BHUTAN'S NATIONAL SPORTS

ArcheryAnyone who has been to Bhutan, watched movies or documentaries, or read about the country will know that archery (datse) is the national sport. An anachronistic sport that goes well with a culture where men wear generously cuffed, collared, and belted knee-length bloussomed coats as theirmain garment. Whether competing with traditional bamboo bows or the far more accurate American-made compound bows, men shoot at a small target 145 meters away at local archery ranges. Returning from a birding walk in Bumthang, Judy and I watched part of a match, but were more interested in the jests and personal antics of the players who make sport of all aspects of the game, including the abilities or disabilities of their opponents.

Hurling with the monksOn the same walk we passed three monks playing daygo, a game of hurling a heavy stone at a dug-out depression at the far end of the field. A variation of horse shoes or bocce with the goal of both placing your stone closest to the goal and also displacing your opponents' stones. Monks are prohibited from participating in archery. I wonder if this rule stems from the same sort of reasoning given by the medieval church, prohibiting churchmen from drawing blood. Militant arch-bishops and other religious notables still sat their saddles in the vanguard, cradling maces and rushing into battle to crush the heads of their enemies. They followed, if not the spirit of the Christian laws of brotherly love and turning the other cheek, then at least the letter of the law of drawing no blood.

Tsheten said the usual strategy is to get the heaviest stone one can throw, but also one that doesn't tire the arm before the end, at which time one's opponent with a smaller stone would have the advantage.

The all day darts game
The best sport show of all was a women's dart (khuru) tournament. Early on our second day birding, driving north from Punakha to the Jigme Dorji National Park, we stopped to experience a village darts game. Women from two villages were competing on a rough pitch about 20 meters long, formed from the lowest terrace of a recently harvested rice field. The teams of 8 or so players were made up of young and middle-aged women, done-up in their finest long skirts or dresses (kiras--more about them in another blog) topped off with traditional shining silk jackets, taegos, over a silky shirt, wonju to complete a most stunning and unsportif outfit.


The darts are about 12 inches (30 cm) long with a 3 inch heavy metal point, a bullet-shaped wood "bobbin" centered on the shaft and balanced with three feathers of thin plastic sheet. Thrown with gusto, the darts spin through the air and end up in a wide scatter around a two foot high target that had been pounded into the ground and angled from the players at about 50 degrees. The celebration after a hit brings the winner and her fellow players into a circle in the middle of the field where they perform a traditional song and dance accompanied with some superior laughter and a bit of showing off at the expense of the opposing team.


Late in the afternoon on our way back to Punakha, still hunting for the white-belly heron, the women's game was in full swing, encouraged now by a much larger audience of rooting fans and boisterous commentators, fueled by a day of festivities.