Photos & Text By : Toni Greaves

echen Zangmo is ten years old, although given her diminutive frame, you would be forgiven for thinking her no more than six. She is genteel and shy in nature. Her chocolate almond eyes carry an astonishing amount of depth. Her lacquered, raven hair, cropped in a traditional style, references the rich culture into which she was born. She is ten and I am thirty, and she tells me in her silence that I could learn a lot from her.

She walks beside me wearing her brightly-patterned Kira (a traditional full-length wrapped blanket-style dress) while holding my hand, because she has decided that I am her friend. She seems to magically appear wherever I am. She is sweet and polite and watches my every move, absorbing every available detail, and I am overcome by the sense that I am not the inquisitive one here, Dechen is. She studies me so closely that it appears my purpose on this visit to Bhutan is to be yet another instrument for her (and others) to learn about the western world. I feel flattered by that.

Bhutan, or Druk Yul (meaning 'land of the thunder dragon') as it is known in Dzongkha, the national language, is a small Buddhist kingdom roughly the size of Switzerland. It is nestled between the Assam plain of India and the crest of the Himalayan range in Tibet. The country has less than 700,000 people and, being a great protector of itself, has long avoided contact with foreigners. The airport was built as late as 1983, and television only showed its officious face around 1998. Bhutan has clutched its culture close to its heart, while trying to nuzzle toward Western benefit without the usual accompanying destruction of land, traditions and values, things that are held tenderly dear to its people.

Bhutans government sits on a double-edged sword of choice and consequence. A rapier balancing act between improving the lives of its citizens and carving into them the wounds of westernisation. They have witnessed the trampled circus that is now neighboring Nepal and seen the effects of its deforestation. They are forward-thinking enough to know that in order to become what others describe as "successful in this world," you often end up destroying that within you that is most precious. I feel this is a destruction they are not willing to make.