Bhutan Budget Backpackers - Day 5 ( Thimphu )

1 October 2014 – Day 5 (Thimphu) 

While Alma had given us his wifi password in the night, the net was down and when it did come up early morning, our phones went bonkers starved of notifications in the past 5 days (I didn’t have data on my Tashi sim). Allowing ourselves the luxury of hot water showers when outside temperatures showed 3 degree Celsius, our first stop was the Immigration office situated on the northern end of Norzim Lam. Norzim Lam is the main artery of Thimphu and the entire city is spread around it. The South end of Norzim Lam leads to the Clock Square. 

Paperwork at the Immigration office

As a foreigner (this is specifically for Indians not using a tour guide), the road permit you received at Phuentsholing is valid only for 7 days and for Thimphu and Paro. If you plan to extend your stay and visit places like Punakha, Haa, etc, you need to get permission per district border you cross. It is a pretty straightforward process which requires you to submit your original permit plus a new form with the additional permits you require. They asked us to come back in half an hour at 11:30 AM after which we had to get photocopies of the forms from a nearby store. This was followed up with an interview with the main Immigrations officer which was a 1 minute affair where she signed our documents.

Fun and Frolic at the Fair

With the paperwork out our way, we headed to ABC (Arts of Bhutan Centre) where the festive spirit was already in display. Handicraft stalls, food stalls were overshadowed by the games stalls. While Smash the Pyramid of glasses is something I have seen earlier, along with traditional darts, they also had a dart variant of Lucky Seven.

You get two chances to throw darts at a custom board with numbers one to six. Adding them up, you get double the money back if you bet on that outcome or you lose it all. The additional twist (my fellow Finance folks will relate to infamous CDS) is a bystander can also bet on what the player will get and similar make their winnings. Everyone is involved. I soon realised a similar concept existed at the mini bow and arrow stall which was the crowd favourite.

While loitering around, we also bumped into a villager we had met in Paro who we had asked for directions to Zuri Monastery. He recognised us and asked our itinerary in Thimphu before carrying on with his business. He had come down to sell his goods to a local market player.


Touristy Brunch

We then came across Ambient café, a continental tourist oriented café started by a Caucasian ex-monk with a message in their wifi password: “nodownloadnoskype”. They also had a mini library of yellowed paperback novels that you could pick from and read and even exchange.  For brunch, we had a sandwich, some pita + hummus, a Bhutanese take on spaghetti (spicy) and milkshakes, filling us up and emptying our wallets by approx. 750 Nu which is on the pricier side in Bhutan. I think the place also doubles up as a working space as we saw couple of folks well settled into their laptops typing away furiously. Ambient is on the first floor opposite the Druk Punjab National Bank where we ended withdrawing some extra cash with my Maestro card just in case.

Walking around the city

Walking across the clock square further down, we found the bus stand on the left under the bridge at the end of the town. We booked ourselves one way tickets (you can’t book return tickets nor tickets from other origin points) to Punakha (80 Nu per person) and Bumthang ( 355 Nu per person ). Since we were booking Bumthang tickets a couple of days in advance, we picked seat numbers 3 and 4, right behind the driver affording us some more legroom. Being the festive season (I’ll talk more about the Tsechu in an upcoming blog), the National Coronation Archery Tournament was on at the Changlimithang Archery ground, a much grander scale than what we had seen in Paro.

 Whilst walking past the stadium, we spotted a huge standing Buddha in the distance and were trying to figure how to get to it. This is when I hit the only blip in my trip. We walked into Relish restaurant to ask them for directions to be attacked by the music of Yo Yo Honey Singh. His creations had reached Bhutan before us. They told us it was at the Coronation Park which was down the road. On the way we also found a cute little tiny temple where we soon realised the prayer wheels weren’t motorised but an extremely old man was performing his circumambulations. Having gone around the entire stadium (In retrospect, we did a full circle around, would have been shorter from the archery range side), we finally entered the Coronation park, a well done quiet spot for families with children’s play areas. On our way, we also passed a lot of local markets, eateries and stores with distinct Bhutanese architecture and paintings. Also passed a closed down cinema hall.

The gigantic Buddha statue watching over the valley

We then haggled with a few taxi drivers who finally agreed from the initial price of 600 Nu to 350 Nu for a round trip to Buddha Dordenma statue (almost 170 feet tall) which overlooks Thimphu valley fulfilling a centuries old prophecy of a Buddha statue that would oversee the world with blessings and the message of peace. You’ll notice this statue from almost all corners of Thimphu. The interior complex which will house over one hundred thousand smaller Buddha statues was still under construction when we visited. The huge complex gives you a sweeping panoramic view of Thimphu and we had walk at least a 100 metres away from the statue to get it into the frame. Few minutes in, it started raining so we quickly jumped back into the cab and headed back passing Kalabazar where Tshering from our bus to Paro ran her substances abuse counselling centre.

Chorten Memorial

We noticed the Chorten Lam at the entrance of the city and asked our driver to drop us off a few minutes later at the only junction in entire Bhutan to have a manned police booth. There are no traffic signals in the entire country (as of 2014). We walked back to the Memorial Chorten, a stupa built to honor the third king of Bhutan. A lot of elderly folks were circumambulating the prayer wheels and the main stupa itself. The Chorten itself glistened after the brisk rains that had followed us a few minutes earlier.

Being on the outskirts, we decided to walk beyond the Indian Military Hospital and further into the suburbs before cutting back in to catch sights of the non-touristy sections of Thimphu. Small houses, school grounds and tiny industries were littered along the way as we walked back towards the main city. Our so called small detour ended up being an hour and a half long excursion as we reached the clock square by 5:50 PM.

Free movie screenings at the town square

Being the festive season, they were playing contemporary Bhutanese movies in the clock square projected over a large screen for free. By the time the movie started, I could guesstimate about three thousand plus folks seated around us, majority of them being the elderly, the women and kids. They were also better prepared than us having come with mats and cardboard pieces to sit on as the floor became cold and wet as the dew set in with nightfall. After about half an hour, we decided we weren’t getting anywhere with the movie and hunger pangs were calling.

We walked into Hotel Ghasel. Since we had got in earlier than the 7:30 PM dinner time, service was again extremely slow, a repeating theme throughout this trip. Being a guesthouse also, a lot of folks were asking for accommodation but the owners highlighted that with the local festival plus Durga puja in India, they were packed and so was the neighbourhood. We thanked our stars that we had found ourselves a place. After a ( ~300 Nu ) dinner over cheese momos, ema datsi and puri, we walked past the now deserted streets of Thimphu as we made our way back to our host’s place at the other end of Thimphu city and trudged uphill against the cold pre winter breeze. 

Key Points

Department of Immigration : Norzin Lam 3, Thimphu

Didn't catch the name of the photocopy shop but it was about 5 buildings down in a shopping complex.
 

Ambient Cafe : R Penjor Building, Norzin Lam. Thimphu  ($$$) Average meal for two - 750 Nu. Free wifi. Popular with tourists. Continental menu

Druk PNB bank right opposite with ATM that accepts Maestro cards

Buddha Dordenma : Cab round trip - 350 Nu.

Chorten Memorial : Chorten Lam (south side of the city) 

Hotel Ghasel ($$) ; Right opposite clock square on Norzin Lam. Vegetarian place. Popular with Indians. They had south Indian dishes on the menu which we obviously didn't try. Patchy wifi.