Bhutan - Fortresses

Each valley in Bhutan had a fortress. Bhutan has only been a unified nation for about 100 years. 100 years ago the warlords that ruled each valley met up battled each other to the death, and the winner became the king of Bhutan. There have been 6 kings, all of the same lineage. The current king is 29 and unmarried. His father gave him the crown in 2008. The fortresses are where the government does its business, and also where the monks live. Half of each fortress is administrative, and half is religious. You aren't allowed in the administrative half, and you cant take pictures in much of the religious half. But they are pretty amazing.




My guide talked for over an hour at this painting of the wheel of life, explaining in amazing detail how the Buddhist faith believes souls pass between the six realms. Really interesting stuff. Heaven is actually not as good as the human world, as you have to go to hell after you go to heaven. The goal of the whole game is to become enlightened and break out of the wheel like Buddha did. Sounds too hard. I'm shooting for either another run at the human world, or the ghost world, it sounded pretty cool.