What Namgay thinks about Halloween

Lately I've been going to book groups and talking about MARRIED TO BHUTAN. Last week someone wanted to know what Namgay thinks about Halloween. So I asked him and he said: "When we first got here I though it was kind of strange to decorate the houses with spiders and cobwebs and cut off hands. Now I'm used to it and I don't care." It wouldn't occur to  him to dress up, but he thinks the costumes are funny. Many of our American holiday customs are kind of hard to explain to someone who doesn't live here. Once he asked me about Easter. "Well," I said, "Easter is the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus. He was killed, and three days after that he came to life again and went to be with God, his father."

"Okay, well than who is the Easter Bunny? And where does he get the eggs?"

Namgay likes Thanksgiving because we have people over and we cook a lot of food and it's the holiday that's most like a puja or Losar, the Bhutanese new year. When we were first married I told him that for Christmas it was traditional for husbands to give their wives jewelry. He's on to me now, but he still keeps the tradition. Nice.

The Kindle version of Married to Bhutan is on sale for $2.51. The Nook version is $2.99. Great deals if you like ebooks.

The Royal Wedding Dispatch



This is the best. A description of the Royal Wedding from my dear friend Louise Dorji.

It was poignant when all the guests were assembled, a daunting array of royalty gathered in the courtyard and this slender young woman walked in alone, approached the dais where the king waited and prostrated before him and offered him a scarf. She was then conducted to a slightly lower dais beside him for the marchang ceremony. Again later, after the multi coloured scarf had been placed around her neck by the fourth king in the Shabdrung chapel, Ashi Jetsun Pema had to walk alone into the Kunray and to approach the king seated on his throne, prostrate again before him, and offer a precious golden container of symbolic elixir of life. The king came down from the throne and crowned his new bride with a traditional queen's crown of embroidered silk. This was the most charming moment: he adjusted the crown carefully, his fingers cupped her face tenderly as he raised her head to check the crown was well placed and then he broke into a lovely smile. Then seated on her own, lower throne, there was a lengthy process of the offerings of precious objects and prayers before the guests started giving their scarves and congratulations. Punakha was the perfect setting for a fairytale wedding. There is an expanse of green between the palace and a small lake next to the dzong. Their majesties strolled hand in hand among the guests, chatting and smiling with great and small. The press group were bowled over it seems. I was amused to see a reporter from the UK saying how charmed he was by everything and that he felt Bhutan had the best royal family in the world really. That coming from an Englishman where tradition and ceremony have been done rather well for hundreds of years was a compliment indeed.

When the Spirit Moves You

At the Southern Festival of Books in Nashville this Friday I'm signing copies of MARRIED TO BHUTAN, and I'm on a panel talking about spirituality. The title of the discussion is "Where the Spirit Moves You -- True Stories of Faith in Change." I don't usually talk about my own spirituality or comment on the spirituality of others. It's a private thing. Our spirituality manifests itself-- whatever our beliefs-- in our actions. Why talk so much about it when you can live it, so to speak?

The spiritual realm, whatever and wherever that is, is the only place where true change happens, in our lives and in the world.

I moved to Bhutan so many years ago because I was drawn to the spirituality of the people and place. It oozes out of the rocks. It's not so much religion as it is a way of life. I also like the way that the pace of life unfolds in a purposeful way. Living in Bhutan has taught me the most important lesson of my life and this is it:  Before we talk about "spiritual," and even before we pronounce ourselves spiritual beings, we have to get things right in our lives. We have to look at ourselves in the mirror and be honest with what we see. Not possible for some. Possible for others. But we know when we don't have things right in our lives, in our jobs, with our families, and especially in our motivations. 

                   The saddest are those not right in their lives/who are acting to make thing right  for others:/ they act only from the self - /and that self will never be right:/ no luck, no help, no wisdom. -- William Stafford

Southern Festival of Books: A Celebration of the Written Word

I'm so excited I'll be at the Southern Festival of Books in Nashville FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14th!


Come see me at 1:00 - 2:30 pm, Room 29 of the Legislative Plaza.  So many great authors will be here! The 23rd Annual Southern Festival of Books is presented by the Tennessee Humanities Council.

Book Review: Married to Bhutan by Linda Leaming

Book Review: Married to Bhutan by Linda Leaming