Bhutan - Lindsay Brown [227]
Malaria is a high-risk disease in pregnancy. WHO recommends that pregnant women do not travel to areas with Chloroquine-resistant malaria. None of the more effective antimalarial drugs is completely safe in pregnancy.
Traveller’s diarrhoea can quickly lead to dehydration and result in inadequate blood flow to the placenta. Many of the drugs used to treat various diarrhoea bugs are not recommended in pregnancy. Azithromycin is considered safe.
Although not much is known about the possible adverse effects of altitude on a developing foetus, many authorities recommend not travelling above 4000m while pregnant.
In the urban areas of Bhutan, supplies of sanitary products are readily available. Birth-control options may be limited so bring adequate supplies of your own form of contraception. Heat, humidity and antibiotics can all contribute to thrush. Treatment is with antifungal creams and pessaries such as Clotrimazole. A practical alternative is a single tablet of Fluconazole (Diflucan). Urinary tract infections can be precipitated by dehydration or long bus journeys without toilet stops; bring suitable antibiotics.
Return to beginning of chapter
Language
* * *
Pronunciation
Conversation & Essentials
Directions & Transport
Health & Emergencies
Numbers
Shopping & Services
Time & Date
Trekking & Country Life
The official language of Bhutan is Dzongkha. While Dzongkha uses the same ’Ucen script as Tibetan – and the two languages are closely related – Dzongkha is sufficiently different that Tibetans cannot understand it. English is the medium of instruction in schools, so most educated people can speak it fluently. There are English signboards, books and menus throughout the country. Road signs and government documents are all written in both English and Dzongkha. The national newspaper, Kuensel, is published in three languages: English, Dzongkha and Nepali. In the monastic schools Choekey, the classical Tibetan language, is taught.
In eastern Bhutan most people speak Sharchop (meaning ‘language of the east’), which is totally different from Dzongkha. In the south, most people speak Nepali. As a result of the isolation of many parts of the country, a number of languages other than Dzongkha and Sharchop survive. Some are so different that people from different parts of the country can’t understand each other. Bumthangkha is a language of the Bumthang region, and it’s common for regional minorities have their own language. Other tongues in Bhutan’s Tower of Babel are Khengkha from Zhamgang, Kurtoep from Lhuentshe, Mangdep from Trongsa and Dzala from Trashi Yangtse.
The Dzongkha Development Commission has established a system for transliterating Dzongkha into Roman script. This official system uses three accent marks: the apostrophe to represent a high tone (eg ’ne) or a ‘soft’ consonant (eg g’); a circumflex accent (eg ê) to represent long vowels; and a diaeresis (eg ö), which alters pronunciation in different ways, depending on the vowel (see Vowels, below). The system also attempts to represent sounds in Dzongkha that don’t occur in English, such as retroflex and aspirated consonants. In this language guide a simplified system is used, with the primary aim being ease of communication at the risk of imperfect pronunciation. In the rest of this book, no accent marks are used in the Romanisations.
Return to beginning of chapter
PRONUNCIATION
Vowels
a as in ‘father’
ä as the ‘a’ in ‘hat’
e as the ‘ey’in ‘hey’
i as in ‘hit’
o as in ‘go’
ö as the ‘ir’ in ‘dirt’ (without the ‘r’ sound)
u as in ‘jute’
ü like saying ‘i’ with the lips stretched back
Consonants
Most consonants in Roman Dzongkha are pronounced as in English. The following list covers letters and