, the head monk, sits high on his throne, his long scarf wrapped loosely around him. Tshering, the umdze or ‘choirmaster’, is positioned a little lower to the left and holding a set of heavy cymbals.

The other monks are seated on pillows on the floor in neat rows facing each other. On the other side of the room, in the far corner, I can recognise the faces of the dzong dancers and a few older minakpas.

It is the fourth day of tshechu, and the long preparations and nights of prayers and rituals are about to conclude.

Little monks, small boys in red robes, can hardly stay awake and sleepily follow their elders in prayer. Across from me, someone’s eyes close tightly, a head slumps to the side and peaceful slumber takes over. A tiny neighbour tries to waken his friend by blowing into the dreamer’s ear. Then the kudung, the ‘master of discipline’, swishes his rosary in reprimand.

Even Lam Neten’s face disappears every few minutes behind a fold of his robe, seemingly asleep. Yet at a sign not visible to my eyes, he lifts his head and again his powerful voice leads the monks through rituals of devotion and sacred mantras.

The steady murmur of the prayer is mesmerising, at times ebbing to a low mumble, then rising to its overpowering crescendo. The soft singing of cymbals accompanies the verses. All of a sudden, the music swells. All instruments join force and the powerful blowing of the long horns, the melodic tune of trumpets, the quick tock-tock of the 234

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handheld, double-sided damaru drum and the urgent

ringing of bells rise to an awesome fanfare – Guru Rinpoche is invited to join the puja. For a moment it strikes me that yes, certainly the noise is big enough to make even the furthest angels aware of the invitation.

Jigme, with a white scarf tied over his mouth and nose, fills a bowl on the altar with water, then holds a tiny ladle in his right; the other hand he lifts above and in front of him, as if greeting the Guru. Prayers quiet with that peculiar slowing of speech that reminds me of a gramophone playing at too slow a speed. To another ‘chish’ of the kudung ‘s rosary, little monks rush forward to serve tea and sweet rice. Three times everyone’s cups are filled before the prayers resume.

From the altar, the glow of many rows of little butterlamps is reflected in the lustrous decorations, throwing fluttering shadows on the polished wooden floor. They sway with the draft of a breeze through the open windows and flicker with the deep intonations of prayer. And then, like a vision bestowed on dreamy sleepers, out of the mysteries of the back of the temple, a fairy springs. An angel dressed in blue and gold shimmering garments, a silver crown on the head, holding a damaru drum and a bell. Soon another fairy joins him, and together they prance and turn, jump and leap in a dance nothing short of magic. Their presence fills the room as they circle around each other, not once lingering to recover but proceeding in a breathtaking vision of beauty.

I feel uplifted, enchanted, in love with the delight of the moment, inexplicably bound to the wonders of the night.

For a second, I am enwrapped by the mystery of the spirit that flees to where no human mind can grasp its essence.

Faster and faster the fairies spin, boldly they leap, then their drums pause a moment.
Tock-tock… tock-tock…
and the dance goes on. Again they leap, they ring the bells, and, finally, they turn to face Lam Neten, bouncing high to 235

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touch both knees almost to their ears, and disappear. Their magic lingers on.

As dawn sends its first glitters of light through the lhakhang’s windows, the puja ends. In the dim courtyard, a lantern-like vase pours out incense to purify the air. A procession of monks carries a long folded cloth around the central tower. Bikul and I follow them. We circumambulate the building three times, setting many small prayer wheels in motion, before the huge cloth is pulled up to the top floor of the tower. Then, in front of the crowd of villagers watching in awe, the image of Guru Rinpoche unfolds.

The silence that follows is complete. Through the dim morning air, the Guru’s face looks serenely down on us.

We are encompassed by his view; we are enlightened by his sight. To the Bhutanese, the vision of this magnificent thangka is holy. Its name,
thondrol
, means ‘liberation on sight’. With deep, zealous belief, sins are washed away by looking at the Guru’s kind appearance.

On the stones of the courtyard, seated facing the thondrol as they would otherwise face a shrine, the monks begin their puja. Incense sticks waft heavy perfume in front of the silken image, and hundreds of butterlamps flicker in the light of dawn. Quietly, minakpas gather to witness the precious thondrol. The unshakeable belief in their religion is clearly written on their devout faces. Today is a day of forgiveness and a fresh beginning with a hope for the future. A pink sky in the east welcomes the new morning, and with the first rays of sunlight peaking over Kori La, Guru Rinpoche’s image is withdrawn to the temple for another year.

‘I have to find Lam Neten. Will you wait here for me?’

I nod and watch Bikul entering the dark rooms of the temple. I know that all night the thought of his patient has weighed heavily on his mind, and he is anxious to return to the hospital.