I have always dreamed of celebrating my birthday outside of the country. In my 39 years i have spent it in a small house in the squatter's area in Caloocan or in my childhood home in a southern booming rural city where my wonder years were spent mostly or back again in the various restaurants or coffee shops or even hospital wards during my different adventures as a growing adult in the main capital city.
It was my childhood fantasy to reach the Himalayas. What country can best exemplify the fictional place by James Hilton from the 1933 novel, the Lost Horizon labeled as the last Shangri-la but the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.
Sandwiched between two most populous countries in the world, north by the Tibetan borders of China and south by the mountainous regions of India, Bhutan has remained hidden from the modern world by choice.
Its my choice to spend my 40th birthday in this wonderful, bewitching, grandiose country which is less than half the size of the southern island in the Philippines but with lesser population than the city of Z. And i have never regretted it ever since.
It was the simplicity, and the hospitality of the people which makes this country one of the best places in the world to live in. Their character was shaped probably by their philosophy of Gross National Happiness being better than gross national product. What would be a simple dinner among the tourist agency's guests (2 German couples plus two Filipino adults in their early forties), turned out to be a surprise chocolate birthday cake and a birthday greetings from our host. I didn't mention anything about my birthday. But Deki the young daughter of Dorji must have seen my passport when i was applying for our visas.
We were offered a Bhutanese hospitality, the experience of a typical Bhutan home, spicy Bhutanese food in the buffet table consisting of pork, chicken and fish cooked the traditional way.
The German couples in their sixties were also delightful dinner companions.
This is definitely one of my unforgettable experiences, even away from my loving family.
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