If your summer is about being happy with your intention, we recommend the happiest country in the world – Bhutan. Bhutan is the perfect place for summer, making Bhutan one of the most popular...
Ritu Singh
Navya Upadhyay
Shweta SinghCategory - Bhutan
Bhutan is located in south-central Asia on the eastern ridges of the Himalayas. Bhutan, historically a remote kingdom became less isolated in the second half of the 20th century. By the early 21st century a trip from the Indian border to the Bhutanese capital, with improvements in transportation. Radically, the governmental structure also changed. Reforms initiated by King Jigme Dorji Wangchuk who was reigned in the 1950s and ’60s led to a shift away from absolute monarchy in the 1990s and toward the institution of multiparty parliamentary democracy in 2008.
Bhutan’s western and northern boundary with the Tibet Autonomous Region, part of China, although undefined, generally follows the crest of the Great Himalayas. Bhutan’s mountainous territory is dissected by lots of rivers. The main rivers from west to east are the Wong, Sankosh, Manas, and Torsa. All the rivers flow southward from the Great Himalayas and join the Brahmaputra River in India. Bhutan’s climate is more diverse than that of any other similarly sized area in the world. The climate changes with producing striking meteorologic contrasts, elevation, different exposures to sunlight and moisture-laden winds result in complex local variations. Three principal climatic regions can be distinguished: the humid, the hot, subtropical tract of the Duars Plain and its adjacent foothills. The cooler region of the alpine tundra region of the Great Himalayas and lesser Himalayas. For instance, in Thimphu, in the country’s west-central region, in January, high temperatures are usually in the low 12 °C and low temperatures in the 2 °C in July, Thimphu’s temperatures are somewhat warmer, typically rising to the 19 °C and dropping to the about 13 °C.
Bhutan’s flora is famous for its continuous transition and its great variety from tropical through temperate to exclusively alpine forms. In the Duars Plain and adjoining hills and the moist zone of tropical deciduous vegetation occupies the south. Dense and tall grasses used in the manufacture of paper and pulp are an important plant resource in the lower elevations. With some oak, forests of pine dominate the slopes between 900 and 1,800 meters. There are three major ethnic groups in Bhutan. One is the Bhutia, they also called Ngalop, second is the Nepalese, and the last one Sharchop. The Bhutia makeup about half of the population and are the largest ethnic group. The Bhutia are dominant in central, western and northern Bhutan. They speak a variety of Tibeto-Burman languages, and the most common of these, Dzongkha, is Bhutan’s official language; the written language is identical to Tibetan. The Bhutia dominate Bhutan’s political life.
About three-fourths of Bhutan’s population follows Buddhism, primarily of the Tibetan variety; formerly the official state religion, it is now described in the 2008 constitution as the “spiritual heritage” of the country. Of the four major branches of Tibetan Buddhism, Nyingma and Kagyu are practiced in Bhutan. The population is young. Nearly one-third is under age 15, while about three-fifths are under 30. Both the birth rate and the death rate are below the global average. The life expectancy is 72 years for women and 70 years for men.
