Ugyen (Sherab Dorji), a schoolteacher in his final year of training, has been sent to the remote town of Lunana in northern Bhutan. He must brave the high altitude, a lack of amenities and a brutal winter.
Without access to the Internet, cell phones, or even the modern comforts of electricity, Lunana comes as a shock to an urbanite like Ugyen, who wants to pack it in and head back home almost immediately. But it wouldn’t be much of a movie if he did, and Ugyen chooses to stay after the children make clear the earnestness of their desire for a real education in this rural outpost.