Quarantined: Days 3 – 7

Nothing exciting is happening in quarantine! All in all, we are spending our time pretty leisurely -mostly reading, writing, watching news on television or some interesting YouTube programmes.

Last night I was woken up at about 1 AM by a very loud noise from the next door. This guest was speaking on her phone and I could even hear the person on the other side talking. She would speak very loud (almost shout), make funny exclamations, laugh aloud and sometimes even scold the person on the other side. This process went on for over an hour. In the morning I had to lodge a complaint to the hotel management and make sure it is not repeated next day to spoil my sleep. It seems the information got conveyed effectively as the event was not repeated again.

I was suffering from severe toothache from day 2. I hoped it would go away but was only aggravating. On the 4^th day, I called Dr Gyan and asked for advice. He prescribed antibiotics and some strong anti-inflammatory medicines. I forwarded the requirements to the hotel staff, a Dessup volunteer serving through the whatsapp connection. She was kind enough to forward it to a hospital staff who in turn delivered the medicines in the afternoon. What an incredible service! This perhaps happens only in Bhutan.

Even with medicine, the pain was coming back frequently until Day 6 and less frequently from Day 7, but did not go way completely. It would start at a particular point between upper right molars but would spread throughout the jaws and gums, neck and head. I have to somehow sustain the pain until I am out of the quarantine and is able to see a dentist.

In between there were few online meetings and discussions with the management team of the college, almost every day. Besides these official engagements, I still have enough time to read. I hope to read some more books in next one week that we have here.

Food is reasonably good in the hotel, even though there is some monotony in the menu. The volunteers make a big bang on the door after dropping the food on a table kept next to the door. They disappear from your sight immediately. Door is closed right away and permanently. Food comes in small aluminum foil packs. Breakfast at around 8 AM includes fried rice and occasional puri and sabji with tea in tiny paper cups every time. Lunch at around 1 PM includes rice (invariably) with dal, vegetable curry and occasionally some non-veg item. At 4 PM you get your tea in small-sized cups along with some biscuits and occasionally some fries. The supper is at around 8.30 PM and is not very different from the lunches. We are habitually fond of milk tea and insist that we get some fresh cow milk in our tea and hopefully make curd for meals. The dairy shop in front receives and sells milk to people who keep dropping in throughout the day. We have managed to get at least 3 times a bottle of milk each through a contact in the pharmacy. This gentleman has been kind to add a bottle of fresh milk with our purchase from his shop and drop at the hotel counter for delivery to our door table. So we continue enjoying milk tea and continue making curd as a supplement tastemaker in our meals. Thanks to the curd that we brought from home which is serving as a starter.

Amidst reading writing and some official correspondence with the workplace, we do enjoy the sun that finds its entry from three panel window into the hotel room, which is luckily facing east. We do brisk walks across the room, do some stretching and yoga poses to give ourselves some exercise. We also watch people on the street, cars passing by and cleaners cleaning the already quite clean road.  Once a while the noise through a mike from across the border breaks the silence and reminds about a very different mood out there. Prayers or spiritual hymns, Bollywood songs or some political speeches are overheard frequently assuring everyone that life is moving on as usual in spite of 3^rd or 4^th wave of corona surge in our neighbor's great land!

Here in the hotel, everyday tests results are announced by the staff through the whatsapp group and fortunately until this time all the ones tested from this hotel have shown negative results.  On the 7^th day we gave our test to two smart ladies who appeared at the door in their full PPE. Also everyday few people are seen leaving the hotel on completing their quarantine and heading for some other destinations. These travels are very well coordinated and organized by the Task Force staff and Dessup volunteer staff. This is amazing how we have become very efficient in managing affairs in these times of dire need. In spite of all these, virus is making its way into the communities. Country saw a surge in cases with one more death reported recently. Phuntsholing is seen leading on the country’s datasheet. Unfortunately one more patient with kidney troubles succumbed to COVID infection taking the national death toll to four. We hope and pray that this is the last tragedy and the last wave of pandemic.

Day 2 - Quarantined

 From Central Hotel Phuntsholing, January 24, 2022

This loss was deeply felt. We had a plan to interview Madam CK this winter and to write some kind of biography about her, a thought that came too late. Later in the day we were connected to a live forecast of the funeral by Madhu, Madam’s grandniece which was also exclusively shared for her nephews and niece in Kathmandu and Darjeeling. Included in this close virtual group. This has to pass and life has to move on – that is the key lesson that we have always learned from such incidences.

In the evening, Tulasa started reading a book by Dr Byanjana Sharma (Bhattarai), Gham Astayeko hoina (The Sun is not Set) and occasionally would read out lines from the book, which was a memoir of a mother who demised back home in Nepal when the author, the youngest daughter, was a student in Australia and was unable to join the last rites. Author had a daily diary written expressing her feelings for her mother and how finally this helped her come out of this melancholy. She has described a theory developed by psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross which suggests that we go through five distinct stages of grief after the loss of a loved one: Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance (https://www.everydayhealth.com/emotional-health/5-stages-dealing-with-grief-sorrow/). This is a very practical lesson for everyone since none is spared from such tragedies at some point in time in our lives.

Well, Madam CK was not biological mother of Tulasa and this may be seen by some as a bit of over-reaction. But often your emotional bonds with a person defines your relationship with the person and not only a family connection or a blood relation. The reality is that we are now in a quarantine and have no other option but to mourn from here as we can’t visit the family even though it is just about two hours drive from here.

Just a day before on the 22^nd January, one of the greatest Buddhist Zen master and peace activist, Thich Nhat Hanh had died at the age of 95 in Vietnam. Tulasa had enjoyed reading his “Old Path White Clouds” some years ago. She would keep mentioning about the practical and universal ideas about life, living and death detailed out in the book which is a recount of the life and teachings of Gautama Buddha over the course of eighty years. The book speaks through the eyes of Svasti, the buffalo boy who provided kusa grass for the Buddha's enlightenment cushion, and the Buddha himself. This popular book was given to Tulasa by a young man Yeshi Dorji who incidentally died suddenly before she could even return the book to him. The book remains with us even now.

Two days later on 25 January, Dodrupchen Rinpoche, one of the most prominent contemporary masters in the Nyingma and Dzogchen traditions of Tibetan Buddhism, passed into parinirvana. No one including these spiritual personalities who have worked to bring world peace and taught us about the cycles of birth and death can escape death. Some random statistics says that nearly 163,000 people die every day which is about 114 per minute and almost 2 per second!! So what is so frightening or sorrowful about death? We also know that the world birth rate is almost the double the death rate. That is why the global population is always on the rise. Life has to go on is the key answer to all the sad feelings!

Second day of quarantine for us here in Phuntsholing is pretty pleasant. It is sunny and seems warm outside. The streets are empty except for some pigeons flying freely around. Occasionally you see some stray dogs running aimlessly and chasing each other. On the other side of the road there is a row of 3-4 story buildings mostly looking brown from outside. These are beaten hard by summer heat and heavy downpour this place is known to receive. An old Ama is seen walking to and fro a narrow and short verandah with her prayer beads on her hands. From one end of her verandah she will be able to see the Lhakhang just about 50 meters away inside the park. She would look up at the temple with folded hands once a while. On the next building I see a middle-aged man making swift strolls within his short porch for over an hour. Few people are seen coming out on the street masked up with ‘movement pass’ on their hands and small bags with essential stuff.

People are mostly out to get some basic supplies from few stores that are open at this time. There are just two shops open on this side of the road from what is visible from my windows – a medical shop and a dairy. People enter into these and get some stuff and return. These stores seem to be doing some brisk business during the lockdown.

COVID and Quarantine – Day 1

    After confinement of nearly two years in Thimphu, this winter vacation we decided to travel south and beyond. Upon getting a permission from the Department of Immigration to travel out (a requirement in Covid time) of the country, we packed our luggage, bid goodbye to our younger son, Suraj, who decided to stay back and work on his film, and drove enthusiastically towards Phuntsholing. Passing through new transit arrangements at Sorchen, briefly stopped in Phuntsholing and drove straight to Mechetar (Khandothang). After a couple of days, had a pleasant drive further to Dorokha and made some visits, and returned to Samtse for few more days of warmth and then to the exit point in Phuntsholing. The Omicron was on rise globally, few cases were suspected to be emerging in Bhutan but determined that we will travel out, we left the gate with some amount of hesitation. Life out there seem as normal as before and soon we forgot about the pandemic and spent our times with the near and dear ones that we had been missing for too long!

    After nearly two weeks, equally nervous we reported at the Bhutan border gate only to be welcomed back with all the protocols in place. Within an hour we were in a quarantine facility – Central Hotel in the heart of the town. There were some preconceived worries about the hotel, so I tried calling out some good friends for their help in securing a reasonably good hotel. We were advised that the hotels are packed due to the recent surge and there would be no choice of hotels. In his briefings, before getting into the hotel, the young Dessup mentioned that it will be a 14-days quarantine (unless we test positive when tested half way through) and the first night would not be counted. As we were settling down and got connected to the hotel wifi, the first news received was a very tragic one. We had just lost a veteran educator of the country and the first woman graduate of Bhutan, Ms CK Gurung in Samtse. Tulsa had been a huge beneficiary of Madam Gurung since her primary school days. Madam was not just her teacher and a mentor, but a guardian and a Godmother with whom she had stayed for couple of years until she became a teacher. Ever since Tulsa (called Tulsi by the family) remained a part of the family and particularly close with Madam. This loss was very personal for us and it was very hard for Tulasa.

    As the news got spread across the country and beyond, there were a lot of condolences and RIPs pouring in the social media of which the most comprehensive was the one from our distinguished educator and the former Education Minister Lyonpo TS Powdyel.  I take this honour and also liberty to quote and re-post his post as it is:  

“The Noblest of the Sector Noble... no more...

 It is difficult to believe that this life larger than life is no more. Just a few days back when I contacted the family, I was given to understand that our beloved Madam Gurung was getting better even though still very frail and bed-ridden.

 One of our brightest stars in the Sherig firmament dimmed into her heavenly abode at eighty-seven yesterday even as the day was drawing to a close at Gurung Basti in Samtse.

 Miss CK Gurung, as the outstanding life-time educator was well-known, symbolised the noblest virtues of the Noble Sector and inspired a whole generation of educators by her exemplary dedication, edifying grace and rare commitment to the highest ideals befitting the mission called Teaching.

 Even as a primary school student in my village, I used to hear my elder brother speak in glowing terms about his amazing teacher and mentor at the erstwhile Samchi Lower Secondary School and then as his trainer at the then Teacher Training Institute (TTI) where Miss Gurung was one of the only two Bhutanese lecturers when the first teacher education facility started in the country in May 1968. Lopon Samten Wangchuk moved on to pursue his spiritual calling.

 When I came to Samtse to continue my studies, I would often obtain fleeting glimpses of the highly revered Miss Gurung as she followed her trainees in her quintessential elegance and awe-striking presence. Years later, when I myself joined what had then become the National Institute of Education (NIE), of which Miss Gurung had become the first Bhutanese Principal, a fresh and excited young lecturer, just returned from my training, immediately found a true idol and mentor.

 The first batch of our B. Ed graduates passed out in 1986 under the oversight of Miss Gurung and her highly motivated team. Samtse and Paro Colleges of Education have over the decades done a most commendable job of preparing the nation’s vital teaching force and of strengthening the country’s educational destiny.

 As the first Bhutanese woman graduate, having attended excellent schools and well-known institutions including in Edinburg, Scotland, and with work-experience in Singapore, Hong Kong, the British Army School in Malaya, Miss Gurung was well-travelled and led many Bhutanese delegations to important events and assignments abroad.

 With all these distinctions, Miss Gurung still chose to continue dedicating her life and work to the cultivation of her first love – Education – when she could have selected any department in the government then and become what people would call ‘a big shot’. And, that made all the difference. She became ‘a bigger shot’ as an educator and raised hundreds of dedicated leaders who have made a difference in their own right.

 There was something uniquely characteristic about Miss Gurung. Despite being a scion of a well-known family, there was no trace of pride or arrogance in her. Though a spinster, Miss Gurung was a mother-figure to all and her benign warmth radiated everywhere even as she lived out and expected the highest professional and personal standards in those in her charge.

 Her self-effacing demeanour, innate good cheer, infinite goodwill and respect towards all, her positive outlook, and her almost saintly disposition earned Miss Gurung rare reverence from all whose lives she touched in her own endearing ways.

 Soft-spoken and approachable but armed with a no-nonsense confidence, Miss Gurung lived by example and naturally inspired numerous batches of young men and women who took it upon themselves to take on the most difficult, yet the most important, mission in the world – Teaching. And that generation of Miss Gurung’s students has done the nation proud in good measure.

 A veritable institution in her own right, Madam Chandra Kala Gurung was a recipient of coveted awards and singular commendations for her outstanding contribution to the advancement of education in the country. The Ministry of Education had the privilege of acknowledging Miss Gurung’s life-long service to the education sector in its own humble way during the celebration of Sherig Century during 2012-2013.

 At a time like today when education and educators all around the world are under the scanner for different reasons, it was our good fortune that we had the likes of Miss Gurung to look up to and do our part in this vital endeavour called nation-building.

 On a more personal level, it is a regret that I wasn’t able to visit and pay my respects to my beloved mentor, the dreaded virus having come in the way. But it was enough to know that Madam Gurung was there... With her gone now, like so many of my other venerable elders, there is a palpable void that will not be easy to fill.

 May the noble soul of our beloved mentor rest in peace in the loving company of her virtuous ancestors in heaven...

 And, may the Almighty grant the bereaved family courage to overcome this painful loss...

The legend is gone, but the legacy lives on...”

 I thank Lyonpo Powdyel for his succinct yet a complete account of the life of Madam Gurung and also pay our deep respect and homage to the departed soul.