Beyond the Sky and the Earth_ A Journey Into Bhutan - Jamie Zeppa [0]
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Epigraph
Arrival
A Remote Posting
Orientation
The Lateral Road—Bash on Regardless
What to Do?
The Way to Tsebar
Entrance
Anyone Can Live Anywhere
For Tour Kind Information and Necessary Action Please
Morning Clinic Day Duty.Evening walk
Hidden Valleys
Royal Visit
Entrance
Movement Order
Rangthangwoong
The Vomit Comet
Do Not Eat Your Spelling Tests
Beating Nicely
The Shrub’s Name Is Miss Jammy
The Question Why
Movement Order
Peak of Higher Learning
Sliced Bread
Oh Dear
Cultural Competition
So Lucky to Be Here
Blessed Rainy Days
Durga Puja
The Situation
The View from Here
Winter Break
Involvement
We the Lecturers
A Silly Passing Infatuation
Foreigners Can’t Understand
The Map
Jam Session
Belief
Enter Macduff
Zurung
Boils
A Flux of Light
Return
Love
Love Is a Big Reason
A Secret in Eastern Bhutan
Furniture
F-7
Tashigang Tsechu
Jomolhari
Lotus Thunderbolt
Revenue Stamps
Postscript
About the Author
"Zeppa’s telling of her clumsy attempts to adapt rings with sincerity and inspires sincerity.... {Her} lucid descriptions of the craggy terrain and hones respect for the daily struggles of the natives bring the tiny land to life in a way that is reverent but real. A lively tale.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Delightful ... her enthusiasm for Bhutan and its people is infectious and her descriptions of her encounters with Bhutanese culture are often funny and always enlightening.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“In Beyond the Sky and the Earth, {Zeppa} gracefully and movingly tells how she came to love the towering land, its changeable climate, the day-long walks.... Zeppa’s surroundings and the tremendous change in her life are indeed breathtaking. Her book may offer the last, best long look at today’s Hermit Kingdom.”
—The Toronto Star
“With empathy, intelligence and self-mocking wit, Zeppa chronicles her passage from sheltered First World child to clearer-eyed citizen of a wider world. Anyone who has similarly slipped the traces of Western culture, even temporarily, will appreciate her keen insight into that experience.”
—Toronto Globe and Mail
“Zeppa writes seamlessly about the country she comes to love.”
—USAToday
“A beautiful account of Zeppa’s gradual transition from a preoccupied Canadian, questioning the direction of her life by immersing herself in an alien environment, to a woman reinvigorated by the warmth of the Bhutanese culture.”
—The Independent (London)
“This nonfictional account of {Zeppa’s} ten years in Bhutan goes deeper and further than much travel writing. It is also made readably entertaining by the frequently humorous clash between Zeppa’s privileged Western point of view and expectations and the intricate otherness of what she finds. Here is both a lyrical homage to the beauty of Bhutan and a clear-eyed account of some of its harsher realities.”
—The Bookseller
“Beyond the Sky and the Earth is part-travelogue, part-diary, part-love story. Zeppa’s powers of description are such that Bhutan becomes familiar and desirable. How the author departs one culture and is dropped into another is a great read. {She} is a wonderful writer and storyteller and she has a great tale to tell. An unusually compelling memoir.”
—The Toronto Sun
“Zeppa ... recounts her entry into the distant land known as the last Shangri-La on earth with grace and self-deprecating humor.... Zeppa’s depictions of life ... teem with exquisite physical details.”
—Quill & Quire
“Zeppa is a wonderful traveling companion through a place that challenges many of our western assumptions about the good life.”
—Indigo Books
“Zeppa’s description of the terrain is breathtaking; her description of adaptation, growth, and transformation is both comforting and inspirational. This is a story as much about personal triumph as about travel, and about people as well as place.”
—Booklist
“Rich in detail, humor and adventure.”
—Maclean’s (Toronto)
“Beyond