By Bibhu Bikram Pant

You can call me a commoner, or a layman, or simply a Nepali. A man who has dreams of peace and prosperity, but fears to dream since dreams and aspirations are suppressed under the current affairs of the country. A man who sets out for his office every morning with the hope that the day will be good, but fears of the unknowns and bears a strange phobia that someone or something is lurking behind for an ambush. Someone has truly said - dare to dream. Today, it takes a daring to dream a great future. The question that hunts me the most today is why the f__k I didn't go aboard for study, and settle there? Was it the love of the country, or love of the closed ones, or simply my inabilities? Frankly, I do not know. But the question remains - is it a sin to stay in one's own native land and dream of a good life? Definitely not. The ground realities, nevertheless, are still the same - insecurities and uncertainties.

The biggest blow to my sense came when the holy shrine of Pashupatinath was meddled in the controversy. What greater debacle could one hope after this? Education sector was attacked, health sector was not spared, socio-economical issues were tainted – the branches of foul politics spread everywhere, but Pashipatinath?? Give us a break!! I don’t believe in craps like “desh ma aba anista hune bho, Pashupati lai pani chhodenan iniharule”. The so called “anista” has hit the nation way back. I blame politics for all what is happening, you certainly do too. But what are we doing about it? Politics, or dirty as you may, is a result of our indifference. Better late than never, we should act now. Well there, that was easy. I know it’s simple to lay down one’s frustration over words, which I am doing right now. No action whatsoever on my part to try to mend the current affairs. After all, I am also a human being – a lone man can not act in solitude, no matter how great his intentions are. This is actually what is happening. I do not have solutions, neither do you. The problem requires a joint action on the civilians’ part. Or, have we learnt to live lives with stigma attached over our foreheads and simply say “C’est la vie”.

By:Jules West

I challenge you to contemplate - really stop and think for a moment - what your life would be like if you had to live 10 hours of each and every day without electricity.

I hadn't gotten an email from Sudip in a few days so yesterday I Skype-called him and he reported that load shedding is now up to 10 hours per day. The reason I hadn't heard from him is that he hadn't been able to get to a computer while the power was on.

Wikipedia defines it this way:
A rolling blackout, also referred to as load shedding, is an intentionally-engineered electrical power outage. These blackouts are normally in response to insufficient resources and inability to meet prevailing demand for electricity.
I define it another way: Load shedding = dark & cold & a barrier to communication, business, development and progress. It's an everpresent feature (or should I say an everabsent feature) of the daily lives of the people of Nepal.

Here I'm quoting fellow blogger Bibek Paudel because he says it so well: "People plan their days accordingly. They sleep and wake up accordingly. Businesses and office-goers, professionals try to adjust their work and daily routine in harmony with the load-shedding schedule published by the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA, aptly called No Electricity Authority of Nepal). NEA is very good at doing it. It changes its schedule and duration time and again, citing different reasons. In summers, its usually because of the flooding at certain rivers that grains and rock try to disturb the hydro-power plants. In winters, its because most rivers originating in the mountains decrease in their volumes because the snow melts less. At other times, its because one or the other power plant needs to be closed because of technical difficulties. At no points do we learn about measures taken to forestall annual occurrences of such events."

In a country where the snow melt runoff from Mt. Everest and the rest of the Himalayan range produces a power potential equivalent to the combined installed hydroelectricity capacity of Canada, the United States and Mexico, this is ridiculous. Less than 1 percent of Nepal's power potential has been developed. Basically, Nepal has the potential to produce enough power for itself, India and other other South Asia countries, with the sale of the surplus power fueling economic development.

Some assert that this latest crisis is falsely generated for some political motive such as government officials who will benefit from the building of diesel-run power plants. Others say that the current power plants are in such terrible condition that they cannot handle the load. The rapid growth of the Kathmandu Valley population is also cited.

Whatever the real reason, its a great hardship for the people.

By: Bipendra
Just came out of an evening of brain storming about Naya (New Nepal); the idea was to discuss some of the scholarly articles on how can Naya Nepal be "federated". In other words how can our country be demarked into various states/political regions and can they be socio-economically viable? To figure out what makes sense and what does not? It was indeed a great idea of all the people involved in organizing such an event and a way for us to "Speak Out our Mind". More than any thing else it was a great opportunity for Nepalese staying abroad to pass on their concerns to the legal entities of Nepal. I applaud the organizer Washington Nepali forum and United States Institute for Peace for providing us this opportunity.

     I felt like we are still really back in a game where we are trying to weed out our differences of being from different caste system. Some one complains about being left out in the past whereas other talk about possible exclusion of minorities, yet again.  It was a general consensus that Naya Nepal is needed but no one really wants to see new neighboring states with people that they have not seen before or moved in just because they seem to be under same ethnicity.

 I don’t feel ashamed to confess that being a graduate student I do not know how the federal system works in Nepal; and what kind of political division are planners making. I know from media that there has been a general consensus to autonomies states based on their ethnicity, but is it just for name sake? Does Limbuwan State will only have majority of Limbus and only Limbu speaking people can dwell in such state. I know this is not true; at least I hope that this is not true. If this indeed the case, then need to educate people about it and the name “Limbuwan” is just a name; has no significance to the other people already living there and that area was historically Limbu dominant.
 
 Have any engineering thoughts been put into demarking the states. I have a fear that if conditions of existing infrastructures are not considered in demarcation then while Kathmandu is planning on building Skyscrapers; a state in western Nepal might be scrambling to make a Jholenge pool (suspension bridge) or even fighting hard to provide a basic need of food and shelter. If enough thought is not provided into existing physical resources then we might just increase the economic gap between states. A prosperous neighbor is good to have, but then they make my house look smaller in the neighborhood.

 There are lots of people with reservations and   fear about the new structure of Nepal. Fear of inadequate resources, fear of isolation and fear of ethnic violence. I know this is out of question now but there were people who even questioned about necessity of new political structure or should we look into empowering the existing system without redrawing new map of Nepal.

 I know there are more questions on my write-up than answers and that’s because I belong to millions of Nepali people who have not been answered in the past. Rather imposed of the new rules and regulations. Hope this does not happen this time along as I like to think that our new constitution will be so strong that we don’t need to go into its amendment every fortnight.
 
 Let us spread the word around, lets educate and uplift our fellow citizens where were left out in the past and unite to make our voice stronger; let the people of Nepal be more thoughtful than they ever have been. Let our future generation be proud of this Naya Nepal. I believe that we can change Nepal, a change that’s direly needed and I blog at http://blog.nayanepalnews.com/ to spread my thought and assemble yours.
 

By: Pranay Panday

Recently, millions of Nepalese woke up to see the end of the monarchy and a fresh, new start of republican Nepal. As a student, I was never up to date with politics; however I am glad to be a part of the history in making, as history books are rewritten since the time of the Shah Kings has eternally ended. For me it wasn’t really pleasant to see the dissolution of a 240 year old monarchy, the more deserving kings that once ruled this country such as Prithivi Narayan Shah’s legacy and their flawless commitment to their country slowly disappearing. However, at the present time, I guess the only possible way we saw to a better Nepal was ending the monarchy.

But then there is an unsure feeling I have to a common headline that has been published in all newspaper; two words that slip out of every minister’s mouth, “New Nepal”. ‘How’ and ‘when’ is the only thing I think of when somebody mentions me of a newer Nepal. How will we tackle all the problems Nepal is facing? Rising fuel prices; load shedding that is bound to double up in winter; growing traffic congestion and smell from rivers that practically resemble sewers, killing the air…….so is this really the new Nepal. And you can add to that the social conflicts among the people here. Gender, colour inequalities are just the things people in societies bicker upon. When everyone has the same blood colour then there is nothing you should argue about, nor does your caste decide how you should be treated. Bribing, robbery, kidnapping is with no doubt ruining Nepal’s title as the land of gods. Books are not supplied in an entire district and these same people are expected to take over the country. for Nepal, its out of the frying pan and into the fire, problems one after the other.

Just because of the election, end of monarchy and the new parliament hasn’t made a new Nepal; the only thing that is new is the increasing number of problems. When we are never independent and always rely on others for even the smallest things then we will always be in an early stage of development. But we are all endowed in one thing or the other; humans have the power to love, share, imagine, understand and work together which is the strategy we should put in work to take anything to a prominent level.

 

In the past, and now as well, the situation in Nepal has been quite appalling. After the elections some of us started to hope for the best, but meantime also expect the worst. I like many my eyes were vague as I was confused for what was going to happen. But then I realized that no matter how much of a heap of mess Nepal was in, time is always passing away and even the darkest moment in Nepal will go by, eventually. So together lets reopen gates of the Shangri-las’; repaint its polluted panorama; let people from all over the world indulge themselves in Nepal’s large pool of cultures and tradition and most importantly lets try our best to restore peace in each and every corner.

Together as one nation let’s step into the new republican era and awake the magical, mystical and mountainous nation of Nepal from its deep sleep.

By Uli Loskot

The overnight train ride from Kolkata to Patna does not feel as enjoyable and safe as all the other train ride adventures I have had so far. I am a bit concerned about my safety and the safety of my stuff. During the entire ride persistent beggars come through the train and people look at me with less compassion and openness, but more despair and envy. The North Indian state of Bihar, which is where I am travelling through, is one of the poorest regions in India.

I arrive dazed in Patna in the morning and take a collective motor rickshaw to the bus station, a dusty and forgotten place on the edge of town. It's a long eight hour bus ride from here to the Indian border town of Raxaul. Somewhere on the way the bus breaks down in a small village. As soon as the kids of the village see me they come running at me, and a wild, crazy mob encircles me. I take the situation in my hands by pulling out my camera and take photos with them and me. They love it!

Raxaul is a dusty border town. There is no bus that crosses the border into Nepal. The means of transportation is a horse rickshaw. I have no idea how far the actual border is, so I am being overcharged for the ride. But hey, I have never crossed a border in a horse wagon!

The Indian border is a tiny, inconspicuous house on the side of the road with an eccentric border officer. He proudly shows me a couple of postcards, pictures and things he has been given by other foreigners, goes on to charge me a border fee without a wink of his eye and marks me down in his big book. I am told later that there is no border fee, so that guy must be making pretty good money with all the travelers that come through his border.

Then we are off on the horse wagon again on a bumpy street, further on to the Nepali border. I am obtaining a visa to enter Nepal, which consists of a hand filled out preprinted sticker in my passport. The border officers are friendly, proud and handsome guys in uniforms and I express how excited I am about visiting Nepal.

The horse rickshaw driver drops me off soon thereafter on the Napali side. I am in another dusty border town called Birganj. At this point I am totally in tune with the fact that I will be stuck in an uncomfortable seat on an old bus for another eight to ten hours, riding over the foothills of the Himalayas down into the Kathmandu valley. I don't have much of a vista on this trip, its dark outside. I can feel how the temperatures have dropped drastically and there are pine trees along the side of the road, the air is brisk. When we stop for some chai in the middle of the night, which is called chia in Nepal, I slowly realize that I am in Nepal.

जनकपुरधाम ।महोत्तरी जिल्ला विकास समितिको प्राविधिक कार्यालयको प्रमुख तथा जिविसको निमित्त स्थानीय विकास अधिकारी कृष्णचन्द्र मिश्रलाइ जनकपुर नगरपालिकाको वडा नम्बर ४ को आनन्दनगर स्थित आफ्‍नै घरमा बुधबार राती गोली प्रहार गरिएकोछ ।मिश्रको छातीमा गोली लागेकोछ र उनको उपचार जनकपुर अञ्चल अस्पतालमा संभव नभएपछि राजधानी लिगएकोछ ।अस्पताल स्रोतका अनुसार डी.इ मिश्रको स्थिति चिन्ताजनक रहेकोछ ।डी.इ.मिश्रलाइ जिविस महोत्तरीमा व्यापक अनियमितता गरेको आरोप लगाउँदै गोली प्रहारको जिम्मेवारी जनतान्त्रिक तरार्इ मुक्ति मोर्चा (राजन मुक्ती )समुहले लिएकोछ ।प्रहरीले घटनामा संलग्न रहेकाहरुको व्यापक खोजी भइरहेको जनाएकोछ ।आनन्दनगर क्षेत्रमा अहिले व्यापक प्रहरी परिचालन गरिएकोछ ।घटनाकोजिम्मेवारी जनतान्त्रिक तराइ मुक्ती मोर्चा(राजन समुह)का अध्यक्ष राजनमुक्तीले लिएका छन ।उनले केन्द्रीय कमाण्डद्वारा गरिएको कार्वाही केन्दि्रय कमाण्डको प्लाटुन कमाण्डर प्र ले मुक्तीको नेतृत्वमा रहेको समुहले गरेकोछ ।यसैबीच धनुषा जिल्लामा एकजना इञ्जिनियरको बुधबार अपरान्ह अपहरण गरिएकोछ धनुषा जिल्ला स्थित खरिहानी गाउँ विकास समिति स्थित पैतृक घरबाट जनकपुर तफ आउँदै गरेको बेला इञ्जिनियर जामुन साहलाइ अपहरण गरिएकोछ ।खरिहानी गाउँ विकास समिति वडा नम्बर ३ घर भएको इ.साह जनकपुर ढल्केवर सडक खण्ड मध्ये सपही जनकपुर खण्डको सडक ठेक्केदारको कन्सलटेन्टको रुपमा कार्यरत्त रहेका थिए । इ.साहलाइ खरिहानीको गेरुवाही नदीबाट अपहरण गरिएको बताइएकोछ इ.साह र उनीसँगै रहेको परिवारजन मध्ये साहलाइ मात्र गाडीबाट पैदल अज्ञात स्थल तफ लगिएको बताइएकोछ । इं साहसँगै उनका परिजनहरु दुइवटा जीपमा सवार रहेका थिए ।जीपलाइ नदीमा दुइ घण्टा भन्दा बढी समय सम्म रोकेर राखिएको र पछि परिजनलाइ फिर्ता खरिहानी तर्फ पठाइएको थियो ।इ.साहको स्थिति अज्ञात छ ।जीप अबेर राती सम्म नदीमै रहेको थियो ।प्रत्यक्षदर्शीहरुका अनुसार दश जनाको संख्यामा रहेका सशस्त्र समुहले इ.साहलाइ पैदल लगेकोछ ।पिताको वार्षिक श्राद्ध सकेर उनी सपरिवार आजै जनकपुर फर्कन लागेको बेला दिउँसो करिब साढे चार बजे नदीमा पहिले नै कुरेर बसिरहेको सशस्त्र समुहले अपहरण गरेकोछ ।

The real question is what will each of us give back to the country to which we owe our identity? Or will there be no members of our generations to shoulder the responsibility –

By Nisha Shrestha
This article titled was originally published in the Nov 1-15 issue of New York Nepali Samachar.

Still cannot get to sleep, I turn lazily to the other side of the bed. I open my eyes to glance at the alarm clock; the green digits read 2:00. Five more hours and it is going to come to life, force me out of bed to go to school, then work, and back home late at night. Time never stops, does it? Time passes away with each blink of an eye, and it is up to us to utilize it. The feeling of uneasiness grips me again; and the reason is suddenly clear. I have been thinking about my conversation with Dikshya di and Dipendra dai over tea this afternoon. I have been thinking about what next after graduation.

There are many Nepali students like me in the United States, and many more scattered in countries all over the globe, who have left Nepal in pursuit of higher education. The number is definitely substantial, as I myself have only a handful of friends back home. As students we make immense sacrifices to get that degree we came here for. We think of graduating as our salvation. We hope for an American dream, to get rich and have that perfect house and the perfect job. But what are the chances? And what about Nepal, the essence of who we are? So, when Dipendra dai and Dikshya di both voiced their decision to go back to Nepal after graduation, I had an array of emotions. Shock, admiration, confusion, respect.

My confusion is indeed justifiable. When one goes back to Nepal and gets a “good job,” one may earn Rs. 30,000 a month, which is (30,000/74) $405.40. A week’s wage here, even for a minimum paying work. There is also the question about the lack of opportunities. It is indeed tough for a country to get investors (both foreign and domestic), to invest money when it is still politically instable. Another opportunity lost, because Nepal could gain a lot from the recent trend in globalization. Over 80% of the total Nepali population relies on agriculture; over 80% of the European population were agricultural too, but in the 17th century. It was before the industrial revolution there, which transformed their society from agricultural to industrial and today to technological. Are we 4 centuries behind? It pains me to admit, but the answer sadly is “perhaps.” Perhaps, although our county has had many political revolutions, what we really need is an intellectual revolution.

Nepal doesn’t lack talent or intellect. Nor does it lack natural beauty or appropriate geographical location. I think Nepal is very capable of competing in today’s global market; all it needs really is us – we are the future of Nepal, and it is up to us to determine its fate. Most of the people that I talked to did want to go back to Nepal if there were opportunities. They talked about the prestige and respect they would have back home; the familiarity, family, quality of life and self-respect. Yet others like my friend Pariksha wanted to work here to gain more experience and earn before returning back. “I should at least reach my break-even point,” she explained like a true finance student. And a few others saw no reason for going back.

As I analyzed my confusion again, I realized that I was asking the wrong question. It is not just the question of where we will be working after graduation. The real question is what will each of us give back to the country to which we owe our identity? Or will there be no members of our generations to shoulder the responsibility – will there just be a void?

Nisha Shrestha is a 22 year old Nepali student, majoring in finance and minoring in CIS and ethics in Baruch college, CUNY, New York. She is also a Contributing Writer for New York Nepali Samachar.

नेपाल बाट धेरै टाढा अ्एरिका मा केही साथी हरु ले देउसी अगृम रुप मा मनाउने बिचार गरेछ्न् र शनिबार को दिन पारेर देउसी खेलेछन् । देउसी निक्कै रमाइलो भएको जस्तो लागेर साथी हरु लाई यो भिडियो राखी दिएको छु । मन पर्‍यो भने  कमेन्ट गरिदिनु होला नि त, नत्र भने मेरो तर्फ बाट पनि देउ सु रे