When Bryan Gensits graduated from Northwestern in 2013, he could never have predicted he would find himself studying in a small Asian country halfway around the world, let alone becoming the first international student to complete a Master’s degree from a university in Bhutan.

Six years later, Gensits is initiating a new venture.

“A partner in Bhutan and I have started a tour company, Bhutan Marathon Tours, which specializes in designing tour packages around the premier races in the country,” Gensits explained.

“The races are kind of the focal point, but we also offer cultural tours and eco-tourism,” he continued.

Gensits himself ran in several races, placing third in the Bhutan Ultra 50k, fourth in the Global Limits Bhutan 200k trail race and 10th in the Bhutan Coronation Marathon.

“We’re trying to increase the awareness of racing in Bhutan and we want to bring the country into the forefront,” Gensits said. “The Bhutan International Marathon is relatively unknown.

“My friend, who’s Bhutanese, has a tour agency and has been doing tourism for over 30 years, so this is an offshoot. We want to bring tourists to run the races.

“The biggest race in the country is put on by the International Olympic Committee.”

Gensits says running in Bhutan is unique because “you get to race through the Himalayas and the villages.”

The two also want to help promote tourism in the country.

“No tourist comes to Bhutan without visiting the ancient fortresses and temples, the oldest of which dates back to the 7th century AD.”

According to Gensits, tourism is the third or fourth segment of the economy.

“Bhutan wants to bring in people who will contribute to the economy, but they just don’t want the high volume,” Gensits said. “The tourist who do come are of a certain class. When it comes to tourism, the country has a low volume, high impact philosophy.”

While at Northwestern, Gensits ran cross-country for a year.

“I got really into it using my feet as a mode of transportation and being able to explore places not accessible in any other way,” Gensits said. “It was just for enjoyment and for recreation that I started running on my own.”

Gensits spent three years living in the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.

He earned a Master’s degree in macroeconomics from the Bhutanese University in the College of Natural Resources, part of the Royal University of Bhutan.

“It was research driven by my Master’s dissertation,” he explained,

“I studied farmers decision making regarding pesticides, crop diversification, and seed decisions. I worked with the extension services there.

“Sixty percent of the farmers follow the same practices going back hundreds of years. The farming is terraced. They have rototillers.

“They grow rice as their main crop.”

Kitchen gardens are widespread.

“Each family is mostly self-sufficient, and everyone is a landowner with a three-story house,” Gensits said.

The history of the country is unusual.

“In 1908, the country was unified and that began the Wangchuck Dynasty,” Gensits said.

“In 2008, the fourth king stepped down and passed the reigns to his son, and he created a constitutional monarchy.

“I think it was the first time in history that a monarch renounced power in order to preserve the country, reasoning that democracy would make it more robust.

“The country has a parliamentary system that is election driven. The king now is a figurehead in a lot of ways.”

Gensits said Thimphu, the capital, is vibrant with its traditional architecture.

“There are no skyscrapers and though there’s traffic, there are no stop lights, so it still has charm,” Gensits said. “It’s super clean and very, very safe, but it’s on a fault line so it’s prone to earthquakes.”

Gensits noted that for hundreds of years, Bhutan was pretty much stagnant.

“They just got telephones in 2001 but now, 98 percent of the people have TVs and the cell service is incredible,” he noted. “I believe they have only had a written language for the last 200 years or so.

Dzongkha uses the Tibetan alphabet to approximate the sounds. That’s the national language. But there are 19 unique languages.

“Some are dialects but some are completely unique. In a generation or two, they may not be around.”

“The current king is very forward thinking,” Gensits said. “He believes no one will miss Bhutan if they don’t know what Bhutan is.”

Few Americans know about the country, but Gensits credits his high school years for his first interest in the small nation.

“I think I heard about Bhutan in Mr. Kleinert’s [economics] class of all places,” Gensits said.

“He was talking about alternatives to GDP as a measure of prosperity and we might have had to read a small article about Bhutan. Then it completely faded away.”

After graduating from Northwestern Lehigh, Gensits continued his studies at a small school in Colorado.

“Naropa was founded by a Tibetan refugee, a Buddhist monk who came to Colorado to teach,” Gensits explained. “The school was named for a Buddhist teacher and it was started as a Buddhist institute that later became a liberal arts college and then expanded into a university.”

“I was inspired by [Naropa’s] approach to education,” Gensits said. “They focus not only on the course material but also on individual and that’s often neglected.

“I did my undergraduate work, majoring in environmental studies with minors in religious studies and peace studies, just basically geopolitics and conflict resolutions on a macro and micro level.”

“Naropa has been around since the ’70s. I really, really, really enjoyed my time there.”

Gensits completed his undergraduate work in a year and a half.

“I had so many credits from high school and I took summer classes, so I was only in Colorado for a year and a half,” he said.

Amazingly, Naropa had a partnership with the Royal University of Bhutan.

“It’s the only university in America that can send students to study there,” Gensits stated.

That was a life changer for him.

Studying in Bhutan was a quintessential learning experience.

One of the biggest cultural differences according to Gensits is their relationship to time.

“For them, time is not linear. Even meetings and schedules are suggestions at best. You just have to be very adaptable.”

“When I first got there, I kind of gave myself an aneurysm every day with worry,” he quipped. “Things take so much longer.

“I could have stayed there but I did miss the simple things,” Gensits said. “I was the only western guy for miles and miles.”