officially Kingdom of Bhutan, Dzongkha Druk-Yul, kingdom of south-central Asia, located on the eastern ridges of the Himalayas. Bhutan's undefined northern and western boundary with Tibet follows the crest of the Great Himalaya Range for the most part. Its boundary with India lies to the south of the Himalaya Range in the Duars Plain. Directly south lie the Indian states of West Bengal and Assam. To the east, Bhutan borders Arunachal Pradesh, and to the southwest it borders the Indian state of Sikkim. Thimphu is the capital. – from Encyclopedia Britannica Online
A Painter’s Year in the Forests of Bhutan, by A. K. Hellum (Honolulu: University of Hawai’I Press, 2001)
During the two years A. K. Hellum spent in Bhutan, he painted many of the “rarely seen plants” found in its mountains and valleys. More than one hundred of his beautiful paintings are collected in this volume, along with journal entries describing the plants, seasons, people, and landscape of Bhutan. This is a book to treasure.
The periods between darkness and light, between cold and warm, between night and day, those are pure poetry for me. When frost is melting and dripping to the ground like rain from trees and rooftops and flowers, when herders goad their cattle to the forests and meadows in their bare feet, when their calls sound like singing in the crispness of the air, and when the smoke has started to stir from the valley floor, that is a wonderful time for me. Then there is no place like this far-off valley in far-off Bhutan.” – from A Painter’s Year in the Forests of Bhutan, by A. K. Hellum