Nomadyzm i nomadologia: rozważania i analizy

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Nomadyzm i nomadologia:

rozważania i analizy

Redakcja naukowa:

Aleksander Kiklewicz i Arkadiusz Dudziak

Olsztyn 2018

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Recenzent:

dr hab. OLEG LESZCZAK, prof. UJK (Kielce)

ISBN 978-83-61605-15-7

Projekt i opracowanie graficzne okładki:

OLENA DUDAŁA

Zdjęcie na okładce:

SZYMON ŻYLIŃSKI

Skład i łamanie:

ALEKSANDER KIKLEWICZ

Wydawca:

CENTRUM BADAŃ EUROPY WSCHODNIEJ

UNIWERSYTETU WARMIŃSKO-MAZURSKIEGO W OLSZTYNIE 10-725 Olsztyn, ul. K. Obitza 1

Druk i oprawa:

ZAKŁAD POLIGRAFICZNY

UNIWERSYTETU WARMIŃSKO-MAZURSKIEGO W OLSZTYNIE 10-724 Olsztyn, ul. Jana Heweliusza 3

Dystrybucja:

CENTRUM BADAŃ EUROPY WSCHODNIEJ ul. K. Obitza 1, 10-725 Olsztyn

tel. +48 89 524 63 47 Internet: http://uwm.edu.pl/cbew e-mail: komunikacjam@uwm.edu.pl

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SPIS TREŚCI

WSTĘP ... 7 КУЛУЙПА АЛИЕВА (Москва)

Тенгризм и номадический феномен в кыргызской культуре ... 10 SZYMON ŻYLIŃSKI (Olsztyn)

Beyond the Clouds —

Travel Narratives about the Kingdom of Bhutan ... 31 НУРЖАН КУЛУМЖАНОВ,АЖАР ЖОЛДУБАЕВА (Алматы)

Древние языческие верования казаха-кочевника ... 45 ГАЛИНА ФАДЕЕВА (Москва)

Дискурс Heimat (Родина) как феномен немецкой культуры в эпоху глобализации ... 62 DOROTA UTRACKA (Łódź)

Parodie transmedialne. Tekst kultury jako kod nomadyczny .... 77 ELŻBIETA ŻURAWSKA (Kraków)

Nomadyzm w powieści łotrzykowskiej:

Harry Martinson droga do Klockrike ... 102 JOSEF HRDLIČKA (Praga)

Emigracja i nomadyzm w czeskiej kulturze XX wieku ... 113 Z^HANNAS^HIRYAEVA(Lipetsk)

Traces of Nomadism in Joanne Harris’s Short Stories ... 127 ЮЛИЯ КОТАРИДИ (Москва)

Миф о психее в европейской поэзии начала XIX века ...140 ОЛЬГА СЕВЕРСКАЯ (Москва)

„Чужое” как „свое”, „свое” как „чужое”:

цитата, аллюзия, реминисценция

в поэтических социолектах 1980-2000-х годов ...156

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SZYMON ŻYLIŃSKI

University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn

BEYOND THE CLOUDS — TRAVEL NARRATIVES

ABOUT THE KINGDOM OF BHUTAN

1. Introduction

Bhutan is a small country in the Himalayas, that for centuries remained in a self-imposed isolation (Aris, 2005).

Due to geo-political tensions, it was forced to open up however its King was still reluctant to let independent travellers in, and if done so they have to pay a hefty fee to see wonders of the Last Shangri-La (Conlon 2002). On the other hand, experts and consultants were welcomed because they were needed for the development of the country (Shaw 2013). Those two groups charmed by the pristine nature, unique customs, and intriguing locals wrote memoirs, travelogues, letters etc.

This paper presents chosen deliberately writings of westerners who shared their experiences from their stay in the Raven Kingdom. Compared with other countries’

abundant travel narratives, Bhutan’s one looks insubstantial, both in terms of volume and artistry, therefore

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the sample was not chosen, but all available to the author literature was scrutinized. There are two main groups of writings about the Land of the Thunder Dragon. The first one consists of historical writing, which the main pur- pose was to describe the country, the second one con- cerns modern texts.

Books used in this paper were mostly obtained from Amazon and read electronically, therefore in the abbrevi- ation “l.” stands for a location which is only provided on Amazon’s electronic reader — Kindle. Others were read traditionally, therefore a suggested formatting for this publication is used. In terms of methodology content analysis was used, which is “an empirically grounded method, exploratory in process, and predictive or infer- ential in intent” (Krippendorff 2012, 1). Such method holds its value even in a postmodern age (Thomas 1994) and allows to get concrete results (Neuendorf 2016). In this paper, I try to provide a space for the authors of the analysed books to speak, therefore citations of their works are more than necessary to paint the picture of the narratives from beyond the clouds.

Presented articles consist of five parts and a bibliog- raphy. It opens with the short introduction of the country, then presents first travellers, that in the majority were officers of English Empire. Part three provides information on modern travellers and part four is struc- tured around the most prevailing subjects in the analysed books. Paper ends with a conclusion.

2. Earliest travellers

The Portuguese Jesuit priests Estevao Cacella and Joao Cabral were the first Europeans to visit Bhutan. During their trip that took place in 1627, they also met with the

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Bhutan’s founding father — Zhabdrung Rinpoche Nga- wang Namgyel (Phuntsho 2013). In their writings, they provided all the information they could gather on their trip such as landscape, people, the religious and political structure of visited land (Weßels 1905, 120-163).

Over hundred years had passed until another west- erner set foot on the Bhutanese soil. George Bogle was a Scottish adventurer and diplomat, a private secretary of Warren Hastings, the Governor of East India Company, who responded to the Raja of the Cooch Behar request for help. His land was invaded by the ruler of what is now known as Bhutan. In 1773 with the help of British troops they pushed back the invader from the north, and Warren Hastings appointed George Bogle to undertake a diplomatic mission to establish trade in the Himalayan, which would also serve as a trading channel with Chi- nese dynasty.

Bogle aged 27, accompanied only by a fellow Scot, a surgeon Alexander Hamilton, set on the 5-month expe- dition in 1774 and established a genuine friendship with the Tashi Lama, the ruler of Bhutan. The writings of the young diplomat teem with detailed descriptions of Bhu- tan at that time.

On the day fixed to receive me I walked to the palace of the Deb Rejah. If there is any pleasure in being gazed at, I had enough of it. Being the first European they had ever seen in these parts, the windows of the palace and the road that led to it were crowded with spectators. I dare to say there were three thousand. After passing through three courts, and climbing two iron-plated lad- ders, I was carried into an antechamber hung around with bows and arrows, swords, matchlock, cane-coiled targets, and other implements of war, and filled with a number of priests, servants, etc. squatted down in different places. [...] The Deb Rajah was dressed in his sacerdotal habit of scarlet cotton with gilded mitre on his head, and un umbrella with fringes twirling over him. He is pleasant looking old man with a smirking countenance. On

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each side of him his principal officers and ministers to the num- bers of a dozen were seated upon cushions close to the wall, and the rest of the company stood in the area among pillars (Bo- gle/Hamilton 2002, 76-77).

George Bogle “in a stroke of historical accident, for once and for all distinguished the two countries of Bhutan and Tibet for the Western world” (Phuntsho 2013, 353). Inter- estingly he also introduced potatoes to that Himalayan Kingdom: “I planted ten potatoes [following Hastings’

instructions to try to and introduce this useful crop to Bhutan]” (Bogle/Hamilton 2002, 64). Writings of Bogle were never published during his lifetime and the most comprehensive volume was edited by Alastair Lamb and published in 2002 (Bogle/Hamilton 2002). In the same volume, one also finds letters of Alexander Hamilton, who carried expeditions to Bhutan in 1775 and 1777 (Bogle/Hamilton 2002).

Other British missions to Bhutan were conducted by Samuel Turner 1783, R. Boileau Pemberton in 1838, Ash- ley Eden in 1864, and Jean Claude White in 1905 and 1907 (White 1909, 237–263). Only the latter left viable memoir, in which he not only provided his own impressions but also mentioned previous British officials who visited Bhutan (White 1909, 105-294). Interestingly White is also responsible for the first article about Bhutan in National Geographic (White 1914).

3. Modern travellers

When a monarchy, with the help of the British forces, was established in Bhutan in 1907, and the new king Ugyen Wangchuck took reign, no foreigners were al- lowed and the country indeed became very isolated. That

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period from 1907 until 1960 Karma Phuntsho calls Early Modern Period.

Bhutan’s modern era effectively commences in the middle of the twentieth century, when the reign of the Jigme Dorji Wangchuck, who is commonly memorised as the father of modern Bhutan, commenced (Phuntsho 2013). With the Chinese violent annexation of neighbour- ing Tibet, the Third King decided to modernize his country and look for a strong regional ally who could help him to fend off the potential northern threat. The only option was India, who since then is Bhutan’s strong pro- tector, and Bhutan remains a safe buffer zone between two, not always friendly, Asian nations.

With the modernization process initiated Bhutan was in desperate need of foreign specialists in all fields. Obvi- ously, most of them arrived from India, but there was also a trickle of Westerners who were invited to train, teach or supervise modernization works in Bhutan. This Himalayan Kingdom to many became a fascinating adventure, and those more versed in literature decided to leave their mark.

One of the first ones was John Stedman, an English lecturer who in 1984 signed up for a two-year teaching contract at Kharbandi Technical College (Stedman 2016).

In his memoir, he mentions his research of Bhutan and enormous disappointment when he discovered that there are only two sources of information. The first one was a book by Peter Steele “Two and Two Halves in Bhutan”

a description of his journey with a wife and two children on horseback across Bhutan in 1967 (Steele 1970), and the second was Encyclopaedia Brittanica. It is sufficient to say that up to this day travel literature set in Bhutan still lacks volume. There are only a handful of books, however, it is not the place to mention them all. Instead in the

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section below only the subjects that prevails in all the books and are common to many authors are mentioned and grouped into appropriate categories.

4. Predominant themes

Below are the most common topics that appear in the writings of modern authors that spend a little time in Bhutan, and upon coming back to their countries decided to write a memoir or a travelogue about what they had experienced. Due to space constraints of this paper, only four main categories were distinguished and briefly de- scribed.

4.1. Primary impressions

There is not a single book that does not mention some kind of cultural shock after landing in this exotic country.

Quite often it is the harshness of Bhutanese life. Jamie Zeppa left Canada in 1988 to teach for two years in the remote village, where lack of sanitation, repulsive food, and weather conditions caused her great deal of discom- fort. Eventually, she overcame the obstacles and end up living there for nine years. Such transformative experiences and just the simple fact of being in the last Shangri- La makes a lot of outsiders feel special. “Ugh — foreigners. As if we were not. Bhutan is so difficult to get into, such an unusual and desirable location, that I have be- come swollen with pride, as if my being in Bhutan were a great personal achievement and not simply a matter of luck” (Zeppa 2000, l. 3227).

Travellers to Bhutan also bring with them the baggage of behaviours and preconceptions. Linda Leaming in her memoir mentions that before coming to Bhutan she was usually irritated when someone did not respect her time

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and was late for the meeting, however after coming to Bhutan she got used to the different time perspective.

“when making an appointment for someone to come for a meal or to fix the plumbing, a Bhutanese will say

«Come Wednesday» and that is specific enough. As long as the person shows up within 48-hour window that is Wednesday and Thursday, everything is as it should be”

(Leaming 2011, 10). Another author ads that everything seems to take up more time than it usually does, however such slow attitude (Zeppa 2000, l. 484).

4.2. Nature

Bhutanese constitution mandates that “a minimum of sixty percent of Bhutan’s total land should be maintained under forest cover for all time” (‘The Constitution of The Kingdom of Bhutan’, n.d.) and the Royal Government keeps it even on the higher level —71% has been confirmed (‘Bhutan’s 71 percent forest cover confirmed’

2017). Moreover, location on the Himalayas and three climatic zones position Bhutan as one of the most beauti- ful and spectacular countries on Earth. This trait is mir- rored in travelogues with the awe of authors who are speechless in the face of absolute beauty and seclusion.

Kevin Grange sums it well:

You can’t get this kind of remoteness much anymore in the world and yet, the funny thing was, I didn’t feel the least bit isolated. In the end, distance is not a measure of physical proximity between human beings but emotional distance. I’d felt more remote on a crowded anonymous street in New York City than I ever did on the Snowman Trek (Grange 2011, l. 2081)

Trekking is a popular tourist attraction in Bhutan that every year brings enthusiasts from all over the world. In such a small sample of travelogues, plots of two books

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are woven around trekking. First one is the mentioned above by Grange, the other one is written by Trish Ni- cholson (Nicholson 2015). Her writing is more focused on the details and emotions, and it seems that her trek is less physically and emotionally demanding than Grange’s.

Because the “high value, low volume” tourist policy, introduced in 1974, travelling in Bhutan is unlike in any other country. A visitor is expected to pay couple hun- dreds of dollars per one day of the visit, therefore only the wealthy ones, are able to come.

We both thought Bhutan’s tourism policy was a good idea but had different views about the price — Ryan thought people labelled it expensive because they didn’t have the money, and I thought people labelled it expensive because they didn’t think nature was worth the money. People will gladly spend two hundred dollars for the manufactured experience of a rock concert, a day at Disney, or a night in Vegas. But when it comes to the outdoors, they put their chequebooks away (Grange 2011, l. 1008).

The great Bhutanese outdoors are inhabited by stray dogs — they are mentioned in all the books. They sleep during daytime and howl relentlessly at night forbidding some light sleep travellers their rest. A New York Times journalist, who wrote the most grounded in facts volume provides the explanation:

The Buddhist reverence for all life is one reason strays have sur- vived here. In the cycle of rebirths, dogs are believed to be the last reincarnation before humans, and people often put out leftovers for the animals for a good rebirth (Drexler 2014, 18).

4.3. Bhutanese society

One of the key factors of Bhutan’s uniqueness is its people, unlike any other. They

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are culturally and religiously programmed not to talk much. The Buddha taught his students to speak only if they had something to say. Idle chatter, the American pastime, is anti-dharma, ego- driven, and thus to be avoided” (Leaming 2011, 62).

Authors find themselves welcomed in the Bhutanese society and at the same time they are fascinated by these quiet, mountainous people.

In Bhutan, saying very little is the epitome of good manners. Nar- cissism is not a national trait. Whole families get together for cel- ebrations, meal, births, deaths, and parties, and there are huge gaps in the conversations. In fact, there’s more not talking than talking. People sit, eat, drink, and even schmooze nonverbally.

They have a self-containment that we don’t have in the West. It’s more that okay not to talk. People are comfortable with silence (Leaming 2011, 63).

For many centuries Bhutan’s seclusion created an agrarian nation, and even the latest modernization processes are not deeply ingrained in the society. Most Bhutanese still feel a strong connection with the ancestral land in the literal and figurative sense. Even the elites in the capital

are just one step from the land. When they talk about home, they’re not referring to their Thimphu residences but the small remote villages where their parents and grandparents live (Avieson 2015, l. 471).

Such rural roots quite often bring straightforwardness and lack of tact, (in the eyes of the Westerners, of course), and frequently bear fruit in the form of comic situations, that authors keenly put in their memoirs.

“You’re so fat!” another old woman says as she gets a good grip on my upper arm, zeroing in on the place where I feel most vul- nerable and well, fat. But this conversation has no room for my vanity. I know what to say.

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“Do you really mean it, or are you just trying to flatter me?” I ask.

Saying someone is fat isn’t an insult in the villages of Bhutan; it’s a compliment. Fat doesn’t mean fat so much, as it means healthy and prosperous.

“No flattery”, she says. “I mean it! You’re really fat!”

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” I say. “You’re fat, too”

(Leaming 2011, 174).

Another trait of agrarian heritage is the rigid social hier- archy, that bars the way to modernization, as the writers of travelogues might have observed when the democracy and private media were introduced in the second part of 2000’s (Muppidi 2012, 173).

Bunty Avieson, an Australian journalist, and a media scholar, was in Bhutan during that period and witnessed first-hand reluctance to speak to the reporters. Many of the senior officials spoke of the rudeness of journalists, because superiors were not supposed to be questioned.

Centuries-old hierarchical system began to crack, and show the side of society that was so well hidden behind customs and traditions. Moreover, the change was coming with the youngest generation, that never could speak aloud. Bhutan was

... suddenly awash with fresh-faced, untrained young reporters, poking their noses into other people’s business, asking inappro- priate questions of their elders and exposing some of the society’s underbelly. Many don’t like it. Others are in shock or denial as the newspapers reveal staggering figures for domestic violence, high-level corruption and rampant alcoholism, which are obviously at odds with the country’s Buddhist values” (Avieson 2015, l. 111).

That Australian journalist helped one of the newspapers

— “Bhutan Observer” in the early stage of development.

Another practitioner, an American, Lisa Napoli served as a consultant for growing radio scene, especially for broadcaster Kuzoo FM (Napoli 2011). Those two women

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are representatives of a larger group of specialists from the West that were invited to Bhutan, to help modernize certain institutions and help them to transit from absolute to the parliamentary monarchy. Their work seemed to be simple — to transfer the skills and knowledge from their area of expertise. However quite often westerners faced different standards and expectation towards their work. Avieson in her book describes a situation when one of the young newspapers in the country, on the front cover published dead foetus of a baby that stirred public opinion. Such sensationalism might be common else- where but was unacceptable in Land of the Dragon, and it was fined by the Bhutan InfoComm and Media Au- thority (Avieson 2015, l. 510).

4.4. Local customs

Most authors are fascinated with the same customs and traditions, that are native to Bhutan, for example, male genitalia painted on the houses. It’s such a unique orna- ment that everyone mentions it in their books.

When you have a phallus painted on the house, people will be too ashamed to look and to covet what they don’t have [...]. In this way, the phallus wards of evil spirits (Napoli 2011, 26).

Another controversial custom is the “night-hunting” — young man sneak into girls’ houses at night to engage in sexual activities. Sometimes it is practiced solo, sometimes in groups. Avieson writes about it extensively, cit- ing locals and wisely, after gathering all the information is at ease. She perceives it as most Bhutanese do, as mean of traditional courtship, and an equivalent of an urban date (Avieson 2015, l. 499-644). However, placing the in-

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formation in one book does not prevent new arriving tourists to raise their brows in disbelief.

Also, ban on tobacco in Bhutan is controversial subject.

Authors often mention that it was the first country to prohibit the sale of cigarettes, and outlaw smoking in public areas. Interestingly such strict restrictions do not include marihuana, that grows everywhere in the King- dom (Napoli 2011, 55). Locals feed it to the pigs to whet their appetite, whereas travellers mention that occasion- ally try the forbidden, in their countries, fruit.

Bhutan, being a country with a population of around 750 thousand (‘The World Factbook — Central Intelli- gence Agency’, n.d.) is a place where “everyone knows everyone”, and the revered Royal Family is no exception, for example, Lisa Napoli when talking with a fellow Bhu- tanese, found out that he knows the crown prince (Napoli 2011, 15) — not an uncommon trait among char- acters in the books. Moreover, she mentions that Royal Family was so accessible that in the phone book “the king’s private phone number was said to be listed”

(Napoli 2011, 31).

5. Conclusions

Bhutan’s travel literature is yet insubstantial however the above-mentioned tomes allow painting its contour but only in brush strokes. Most of these books were written by passionate western tourists, travellers and specialists.

Where they lack in artistic and literary merit, they gain in the passion of narration and storytelling.

Obviously, those volumes written before the modern period need to be studied differently. They mainly pre- sent Bhutan from the colonial perspective, even though this Himalayan kingdom had never been colonized.

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The Second group of texts consists of contemporary writers who in general touch upon the same subjects:

spiciness of the food, nature, the quiet nature of the Bhu- tanese people etc. It’s worth to say that they are not, overall, the most interesting ones. When a reader gets accustomed with a few of them, a repetitive pattern emerges: the same facts and anecdotes are told over and over. With the exception of Avieson and Drexler, all other authors just begin they adventure with literature, that could be clearly seen in their texts. Newer books corre- spond with the older ones. Interestingly most of the modern books are written by women. It is impossible to speculate why it is so. Due to publication restraints, this paper does not mention all the aspects of the books, only touches upon, signals possible routes where more robust text might take over.

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