IN THE MIDST OF ALL THESE

In the midst of all these

The days are becoming hotter

The meadows are turning greener

The trees in orange orchards

With its evergreen leaves are bearing small buds

The farmers are done with their sowing

They’re drunk and happy every evening

The oxen are at rest now

They wander the jungle for fresh chew of grasses

The sun climbs up the hill

The landscape sparkles

At noon the river shimmers

With the radiance of sunlight

The birds’ songs are in full rhythm

The butterflies flutter from flowers to flowers

And the multihued orchids adorn the trees

The trees clothe new leaves on their bough

In the midst of all these

Life refines

Life redefines

Life rejuvinates

That Was Archery Match in Kagtong

31/3/12 and 1/4/12 saw an archery match between three villages in Kagtong community—Ngangla Trong, Emalagang and Kagtong. The Kagtong team was represented by the school staff as the people in the village were too busy to spare the days. The people felt the gaining popularity of Yangphel style archery match as three teams raced for the victory. It was a kind of friendly match to bond and revive the relationships between the villages. Each team consisted of six players. Whichever team could roll up 15 points first was betted to take home Nu 1200 from each team. This made the match fiercely competitive.

The days were fine with bright sun on throughout the days. The silent Kagtong was in the rhythm of cheers and laughter. The match broke the humdrum of the people’s life. As the match rolled on, the people gathered to witness the match. The second day of the match saw more people with even Assam based laboureers’ turn up for the match.

The pouring in of ‘Tshogchang’ by the village women revived the allure of the village’s age old tradition. Sitting by the side of the path, the village women served the players with due respect and smile. There were tea and juice for those who didn’t take any of the alcoholic drinks.

By midday in the second day, the competition became fierce with all teams running neck to neck. The shouts, howls and cheers became rampant, each team welcoming the teams hit and swaying away the opponents. The scorching sun blushed red on every players face. Ultimately the days were for Emalagang with 4 set win out of five possible sets during two days of archery match. The final set of the match was a consolation win for the staffs and Ngangla Trong team ednded up not taking home even a single set win.

After all it wasn’t winning or losing the match, it was a weaving of laughter, cheers and dances amongst the people. The smiles were shared and bond grew stronger. All team came together for campfire in the evening of the last day match celebrating the victory together. All was winner at last.

There weren’t dances alongside the match as in most of the matches where men play and women dance. The organizers didn’t arrange nor did the village women turn up for the dance. To this the village Tshogpa remarked that it was due to lack of young girls in the village and they were all studying in the high schools. I responded that young girls weren’t only those who could qualify to dance. I said that the older women could do far better than the girls especially in folk dances which are at the verge of being lost in this fast modernizing world.  Though the women didn’t turn up for dance during the match, few of them came for evening dance during the campfire. As the fire crackled high, the cheers, laughter, jumps and leaps along with talks weaved through the evening. All most all was drunk and happy when the programme went off with a simple dinner.

  

Beyond entertainment and get together, the archery match counted a lot in reviving our age old tradition of playing archery. The match was played with all players playing on traditional bows and arrows. Few players had imported arrows and bow strings. Such moment of playing on traditional bow was too beautiful to let go. Soon the traditional bows would forever remain over the hearths collecting dusts and soot when everyone find it fashionable to own compound bows. To this day compound bows haven’t entered the archery ranges of Kagtong community. I don’t know when will imported bows find its place on the alters of Kagtong folks.

One thing I loved, adored and appreciated apart from all the refreshment the game gave me, was a wealth of cultural values imbued in an old man from Ngangla. He is Duba Wangchuk. He is popular for the talent he has in singing and dancing traditional songs and dances. Last year in my one encounter with him at Ngangla Trong he said that even after three days and nights of Choepala, the local festival his songs wouldn’t finish. His sons and daughters are equally rich in songs and dances. The school is happy that this family has agreed to assist school in teaching traditional songs and dances when they are free. This family is one future of traditional songs in this community.

It wasn’t possible for most of us to play the match with thick woolen gho on the sunny day. All the players made the gho half except that old man. Whole through the match Ap Duba was in full national dress. His gho was, indeed, thicker than all the players, yet he found cool in that dress while others couldn’t brave heat with even light ghos. This is one beauty I cherished during the match.

Further, after the relief of the match, when all gathered for the evening dances, Ap Duba made it compulsory for all the players to dance in full gho. He remarked that the traditional dances were rich in meanings and should be danced in full Bhutanese attire as a token to receive fortunes and blessings from the folk songs and dances. At one point he even questioned one of the teachers to who danced in paint and shirt during the evening gathering. The person like this is really a rare species and deserves due respect and reverence. Last year when all the traditional folk dancers gathered in the capital, he wasn’t recognized by anybody. There is an urgent need to document the cultural values he is imbued with before it’s too late.

All in all, it was really a rejuvenating experience of sharing smiles and laughter with little sense of competition hidden among the players. The texture of all the cheers and laughter would go a long way in as one finest moment to cherish and reflect on. The allure of traditional values which are still rich slants a ray of hope that traditional values would enchant the people for some more years, if not forever.

The Great Hornbill Gliding Over and More

This morning as I head for the school I saw a hornbill gliding over the school. It was a great hornbill and the great sight my eyes met. I watched the flight till it got lost in the woods at the edge of the village. Without flapping its wings it glided swiftly like airplane over us. The children were doing their morning cleaning work. The people hardly observe the flight of the birds. It’s like a sunset and sunrise to them. For the love of the creatures under threat, I give some part of my time to them. One day when human selfishness crawls in I would miss the sight of these wonderful creatures. Backed by the rich vegetations the flights and sights of hornbills of all species are quite common. Now with motor road piercing the nature and forest losing inch by inch to human farming, the sustainability of hornbills is under question. The time will record.

    

The sky was sheepish as if to announce us that it would cry and let its tears pour ceaselessly any moment. The assembly was held. The rain didn’t fall. Fine. The red bougainvilleas climbing up the fishtail palm in front of the academic block was fresh as always. The mist hung around the trees slowly drifted up and slowly the showers came when we stood for the national anthem. The anthem was sung with light showers on. But it lasted for few minutes only. By around 10:00 am the sun rays filtered through the thin clouds and slowly Kagtong brightened up. The children of PP in unison shouted, “Today it’s sunny.” They didn’t need to sing, “Rain, rain go away…” for the brief appearance the sun has made.

During the recess, we had a tea and biscuit by our colleague Mr Yeshi wangdi celebrating his daughter Yeshi Wangmo’s birthday. In the assembly, the children were given chocolates. The children in unison wished, “Happy Birthday to you, Yeshi wangmo…”

These days the red whiskered bulbuls are in abundance. They all gather in the trees even when the rain is in full rhythm. They sit right on the twigs to pick up brown seed and fresh flowers. They dart from tree to tree. The presence on the trees made the trees to lose their purple flowers petal by petal. The meadows under these trees are strewn with purple flowers. It’s awesome!

Making some teaching aids for tomorrow, I made my way to the playgrounds to watch children play. Mr Tshering Dorji, our colleague was coaching the children. I watched them play and practice the ball. The sun was dipping far beyond the clouds inspiring grey-gold sunset. Some villagers and labourers too enjoyed the children play. We let both boys and girls play together. After a brief coaching, Mr Tshering made the children to wage the match boys vs girls with a bet of frog jump for losers. The girls here can equate boys in volleyball. To everyone’s surprise, the girls won and the boys were made to frog jump in the court. It was, indeed, great fun. The tiring mind was finally refreshed.

Then the sky began to darken. The children were sent to their homes. Teachers and labourers began playing football as usual for the evening refreshment. I resigned to my residence. I’m still not recovered with my Knee injury I had about fortnights ago in my tussle with a villagers one evening while playing the football. I’m looking forward to take part by next week with great anticipation that my knee will be all right.

The rain is on still now. It’s drumming hard on my corrugated roofs. There are flashes of lightening and rumble of the thunder. The light loving insects comes in hovers around the tube light. Right now my cat Kaka snatched a green praying mantis and munched it right in front of my eyes. Lord! I couldn’t do anything to save it. So often the insects visiting my room fall as prey to my cats.

 I think I need to sleep to the rhythm of the rain outside and silent within. Goodnight Kagtong.

In the Mist of Time

The milky sky
The warm sunshine
The still bamboos and trees
The birds' twitter
The swallow's flight
The children reading on the lawn
The teacher monitoring
The house wives gossiping
The labourers labouring
IN THE MIST OF TIME

I Blog to Share What Meets my Senses

As days roll by, the circuit of our life expands with life transporting us to different places arched with different skies, peopled with different people, clothed with multi-hued vegetations and inhabited with different animals. The range of our life widens when we share wonderful experiences of our life because each one of us is blessed with individual yet marvelous experiences which are too stunning to let go. We give a pie of our life to them—other people, animals, birds, trees, flowers, insects……. In return, they give a part of their life to us. For instance for the part of life we’ve given to a tree, in return we’re blessed with cool shade on hot torrid day. We grow and we coin a new meaning of our life as our experience keeps widening.

The wonderful experiences are, at times, too stunning to let go and we feel happy when our unique moments are shared. Together we grow and together we succeed. We can share our experiences to our family, friends and the people coming in our life. But it’s impossible for us to have a life haloed with parents’ warmth and circled with friends’ cheers forever. Like we have our life’s obligations and responsibilities to fulfill, our friends have theirs.

Of course the era of fast growing ICT and digital world never leave us lonely. The world really has become small with digital evolution. The mode of sharing and growing together has become much easier. We are now clicks distance from each other. We are always connected. Kudos! Digital and ICT globe! We don’t want anybody to turn and talk to, we can click to social networking sites and voice our voice or dial a number on our mobile phones to keep connected….

Thus the feelings and emotions towards the stimulus surrounding us can be shared easily with immediate feedbacks and responses from our friends and well known people.

Therefore, if I’m too lazy, indeed reluctant to accept the change kissing my feet, I’ll be missing all the wonderful blessings of life breezing through the journey of my life. Thus I write what meets my senses and share with others. I feel light when I share my life experiences in their truest plot with others especially to those who do not get tired of listening to me. When I don’t have anybody to turn and talk to, I just take a pen and leaf the pages of my diary or notebook to share the voice of my heart. I feel relieved when I’ve shared something worth sharing with others.

Nowadays social networking serves as our diary to celebrate and share our experiences. I’ve a dream of creating a blog long time back but my dream blog didn’t materialize due to various factors. Back in the college we are accessible to better internet facilities, but my intersest in ICT world refused to move beyond functional ICT. I was more tilted towards reading with the core thought that I would miss the rich knowledge stacked on the shelves once I would be transported to some strange place where books would not be that resourceful and in abundance as in the college. I took ICT for granted that naturally I would be bounced back in one way or other to it in this fast modernizing world.

Reaching here in Kagtong in 2010 as a fresh teacher, the place was handicapped with modern facilities let alone mobile and internet facilities. The electronic gadgets we had remained in the corners of our room collecting dust. The laptops were confined to watching movies.. Since last year in July Kagtong has been connected with the world beyond the vicinity of kagtong with Bmobile waves breezing through the hemlets of Kagtong community. Then I was hopeful to materialize my dream blog and yes my dream got materialized with a subscription of Bmobile post paid data card last winter and I’m happy that I’m travelling with the changes kissing my feet.

Since 2005 after completion of class 12, I’ve been alone and lonely most of the time. The aloneness and loneniness pushed me into reading and then slowly writing and sharing my inner voices laced with myriad experiences with my diary with some entries going to media houses for publication. Back in the college, my diary titled AS DAYS ROLL BY had been an obedient listener of mine. Here in Kagtong I share everything with my diary named MY KAGTONG TIMES. From today onwards I would like to share some of my experiences including some of creative writings in www.kingapenjorshares.blogspot.com. Indeed my KAGTONG TIMES will remain as my sole companion to share my Kagtong Tales in its quintessential nature and allure.