Happy Mother's Day

Dear Mom,

Thank you for teaching us to climb mountains.  

Happy Mother's day to everyone. 

We love you mom.

Eden, Hope, Trey (and Ted).

The video is of the mountain right next to our apartment in Thimphu high above the painted Buddhas that have appeared before in some of our posts.   You can make out the building we stayed in early in the footage, but then quickly get moved up the mountainside up to the top where this footage was taken.  At this vantage point, we are at about 8,500 feet above sea level.  It was a beautiful day in Bhutan taken a couple of weeks ago.   

Thank you and take care.  

First Day of School

A couple of weeks ago, we told you that we had chosen the Early Learning Center for Hope and Trey.  Eden is also working at ELC as an intern with three other college-aged alumni of the Early Learning Center.  They help around the school and even assist or teach some classes (like Trey's class in the afternoon for Reading).

Hope & Trey's First Day of School Picture: 

 

Eden with one of her fellow interns, Anu:

 

 

On a Bhutan map, you will find ELC along Thongsei Lam and, of course, next to 3 Water Tanks. 

The first day brought it's share of nervousness, new lunch pails and traditional uniforms. 

Girls wear a 'kira', pronounced "keer' a"

Boys wear a 'gho', pronounced "go"

There was also a French movie crew there for the first day taking footage for a documentary about four unique teaching environments in the world (ELC is to be the Asian example).  You will see the crew photo bombing my pictures in several spots. 

Several pictures from the day. 
This is Trey's room:

There are two westerners at the school.  Both of them are characters.  Ivor played drums in a punk rock band in his younger days.  He now is married to a UN diplomat, has two children and is in charge of developing the ELC advocated learning process called DFC (Design For Change). This is a big deal in school for the students. 

'Lizzy' is from Canada (note the Canadian hand motion for 'its cold').  Lizzie is here for the entire school year teaching English to grades 3-5.  In her first day, she asked the third grade class what the national animal is for Canada.  She heard lion, gorilla and zebra before Trey answered 'moose'.  Even though the correct answer is beaver, I believe the Canadian Parliament is now considering changing it to gorilla. 

Pictures of the welcoming ceremonies are below: 

 

Trey lines up with the other third graders. 

Eden, along with all of the other staff, introduces herself to the students. 

Madame Deki is the founder and principal of ELC.  We believe that she is a graduate of Columbia University and was a varsity member of the archery team in her college days. 

Ted here:  Many of you know I was born in Cleveland, Ohio.  I asked this older brother of a current student at ELC if I could take his picture.  He was somewhat surprised I wanted the back side of his head.  The front of his t-shirt read, "Cleveland Indians - 2003, 2005, 2009, and 2013 National League Champions!!!".  The Indians are known as an American baseball dynasty here. 

 

Snack time has rules.  Monday is fruits, Tuesday is salad , Wednesday is celebrated because package foods like Oreo, chips and juice boxes, Gatorade is allowed, Thursday is homemade food day, and  Friday is traditional Bhutanese food day. With snack time being this complicated, we opted for the hot lunch program to allow us to focus on following the snack rules as we get ready in the morning.

This picture is significant because Eden did the artwork on the pail as part of her interning. 

 



With the opening ceremonies over, it was off to class. 

Trey's room is an outbuilding of the main building.  The inside is shown below.

Bhutan advocates Gross National Happiness.  As a result, the acronym is worked into many aspects of ELC. 

Note the bottom left hand corner.  Mean words are especially hurtful to parents.  



ELC has an excellent rural-urban school exchange program. 

Hope on her way to class.  The 6th grade classrooms are in the upstairs of the main building.  

Hope here:  To my 5th grade class (and my teacher back home, Mrs. Ley).  To answer your first question, the marathon had a 16 year-old age limit for the runners, but I really wanted to run also.  We don't know how the 11 year old from Bhutan got to run (in the newscast) but I would have liked to run, too. 

School is different in a good way at ELC. Even though  St. Jude is ahead in most academics than my school here, ELC is stronger in environmental areas and I am learning a lot about Bhutan and their culture. Besides from math, science, etc., we do lots of reusing, reducing and recycling at ELC.   Every day is 5 different periods like 6-8th graders at St. Jude.  Every day has Science, Math, English, Dzongkha(the native language of this part of Bhutan. look below) and Social Studies but mixed up in different order every day.  Wednesday is 'specials' day with art, library, gym and music classes.  We get to wear gym clothes (they call it a 'track suit') all day on Wednesdays.  We also go to school on Saturdays for a short time to learn more about nature, crafts and work on earning money for the Bhutan Kidney Foundation (our ELC adopted charity). This past Saturday we had school elections and I ran for the Sports Coordinator.  We will find out the results next week.

During the week I learned how to count to 10 in Dzongkha. Here is how it goes(I am writing how to pronounce it not spell it):

one = chee

two = nee

three = soon

four = jee

five = gnah

six = doo

seven = din

eight = gee

nine = gho

ten = jickam 

For candy, I really like 'Kinder Joys'.  It is kind of like an Easter egg full of chocolate with a prize inside.  The egg has a little spoon and the prizes are always fun.  The pop comes in tiny plastic bottles and chips come in bags pressurized with air to keep the chips from crumbling. 

It took a long time, but we found the Catholic Church here in Thimphu.  It is a small 20' x 20' one-room building that used to be a garden shed for the nearby office building.  Inside, it has a simple cross with Jesus and two statues of Mary and the stations of the cross on he walls.  There were about 25 people there for services, but no priest.  They prayed, sang songs and read the readings and gospel and a homily.  They translated parts for us (they said parts of the mass in Nepali and parts in English) and they were very friendly.  A priest will be traveling from India to be with this small church during Holy Week. 

Thank you and see you soon!

The 5th grade classrooms are shown below. 

The fourth grade classroom. 

As most everywhere in Thimphu, there is a dog.  This one has puppies under the wood pile in the back. 

I

Ted again:  I recall making a homemade basketball goal in college on Spring Break when stuck in Georgia with car trouble.  ELC also has a similar one that gets plenty of use during recess and after school.  Along with archery and soccer, basketball seems to be the next most popular sport in Bhutan. 

Trey's room again with the mountains (we continue to be surrounded). 

This last series of Trey shows lunch time preparations.  Everyone must wash their hands.  Trey patiently waits his turn, learning what to do along the way. 

Trey, Hope and Eden are doing well at ELC. 

The Half Marathon

So, Eden and I (Ted) thought it would be a great idea to run (on purpose) for more than 13 miles in the Himalayan mountains. 

Yes, we don't have a TV. 

This was the first ever Bhutan International Marathon.  They have an excellent web site with information and results but more importantly - lots of additional pictures in the Photos section.  There were more than 20 countries represented and it was presented by the Bhutan Olympic Committee.   

www.bhutaninternationalmarathon.com

There was also a nice news article with video from the Bhutan Broadcast Service on the event at:

www.bbs.bt/news/?p=37569

We trained.  That might be better described as me doing my best to catch up with Eden on back and forth portions of flat (very rare) Thimphu.  This was more like the shuttle race from grade school for me, over and over and over again.  Nevertheless, Eden was ready and I was pondering small, achievable goals in my head and rationalizing with, "no one will possibly know me" and I become the story teller once it is over.  I was planning to fight off lions (or more likely tigers), Yeti, save a struggling otter and discover better ways for cultivating rice during my race.  It was to be a great run.

Race day.  This being our first marathon event, we were not aware of what was normal.  We woke up at 5am and proceeded to the front of the hotel in complete darkness.  Three of our friends also joined us so we were all standing in the dark.  Deciding we were being stood up by our arranged taxi driver, we all hitched a ride with a French couple who had a van.  I am sure this happens at the Chicago, New York and Boston marathons also.

When we arrived at the parking lot, we were loaded up into school busses to ride to the start line.  Several busses for the Half-marathon; several for the Marathon.  Bus drivers are the kings of the road in Bhutan.  Size matters.  As we rumbled along the winding, no railing, shear cliff roads the ex-pat in front of Eden and I remarked, "I have never traveled this fast in Bhutan before".  Think rocket sled on wheels.  We soon blasted right by our start line with all of us thinking the bus driver was merely looking for a place to turn around and park.  He was not.  It was Piet (the same Piet who has developed trails, wrote a book, finds tigers in the mountains, and who runs also.  More on him later.) who finally overcame the 'the emperor has no clothes' and actually spoke to the bus driver.  He was following the bus in front of him.  We turned back. 

The start line was very well organized - because the Prince of Bhutan was in attendance.  He is the ambassador of sorts for the Bhutan Olympic Committee.  Tea and rice were served. 



Piet is in the green shirt on the far right side.  Eden and I are a couple of rows behind him at the start. 

This was a better picture of the two of us at the start. 

Below you can see Eden and her florescent green Cardegals shirt, off in a flash. 



I was a bit more deliberate and I had Hope's camera with me to capture the moments.  Our race route crossed the rivers in the area several times, so bridges were an attraction. 

I was soon passed by most everyone.

Then I was passed by men on horseback. 



I had the last laugh because they missed the course markings (a pink strip of ribbon every quarter mile or so) and they crossed the river and were not seen at the finish. 



A man on a ridge raced me down to the road (with his load of timber on his back) and motioned for me to hurry up.

 Several bridges on the route.

As Amy mentioned, this suspension bridge below was about 300 yards long and 30 feet off the water, the highlight of the run.  It is the longest suspension bridge in Bhutan. 

 More bridges.

 

The race organizers have fun with you at the end.  The runners in front of you are visible on the ridge on the other side going the other way toward the finish.  You watch every turn in front of you looking for the final bridge back across.   A small pink shirt in the middle is a fellow HVO runner in the Master division. 

As I came around the final turn, Eden came back to run the last 100 yards or so with me.  The finish line is a replica of what the current king and queen were married under a couple of years ago.  I received a nice white scarf. 

The scarf is quite a souvenir.

Eden finished in the top 25 of all females in the Open division, a great first half marathon.  The results show a slightly lower finish for me.  Technically, I think they call it, "Last man to actually finish the half marathon".  I will take it.  I will note that I beat every single marathon runner that day - after they spotted me 1 hour and an additional 13 miles at the start.   

And yes, Piet finished in 1 hour 26 minutes as the first male Master division and 11th overall behind 10 members of the Bhutan armed forces.  His legend lives on. The French couple who we hitched a ride with did well also.  The French woman finished first in her Masters division.      

Again, the marathon website has plenty of cool pictures of Bhutan and runners (two more of me, one of Eden).  Take a look and see more of Bhutan.