Within thirty minutes, two police officers arrived on a Royal Enfield. The village gup (headman) was furious. “This is not a park,” he shouted. “This is where we send our dead to the sky.”
Because in Bhutan, there are no problems. Only negotiations that haven’t finished yet.
Kinley Dorji’s phone buzzed at 3 AM. The message was from a producer in Mumbai: “Kinley, need a crew in Paro by Monday. Subject: disappearing dragon paintings. Budget: low. Speed: high.”
He looked out the window at the rain hitting the tin roofs of Thimphu. Somewhere, a producer was googling “how to film in Bhutan.” Somewhere, a director was having a breakdown over a rejected permit. And somewhere, Kinley Dorji—the last fixer of Thimphu—was waiting for the phone to ring.
For a foreign director, this is a nightmare. For Kinley, it is Tuesday.
She agreed immediately. The first week was smooth. Kinley got permits for the Weaving Centre in Khaling. He bribed a sleepy guard with a carton of Druk 11000 cigarettes to open the gate of a private lakhang (temple) an hour before sunrise. He even convinced a high lama to bless the camera, which Anjali thought was quaint but which Kinley knew would make every monk in the district cooperative.