The Last Place

angela morgenstern writes "Buddhist Bhutan was the last place on earth to legalize television. Trading traditional practices for daytime soaps and WWF, many fear that western influence will trample the culture." A whole set of articles about the effect of American television on one of the most remote places on earth - it's official, there is no escape from American "culture".

Comments

Spread of US "culture"

[jamieo]

Actually this is a bit more accurate than you may think. Recently I spent a month trekking in Nepal - a nearby country to Bhutan and one that has only recently (30 years) opened itself to foregin influences.

The popularity of WWF, even high in the remote mountain villages, was not something I expected. Then again, this is usually the only "culture" the US exports.

I also visited the country about 10 years earlier after a few months backpacking through India. For around 3 months I travelled and didn't once see a bottle/can of Coca Cola (or derivative) - it was all local soft drinks that were available. At the time it was a refreshing change, and gave you a much more local flavour.

On my more recent trip you could *only* get Coca Cola soft drinks (Coke, Sprite, Fanta, etc.), even high in the mountains a week's travel from the nearest road. OK, they were locally manufactured (under license) and tasted different (the Fanta was nice!), but it was something that got in the way of emersing yourself in a completely different culture. As for the locals themselves, there seemed to be no benefit whatsoever for them having "Coke" soft drinks compared to the local ones before them.

Ho hum, roll on the Disneyfication of the planet.