What to do la? Tim Sutton

Author

“What to do la” is one of my favourite expressions. I heard it often in Bhutan when I worked there in the early part of this century.

It can of course be meant as a question, “What to do la?”. But in Bhutan I rarely sensed a question mark at the end of this phrase, nor a comma or an exclamation mark.

What I did sense most often was just a full stop “What to do la.” And in some of the more remote areas perhaps three dots “What to do la …” suggesting an understanding or acceptance of things beyond our immediate control? I also thought this meant (to paraphrase in my words) “So what - let’s get on with what we can do and have a little bit of trust in the universe that things will turn out OK.”

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