Gangkhar is like a hidden village towards north of Trashiyangtsi Dzong, beyond the mountains.Gangkhar is an hour’s drive through a precarious feeder road from the old Dzong. Jarba village is about a kilometers Gangkhar. On the way to Jarba, few walks along the Jarba river upstream, there is a remains of spring water that once was used for bathing.
Once was many decades ago, when village was isolated from any modern education and development. Elders say that the spring source was once used for bathing by people for healing purposes, and by visitors while on their visit to the villages.
When important visitors bathed at the spring, the village people had to attend to their services and pay tax to arrange for their stay. The place where the guest stayed was called Zimkhang which is at Jarba village. Zimkhang mean a lodge where guests slept during their stay. Burdened by the labour and tax, the village men is said to have covered the bath house and spring with rocks and debris, never to be used again.
During my visit to the site, people had begun to clear the area, but there was no sign of any steaming water! Miracles have been possible in Bhutanese mythologies, and it should be possible for the spring to spit healing hot waters if the story people narrated is true.
A year ago, two village elders sought support from the villagers to unearth the spring to revive for its use. The locals and people of Gangkhar had made financial contributions upon the call for support to which civil servants from native village offered voluntarily.
The path was carved from the feeder road to the spring site. The spring at the moment is a rivulet which will be inadequate for a bath for now. It’s not even a warm water, yet it does have the odour of sulphurous chemical associated with spring water elsewhere.
Although there is no trace of a lost bath tub or it’s remains, there are boulders and rock face that display serenity of the place. Much part of the debri is removed and spring drawn from its nearby source.
The bath tub may be constructed by digging the soil and joining the rocks, but the work begun is a scratch start, and the spring not priming promise of a steaming spring for now.
I hope that the contributions made in breath and money will be able to draw atleast a warm water by some miracle, and the tub come alive for the healing power people talk about. If it does, people are hoping that it will become choices for other people and an income source.
The myth is waiting for its magical revival, and the innocent people of the Gangkhar will have a pride for their effort and hope.
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