What I Did On My Summer Vacation: MERAK

Merak, as seen from Gangu

It is hard to believe I was really in Merak, that it actually exists, that a nomadic group of Tibeto-Burman people, the Brokpa, who do not dress or look like other Bhutanese still manage to thrive and maintain their ways of living.  Hand made houses built of dry stonework, mostly tiny single story, one room dwellings, are stacked up the mountainside. These houses do not have the traditional Bhutanese windows, decorative painting and cornices, elevated roofs, open attics or first floor paddocks.  There are no chimneys except in the rare homes with Bukharis--most people vent their cooking fires through a small triangular hole built into the wall.  Smoke also escapes through the cracks between the bricks, a very inefficient and COLD solution. The paths between the houses are narrow and rocky--and muddy in the summer. Livestock--the pack horses that travel to Tashigang for supplies and the yaks and dzhos that provide milk for cheese and butter and hair for clothes--wander the paths and graze lazily wherever they can find forage.  

Going to school in Merak. There is only a primary school--once kids complete
6th grade, they go to a boarding school in Phongmey.

A pack-yak outside a Merak home

Merak roofs

The Brokpa people are stocky compared to other Bhutanese and are inhumanly strong (on the path down to Phongmey, we passed a man with skinny legs wearing flip flops carrying on his back a metal desk all the way to Sakteng; another came up the trail with a refrigerator strapped to his back).   They do not wear the ghos and kiras mandated by the Bhutanese government as a sign of citizenship.  Instead, the men wear a red wool jacket cinched tight with a gho belt over which they often wear an animal skin poncho.  The women wear red and white striped wool dresses and the trademark Brokpa hat: a yak-hair beanie with five spidery that legs that draw the rain away from one's face (in one of the few truly touristy acts of my time here, I bought one of those hats).  In this region of Bhutan, the people Gelugpa Buddhists--they revere the Dalai Lama rather than Guru Rinpoche or Longchempa.

Brokpa women wearing their very cool hats and characteristic dresses

Man in a Brokpa jacket loading a yak

We woke in Merak to the surprise of high clouds and, blessedly, no rain.  Brick had gotten up before me and had found the elusive caretaker of the guesthouse, securing for us a real bed for that night with a Bukhari for $2 a night.  We encountered a group of three Bhutanese young men in a large tent in the schoolyard outside our classroom 'hotel,' one of whom owned a tour company in Thimphu.  He and his two friends were exploring the Merak-Sakteng area as tourist destination and invited us to join us at the village lakhang for the end of the annual community rimdro (a religious purification ritual).  Determined to see as much of Merak as possible, we told them we would meet them there later, and we spent the morning meandering aimlessly, completely enchanted.

The Merak Lakhang

When we arrived at the lakhang it was lunchtime and the dogs knew it: they were lined up outside the community kitchen (all villages have a kitchen near the lakhang where food is made and served during festivals and other public events) waiting for leftovers.  

Dogs outside the kitchen hoping for lunch. Notice the traditional
Bhutanese roof: tiles of slate held in place with rocks.  One sees this
all over the country, even in the capital, Thimphu.

We visited the tiny old lakhang as the monks rested from their chanting and took some tea, noting the countless photos of the current Dalai Lama on the altar.  Nyengda, the owner of the tour company, came and got us so that we could join him and his friends Sonam and Thinley for lunch in the community kitchen in the building next to the lakhang.  As we watched a monk fashion torma, the sacred sculptures made of colored yak butter that decorate the altars of all lakhangs, we were given enormous momos that had been fried in a vat of salty yak butter with a side of ezzay, the fiery chile "salad" that accompanies almost all meals in Bhutan.  The ezzay was so salty neither Brick nor myself could eat more than a few bites.  This did not deter the dogs: after all the humans had eaten, the scraps were put into a trough outside the lakhang where the dogs had a field day.

Dogs at the trough. Note almost all of them are Tibetan Mastiffs mixed with
something else, except that cute little tan puppy wedging himself between two others.

Nyengda had arranged to film a performance of a traditional dance which wasn't normally done during the summer, but the dancers obliged so he could film them for his promotional materials.  Vigorous and athletic, it looked to me to be a dance about the Megoi, but we were told that it was the Iron Bridge Dance (the Bhutanese have a real fascination for bridges which makes sense in a country with so many rivers to cross) about a spirit who threatens to sabotage the construction of a bridge, but a powerful lama stops him (or something like that).   The rain had begun long before, so the dancers were stamping and spinning in huge muddy puddles, splashing their audience and each other.  Best of all, a young boy in pink overalls stood behind the dancers and accurately mimicked every step, hand gesture, and facial expression of the middle dancer; the boy's level of concentration, accuracy and sheer joy was more engaging than the dance itself. 

Iron Bridge Dance

Boy imitating the central dancer

Merak Brokpas watching under protection from the rain

After the performance, Brick and wandered down to the school where local students home from boarding school and college were practicing traditional Bhutanese dances for a cultural program they were planning to put on for their parents the next night.  We passed a woman washing saag (greens) in a public tap and bought some from her, and some potatoes from one of the two shops in Merak for our dinner.  The shop was dark, lighted by one dirty window, and was recognizable as a store only because of the huge pile of Druk 11000 bottles stacked outside.  Both shops sold the same items: Wai Wai noodles, incense, crackers, toothpaste, mango juice and beer--the basics.  Everything else is grown or made in Merak: their clothes, saddles, ropes, furniture (there is almost none), cheese, butter.

After a surprisingly satisfying meal of Wai Wai noodles augmented by the potatoes and greens we had bought, Brick and I sat by our Bukhari as night fell.  We would be leaving early in the morning with Nyengda, Sonam and Thinley for Sakteng.  They had hired horses to carry their gear; we decided it was a good idea and so hired a horse of our own to carry my pack in which Brick would put the heavy items from his pack.  Though the 9 hour hike to Sakteng would take us over Nyuksangla at 14,ooo feet, I was sanguine about hiking without a pack, rain or shine.  But I was sorry to have say goodbye to Merak.

Anomalous tan puppy in Merak trying to stay dry.