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From chanting nuns to taxi drivers and dancing girls, the changing face of work and play in the Himalayan kingdom
Text and photos by Tim Large
THIMPHU (TrustLaw) - To find the Tashi Tagay dance club in downtown Thimphu, stand in a dusty parking lot and follow the strains of synthesizer, electronic drums and 15-stringed Bhutanese guitar wafting through the night air.
The bouncer at the unmarked door greets you with a betel-nut-stained smile but won’t say a word; he’s deaf and dumb. Inside, bathed in disco light, the male musicians and singers all wear sunglasses; they’re blind.
“Everyone who works here is disabled - except the dancing girls,” said owner Namgay Dorji as young women in ankle-length robes sashayed on stage to the haunting melodies of Bhutan’s popular rigsar music.
A recent phenomenon, the dance clubs have exploded in popularity. Thimphu, Bhutan’s capital city with a population of just 100,000, has no fewer than 12.
But the clubs are under threat of closure in the conservative Himalayan kingdom, where rumours swirl that some of the late-night dancers moonlight as prostitutes.
To many, the drinking establishments have come to symbolize a clash of new and old Bhutan, particularly when it comes to the role of women. While some see the dancers as girls of ill repute, others celebrate their right to express themselves through dance - and to make money in the process.
Bhutan only opened up to foreigners in 1974, banned television until 1999 and uses “Gross National Happiness” to measure its success in development. Seventy percent of its 700,000 people are subsistence farmers.
But as the country comes to terms with newly introduced democracy, youth unemployment approaching 10 percent and a credit crunch following a debt-driven spending boom, many women are entering the workforce in ways that rankle conservatives in the predominantly Buddhist country.
At Tashi Tagay, customers soak up the music in a narrow room festooned with images of King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck and his new bride. Dancers and musicians take a cut of bar tabs. Customers can also request songs for 100 Ngultrum ($1.90).
Though the club has never made a profit, Dorji says he runs it as a social enterprise. He provides all 27 staff with food, boarding and a modest wage. He forks out for their singing and dancing lessons, as well as embroidery lessons for the girls.
“They’re all from poor families in the countryside,” he said. “This is to give them life skills so they can make a living.”
The next day at a taxi stand across town, 30-year-old Tshering Chogen was waiting in her white Maruti Suzuki.
One of about 20 female taxi drivers in Thimphu, she was hoping for a well-heeled tourist who might want to visit the Tiger’s Nest, a spectacular fortress perched high on a crag near Paro town, about an hour away. The round trip costs 3,000 Ngultrum, equivalent to three days normal wages.
“I just love driving,” she said, fingering a pink cell phone that was perfectly colour-coordinated with her kira, the national dress for women in Bhutan, and the doll hanging from her rearview mirror.
Chogen has a daughter and a son, aged 15 and 14. She married at 16. In fact, she married her schoolteacher, who was nine years her elder. As the kids became teenagers, his salary alone was not enough to put food on the table.
So like many young mothers in the fledgling democracy, she got a job.
“I used to have a shop, selling baby clothes and baby shoes, but it wasn’t in a good location. So eight months ago I sold up and bought this car. Everybody who sees me points at the lady taxi driver. My family is proud of me.”
Wherever you look in Thimphu, you see women in roles that would have been unthinkable in years gone by.
Surrounded by towering mountains and lush pine forest, female archers practise the national sport in traditional dress, unleashing arrows from high-tech bows.
At a major intersection in the heart of the city, a woman police officer directs traffic from the shade of an ornately painted pavilion. Her white gloves in the sunlight move like dancing birds.
And at Thimpu’s biggest furniture factory, women operate band saws, grinders and routers. They sand, polish, paint, clamp. They cut upholstery and staple it to chairs and sofa frames.
Elsewhere, women continue to take part in more traditional and ancient roles. At a Buddhist nunnery on the edge of Thimphu, women with shaved heads and dark red robes attend evening prayers.
Beneath a giant revolving drum crammed with thousands of prayers, two women blow elongated trumpets. Others chant from scriptures, beat drums and twirl hand-held prayer wheels.
Meanwhile, on the terraced slopes around Thimphu, it’s time to bring in the rice harvest.
Working their way in rows, women use sickles to slice the stalks into sheaves, which they lay neatly in rows on the ground - a timeless tradition far older than Bhutan.
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