Gross National Hapiness starts with a smile
Bhutan, one of the last remaining Himalayan kingdoms but as of next year it will be kingdom no more as in the land of the thunder dragon democratic elections will be held. The irony is that the majority of the Bhutanese people do not want a democracy as they love their king very much. In this years mock elections the Bhutanese people were teached how to vote, not on names but on color and the vast majority voted for the yellow party, which coincidently is also the color of the royal family.
Although it’s distinctlively different than all the other Himalayan kingdoms it’s not as exotic as I had hoped for. Present day Bhutan is a far cry from the hermit kingdom it once was. Brand new Japanese SUV’s dominating the streets prove that the Bhutanese have embraced the modern age and that the economy is booming.
Many tourist tout this as the real Shangri-la and this is widely believed and supported by the Bhutanese government although they didn’t know of it’s existence before the NGO’s came to work in Bhutan. It is these NGO’s that had brought the purity to the justice, educational and governing systems, all the Bhutanese had to do was to follow the foundations laid by these NGO’s. Even their much hyped and uniquely Gross National Hapiness index was not thought up by the Bhutanese but by a foreign NGO…
L their index just dropped a point.
