• by Yasmin Lee Arpon (thimpu)
• Tuesday, October 19, 2010
• Inter Press Service

An introduction in Bhutan these days is usually accompanied by 'I'm on Facebook!' Anjali Bista, 11, is no exception.

The outgoing Bista has made 71 friends on the social networking site. While that number pales in comparison with the hundreds or even thousands that other Facebook users have, consider this: she has not met more than half of them in person.

But one or two have visited her with gifts when they came to this Himalayan country, located between China and India, which had been isolated for centuries and today tries to manage its interactions with the outside world, including through limits on the entry of foreign tourists.

But the trickle of visitors coming into the ‘Land of the Thunder Dragon’ also reflects how better communication, including Internet, is slowly opening Bhutan up to the world.

There are more than 32,000 users of the social networking site in Bhutan, according to estimates by Candytech, which specialises in marketing and developing applications for Facebook. That number is only almost 5 percent of Bhutan’s nearly 700,000 people, but 65 percent of its online population of 50,000.

The mostly mountainous terrain of landlocked Bhutan has made it difficult for the government to install telecommunication systems in rural areas. Most people live in the central highlands, which can only be accessed through rough roads or narrow trekking paths.

But the government and private sector are slowly building networks even in the most remote places, bridging the distance between the kingdom and the world outside.

Kezang, 23, who in October started a government course on business entrepreneurship skills development, plans to open a Facebook account soon. 'Everyone's on Facebook,' she smiles.

If the government approves her business proposal at the end of the one-month course, she plans to open her own restaurant — and may use Facebook to promote it.

She got the idea from her father's employer, Ten Dorji, who owns a travel agency called Authentic Bhutan Tours that has tapped both Facebook and Twitter in promoting its services.

In downtown Thimpu, 23-year-old Yanchen Lhamo, who like many still prefer to wear the traditional dress called ‘kira’ for women (the ‘goh’ is for men), manages a shop that sells colourful souvenir masks that are believed to ward off evil, Buddhist prayer flags and other handicrafts.

While waiting for customers to drift into the shop, she is logged on to Facebook, chatting and updating herself with her friends' statuses. 'Technology has changed a lot,' Yanchen says. 'In the same way that Bhutan is changing a lot.... The fashion and preferences of people are changing and they are mostly affecting our culture and traditions.'

The government imposes a 200 U.S. dollar per day tariff on tourists in order to avoid mass tourism in what is touted as one of the world's last Shangri-Las, but the Internet and the possibilities it offers know no such boundaries.

Already, basic communication facilities have brought about huge changes in everyday life in communities separated by Bhutan's mountainous terrain.

Twenty-one year old Suresh, who works at a resort in Thimpu, has been going to public school in the capital since five years ago. When he visits his parents and sister in his southern hometown of Tsirang during the winter — the low tourist season — it takes him a day of land travel to get there.

The installation of telephone services in 79 out of 201 ‘gewogs’ or clusters or two or more villages, including in Suresh’s village, has helped ease communication between families like his.

In many rural areas, the government has set up community centres with fixed phone lines and made mobile services available to others.

This situation may be a far cry from other Asian countries, where consumers talk of 3G technology and videoconferencing, but it has made the world of difference in many Bhutanese’ lives.

Ten Dorji recalls that before telephone lines were installed in his village in the Trashigang district in south-eastern Bhutan, he posted letters to his parents but was never sure if they reached their destination. 'Sometimes the letters are not delivered because when the postman comes, they're (parents) in the farm and no one is at home to receive them,' he said.

After fixed lines were installed at a community centre, his parents could talk to Ten Dorji — but still had to walk two and a half hours to get to the calling station. And before that, Ten Dorji had to send a message so that his parents could be told what time he would call.

These days, mobile telecommunications have made it much easier for him to contact his parents anytime, anywhere.

There was a 50 percent annual growth in mobile subscription in 2009 with 460,000 subscribers, according to BuddeComm, an online telecommunications research site.

The private Tashi InfoComm Ltd, which expects to connect all 20 ‘dzongkhags’ (districts) in Bhutan by 2011, has reported a subscription base of 73,000, taking 20.5 percent of the market dominated by the state-run Bhutan Telecom.

While the annual growth rate of Internet subscriptions remains low at 3 percent, social networking has picked up such that some government offices like the health ministry have blocked access to Facebook during office hours, reported the national newspaper ‘Kuensel’.

Such moves have spurred lively discussion, including opposition, from the country’s online users to Internet restrictions — just like they would in any other online community.

'The world that we live in right now is getting developed,' posted a user called Kyel in one web forum. 'We don't live under a rock, it’s a new age now, booming day by day.'

© Inter Press Service (2010) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

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