Beyond the Sky and the Earth: A Journey into Bhutan
Jamie Zeppa made a life-altering decision at the age of 24 when she left an academic career to join a two-year teaching programme for young Canadians in Bhutan. Bhutan is a notoriously difficult country to visit as a tourist, and the opportunity to live there was one Jamie could not ignore - despite apprehension about leaving her boyfriend and family behind. The first months were nightmarish and Jamie existed on a meagre diet of crackers and boiled water for fear of catching tape worm or worse. The unpronouncable language, bizarre local customs and basic living conditions all conspired to make her miserably home-sick but the young chidren she was supposedly teaching eventually took her in hand and taught her to cook on an antiquated gas stove: their grateful families gave her fresh fruit and vegetables and Jamie finally discovered that she was surrounded by friends in a beautiful location. Jamie Zeppa has written a book about the difficulties of living within an alien culture, far away from the security of "home". She tells, with humour, of the everyday prejudices she was forced to overcome as a white woman abroad and writes with genuine awe about the beauty of Bhutan.Her assessmeProduct Details
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
As a teacher of English literature, Jamie Zeppa would understand how the story of her journey into Bhutan could be fit into the convenient box of "coming-of-age romance," a romance with a landscape, a people, a religion, and a dark, irresistible student. An innocent, young Catholic woman from a Canadian mining town who had "never been anywhere," Zeppa signed up for a two-year stint teaching in a remote corner of the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan. Despite the initial shock of material privation and such minor inconveniences as giardia, boils, and leeches, Zeppa felt herself growing into the vast spaces of simplicity that opened up beyond the clutter of modern life. Alongside her burgeoning enchantment, a parallel realization that all was not right in Shangri-La arose, especially after her transfer to a college campus charged with the politics of ethnic division. Still she maintained her center by devouring the library's Buddhist tracts and persevering in an increasingly fruitful meditation practice. When the time came for her to leave, she had undergone a personal transformation and found herself caught between two worlds that were incompatible and mutually incomprehensible. Zeppa's candid, witty account is a spiritual memoir, a travel diary, and, more than anything, a romance that retraces the vicissitudes of ineluctable passion. --Brian Bruya
From Publishers Weekly
Zeppa's story is nearly an inversion of the ancient Buddhist tale of Siddhartha (in which a prince ventures from the paradise of his father's palace only to find the suffering and decay that he never knew existed) in that the author, at the age of 22, abruptly leaves a stale life in Canada to become a volunteer teacher in the remote and largely undisturbed Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan. Cloaked in the airy mountains between India and China, Bhutan initially frustrates but eventually captivates Zeppa with its rudimentary lifestyle that forces her to question former values and plans for the future. Though the story line would seem to open itself to cloying romanticization, Zeppa's telling of her clumsy attempts to adapt rings with sincerity and inspires sympathy. She thinks to herself upon visiting a local house: "In one shadowy corner, there is a skinny chicken. I blink several times but it does not vanish. Is it a pet? Is it dinner?" Zeppa's lucid descriptions of the craggy terrain and honest respect for the daily struggles of the natives bring the tiny land to life in a way that is reverent but real. Though she tries to avoid what a friend terms "that Shangri-La-Di-Da business" and grapples with the poverty, sexism and political squabbles in Bhutan that bother her, there is little doubt that she sees the place in a largely positive light and is tempted to remain. In the end, Zeppa's is a lively tale of her earnest efforts to reconcile what she has learned with what she has known. (June)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Canadian Zeppa turned away from a secure future "to do something in the real world." When the opportunity came to teach in the remote Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan, Zeppa accepted with alacrity over the protests of her xenophobic grandfather and the lukewarm approval of her fianc?. At 22, Zeppa was unprepared for the rigors of life in the Third World. Upon arrival at her assigned junior high school in the tiny tropical village of Pema Gatshel, she was dismayed by the primitive living quarters and her own inadequacies as a teacher. But her overwhelming culture shock was eased by the charm of the Bhutanese and the beauty of the landscape. Leaving her first assignment with reluctance, Zeppa was transferred to a position at a college in the mountain town of Kanglung, became a Buddhist, and plunged into a relationship with one of her students. Her story reads like a good novel; even her youthful na?vet? has charm. Zeppa's deep affection for her adopted home makes this a special book. Highly recommended.AJanet N. Ross, Washoe Cty. Lib. Sys., Sparks, NV
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Customer Reviews
A must read journey about beauty in a remote area in the world!
I chose this book, as I had no knowledge of this country.
My interest of international studies evolves around Tibet, India and Nepal. Until Jamie Zeppa wrote about her journey into Bhutan, I felt a piece of that region was excluded from my area of interest.
I was expecting this book to be a sociological one, but the author's journey and the writing of it far exceeded that conclusion...to my personal benefit!
The author crossed this remote, mountainous region and gave us a glimps of it's beautiful land and it's beautiful people.
Clearly, Tibet, India and Nepal have had their influence on this country, even though Bhutan is tucked away within it's mountainous terrain. But many settlers of these countries remain there, as their languages, foods, and cultures seem to be all incorporated, in their regions.
What was so overwhelmingly interesting about this story is that I could identify with the author. She basically picked a remote region of the world to move to, and offered her skills as an English teacher.
As the author's first journey into Bhutan came to be an unsure one(due to getting to her destination), it was
visibly clear that passage of transportation would be impossible at times, by barriers created from the monsoons and the winter months. Yet for the people of Bhutan, there is an acceptance in living with inconveience. I think that their acceptability has everything has to do with their religion...Tibetan Buddhism.
Thus, a journey in and out of the country takes time and effort; but, time is not of the essence to these people. They don't need to hurry and scurry in their lifestyles. They are quite satisfied and proud with what they have.
Buddhists are carefree and mindful people. They are taught to never intentionally harm other sentiment beings...an important key to their religion. More of this religion is explained in the book.
It was great reading about a person in our Western Hemisphere, going into this remote country, and finding so much beauty. In fact, she returns to Bhutan more times than I could physically imagine.
The simplicity and the repertoire of this remote country entices me to visit this land of splendor some day in my life. But I can not physically do so; therefore, I am hoping that maybe others of you who read this book will want to travel there and update Bhutan to us by publishing your own journey, as well.
This book is a story of survival and inconveience in the beginning, but that is well overcome before long, because the importance of life there can change a person, as author Jamie Zeppa illustrates it does on her journey.
So, thank you, Jamie Zeppa! You brought me into a beautiful region that is rarely written about, particularly on a personal level! The people, the land and the religion are so worth your study.
Please know this is one of the most interesting books that I have ever read!
Fabulous travel philosophy
This book should be a must-read for anyone planning to work outside their own culture. Its treatment of culture shock and adjustment is so very well done.
The author is a very good writer and has a fabulous story to tell, full of interesting characters, amazing places, politically based tension and conflicting emotions as she balances her two worlds and tries to find her place between them. This is a thoroughly enjoyable book, worth a place in any library.
Memoir of a Canadian teacher's experience in Bhutan
Memoir of a Canadian Teacher in Bhutan
Jamie Zeppa, an English teacher from Canada, in 1999 wrote of her life experience in Bhutan from 1989 to 1992. With the World University Service of Canada (WUSC) financed overseas education program in Bhutan, the slightly over 20 year old teacher changed her whole life to take a chance at living in a completely different part of the world. Practically without knowledge of the culture she was going to impact and loads of useless baggage she transferred to this tiny Himalayan kingdom convinced of reaching the Shangrila. The cultural shock of the small village posting, the solitude, the breathtaking but initially frightening environment, the incapacity of connecting to such a different population almost drove her crazy at the beginning. But due to her strong ego and a particularly ironic and self-mocking attitude she slowly learns to cope and understands the life philosophy of these simple but practical people. "Anyone can live anywhere" she wisely concludes. The beauty of the landscape and the joy de vivre of her students conquers her heart and starts a transformation that not only converts her to Buddhism but leads her to accept a new challenge in a superior school in a bigger city.
The college students and colleagues contribute to her re-evaluation of her Western cultural heritage and the deeper comprehension of the Eastern way of life and open her vision of the true nature of Bhutanese culture and difficult political situation. With magisterial delicate tones Zeppa describes the political and ethnological undertones of the Bhutanese youth and the gender discrimination of women.
Unexpectedly she also falls in love with one of her students and bravely decides to make a life commitment to her new found values.
This diary/novel is well written, funny, full of quaint and memorable episodes and a pleasure to read. It conveys all the puzzlement of cultural shocks in the pre-globalization era and shows how the concept of "sustainable economy" was already evident at the beginning of the 1990's. The book contains a plethora of useful information to understand modern Bhutan.
The "spirit of place" is conveyed with grace, the personal experiences gain an universal value and it is possible to identify with the Author.
If you like these types of memoirs I suggest reading Louisa Waugh's "Hearing Birds Fly", a similar experience of a British teacher in Mongolia.
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