Radio Shangri-La_ What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth - Lisa Napoli [61]
Sounds of a giant vat of liquid sloshing about for a few seconds mixed together with her next narration:
“Drinking is part of our celebration for any occasion. As the celebration nears, Karma—name changed—is busy helping her mother make ara.”
Ara is a clear wine, distilled from rice. A Bhutanese friend plied me with several large glasses one night. It left my head thick and cloudy. It was delicious, but it wasn’t something you’d drink if you were hoping to do anything productive the next day.
In this place with so few names, and where everyone could identify a person with only the vaguest description, I loved that “Karma” had felt compelled to conceal her identity. Whatever her real name, she sounded as sweet as Goldilocks making porridge.
“I’m making ara for Losar celebration, la. People should be very happy, and in order to make my family intoxicated and happy, I’m making ara.”
“Can you consume all you are making, la?”
From the background audio, one suspected that Karma either had an enormous family, or was running a distillery. She responded, matter-of-factly:
“Somehow we have to make money. We will sell half of what we make.”
The Bhutanese music mixed in again, and our intrepid reporter returned for the finale:
“All will be busy preparing for their Losar. Some will be frying snacks, some will be decorating their altar, some will be practicing for the archery tournament, and so on. That is all for now. I hope you enjoyed listening to the Losar program. Until then, on behalf of Kuzoo FM 90, it’s Tenzin Choden. For now it’s bye and Happy Losar.”
As the Bhutanese music trailed to a close, Tenzin looked at me, her eyes wide. It was clear that she was pleased with herself. I wanted to say so many things, helpful suggestions and edits to make it a “better program,” at least to my ears. Had she shown me a script beforehand, I would have felt freer to contribute them then. Of the many editorial tweaks I might have suggested, though, none mattered quite so much as the fact that she’d taken the initiative to prepare the report in the first place.
Back home, a story tied to a holiday would have been prepared weeks in advance and aired the day before. Though the piece wasn’t terribly illuminating, it was perfectly fine. In fact, by the standards of Kuzoo, it was quite an achievement. She had collected sound and edited it, and mixed in music and recorded a narration. So I resisted the urge to criticize, and said, sincerely, “Good job, Tenzin”—praise she didn’t seem a bit surprised to hear. She flashed a big smile and scurried into action, copying the audio onto her thumb drive, marching into the studio without knocking, leaning over Kinzang, and uploading it onto the playback computer. When she was ready, she hit Play, and her Losar segment was beamed out to all of Thimphu, probably halfway through a nice fresh batch of ara now, anyway.
A FEW MINUTES LATER, the Kuzoo phone rang. Madam Kunzang Choden (no relation to Tenzin) was calling to tell me that her husband was on his way over to pick me up. I’d almost forgotten I had a Losar lunch date with Bhutan’s first female novelist, who also happened to be, along with Madame Carolyn, the other half of the king-appointed Kuzoo board.
Madam Choden was a tall woman with a sweet, round face, her thick hair pulled back into a bun. She looked like a cross between an earth mother and a kindly, youthful grandma; there was an air of formality about her that was almost regal. The Kuzoo staffers told me she was a descendent of a prominent religious family from central Bhutan. She was held in such high regard that most people called her “Ashi,” an honorific usually reserved for the queens. I myself called her Madam, and she didn’t correct me.
Long before she started writing, Madam Choden had lived a life that read like fiction. Like a handful of Bhutanese