Radio Shangri-La_ What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth - Lisa Napoli [105]
What the prime minister didn’t mention was that the latest powerful force to ruffle Bhutanese prayer flags had come at his invitation, in the guise of the international consulting firm McKinsey & Company. This merry band of bright-eyed young MBAs, dispatched from McKinsey’s offices in next-door India, had been hired for $9.1 million. Their mission was to evaluate the nation’s inner workings and mine them for greater efficiencies and value. After a months-long inquisition at each of the ministries, the McKinseyites had handed down a wide-ranging series of observations and recommendations about how to better “brand” Bhutan. Chief among them was a push to monetize the GNH thing, for GNH was seen as Bhutan’s most alluring (and therefore its most marketable) asset. To achieve this, the McKinsey team proposed nixing the tourist tariff and allowing guests to book directly with hotels; there would be no more wiring thousands of dollars to tour operators you’d never met in order to secure your visa, guides, drivers, and Druk Air tickets. The idea was to make it as easy as possible for tourists to enter Bhutan and ramp up the number of annual visitors to the country from 27,000—the high to date—to 100,000 a year.
Those in the travel industry expressed fear that by eliminating the barriers to entry, the mystique of Bhutan as an exclusive, elite destination would be damaged. What they really feared was that the government was trying to put all but the best-established travel professionals out of business. Others worried that Bhutan might someday soon resemble Nepal, jammed with spiritual-seeking backpackers. Still others snarked that what McKinsey was recommending was simply not possible: If filled to capacity for 365 days, the two jets owned by Druk Air would hold only 93,000 humans. It seemed delusional at best and irresponsible at worst to imagine that a place that had worked feverishly for so long to keep the world out could possibly consider allowing so many people in. And more practically, they lacked the infrastructure to accommodate them all. Besides, how would those who did venture to Bhutan deal with the cult of spicy hot chilies? Bhutan was on the brink of yet more change, this time at the hands of highly paid advisors who wouldn’t have to live with the consequences of their recommendations.
I’M NOT SURE I’ve ever been so cold; I don’t remember it being this frigid here in the winter. I’m in bed under the covers in a not-shabby hotel, far better than the guesthouse where my hosts first stuck me when I arrived last week, where the only thing covering the window in the bathroom was a sheet of newspaper and fleas danced off my suitcase. This room’s a suite, and boasts a modern convenience not widely available in Bhutan: a wall-mounted electric heater. Not that it chugs out any measurable warmth—the room’s too big, and the draft seeping in from the half-inch crack in the patio door is too ferocious. Central heat and insulation are inventions that haven’t quite made their way here, much less the luxury of a warm bathroom. Even locals grit their teeth through their wintertime ablutions.
All the clothing I’ve got on isn’t offering much protection. Two layers on the bottom, four on top, a huge scarf from Bumthang that Ngawang gave me when I arrived, and a Yankees World Championship 2009 skullcap covering my head and ears. Oh, and fluffy pink chenille socks. I just took my hands out from under the three blankets to grab my cell phone and text in my vote for singer number 6 in the Druk Star contest the Bhutan Broadcasting Service has been running. Her shy smile and sweet trill captured my attention. From my woefully inadequate understanding of Dzongkha, I deduced that she’s from