| Username |
Post |
| ashu |
Posted
on 21-Sep-03 12:56 AM
Hi all,
The latest issue of "Nepal" monthly magazine, put out by Kantipur publications,
features 7 youthful Nepali achievers in their 20s and 30s. These were chosen to be promoted by the editors of that magazine.
Featured are Navin Subba (film-maker), Kumar Ale (who takes photos of sahitya-kars), Jogendra Ghimire (who is trained in human rights issues), Rabindra Puri (heritage conservationist) and three others.
Since pieces of good news are so few and even rare in and from Nepal these days, let us spend a moment to take in a feeling of optimism and a sense of hope these people evoke in all of us, and celebrate their various achievements.
Bravo, and well-done!!
I post this here to underscore the fact that only by openly and sincerely celebrating the best among us can we all hope to aspire for excellence in all that we do.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Biswo |
Posted
on 21-Sep-03 01:47 AM
Jogendra Ghimire is quoted as saying something like: it makes more difference if we do things to improve the condition of human right in Nepal by living in Nepal rather than protesting for it from USA/HKG.
I definitely agree with him. I think the impact of the so called "Non Resident Nepali" is so marginal in Nepal that , frankly, the foreign-based-Nepali-organization that may have the most impact in Nepal is probably our own sajha.com, which a few people in Nepal read regularly:-)
By living in foreign countries, we may be able to acquire technical expertise, earn some money(it is NOT true that Nepali people living in ,say, USA earn more money than what they would have earned had they stayed in Nepal, specially the so called " bright people"), we may be worldly wise, but we can't be master of Nepali politics and administration. It requires frequent interaction with Nepal. We may be able to devour books written about Nepal, but we may not be effectively able to gauge Nepal's own weaknesses, trends and evolution by being outside Nepal. Hence, NRN can contribute only so much, and that too in mostly technical fields.
Fortunately, a lot of intelligent Nepali have chosen to stay in Nepal. Today, more than ever, our nation's greatest hopes lie on those very people who are living in Nepal , who have known the world, who know compassion and democracy, who know what is right and what is wrong, who know what they should do, who know how not to lose faith in the time of crises, who know how to create a great nation out of uncertainties of war time and I am sure they will hold our great nation together at the time of these turbulences.I had some opportunities to talk to, to know some of these people in my last trip,they exuded confidence [most recently, remember the ire of CK Lal on Alex Perry's article on Time? I think he had shown the great hope in the time of despair, and despite the fact that I may not necessarily agree with his article, I like the optimism of that article!] and I was thinking that "yes, these are the people who will unite the nation from now on, not some king or some boring royals hiding behind the palace of Narayanhiti in the time of crisis."!
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| Bhunte |
Posted
on 21-Sep-03 02:36 AM
Biswo said ...."Fortunately, a lot of intelligent Nepali have chosen to stay in Nepal..."
Any statistics behind that supports the statement?? thx
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| ashu |
Posted
on 21-Sep-03 05:25 AM
Biswo wrote:
"most recently, remember the ire of CK Lal on Alex Perry's article on Time? I think he had shown the great hope in the time of despair, and despite the fact that I may not necessarily agree with his article, I like the optimism of that article!]"
Yes, I too am all for optimism, but I am of the opinion that even optimism needs to be realistically optimized.
I don't want to diss on CK Dai too much, but what irked me was the fact that a simple phone call to Park Village Hotel yesterday (Saturday), asking the appropriate staff member there about the number of workshops/seminars his hotel hosted in the months of June, July, August (when the ceasefire ended) and (so far) in September told a DIFFERENT and DEPRESSING story (to me anyway, in terms of the hotel's decreasing monthly revenues) than the one CK Dai chose to lead his readers to believe in his
article about the same hotel.
Draw your own conclusions from this.
***
The larger issue here, I would think, is that Nepal-based journalists, like Nepal-based academics, are extremely and even rabidly sensitive about some outsider's painting unsavory pictures about the state of Nepal, and they feel that they have to fight
back with juicy words.
And that is why, instead of fact-based rebuttals, we get this kind of highly personalized, "Oh, yeah, you [Alex Perry of TIME magazine] are a personal failure .. how dare you write about us in that way" kind of a haughty sneer from our esteemed journalists who are, of course, way above the kind of fact-based reporting for which TIME is known around the world.
On a larger note, let's face it: What the hell have we in Nepal got ourselves into when there are Nepal bandhs during the days and curfews at night, when we cannot travel freely in our own country, when children and shopkeepers and other innocent bystanders get murdered and we find no voice to condemn their killings, and when
our idea of a great day has been reduced to a day -- any day -- without bombings . . .?
What kind of living is that, if not "living on the brink"?
No wonder more and more of our fellow Nepalis are leaving in droves to exercise their sense of optimism in other parts of the planet.
The sooner we get realistic about the problems of Nepal in a non-fuzzy, no-bullshit way, and acknowledge our collective shortcomings and then set about addressing those problems head-on with tact, timing and persistence, our standing up to a TIME reporter (with a, let's accept grudgingly, lot more international influence than any of us collectively muster) is more a symbol of our wounded and temporary "gorkhay pride" than of our ability to turn problems into opportunities for actions.
[A few months ago, in times of the ceasefire, the same TIME magazine, in a one-page travel bulletin, had praised The Club Himalaya Hotel, owned by the cousin of the owner of of the Park Village Hotel, as a top destination for tourists. So, it's not like TIME is on am mission to destroy Nepal's tourism industry.]
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Biswo |
Posted
on 21-Sep-03 12:22 PM
Bhunte,
I have said "a lot of", and I haven't used comparative terms. So, I guess all I need is to provide a list of smart and intelligent people living in Nepal.
That is, what "real analysis" folks would often say, obvious. We have some very good doctors in our country, some people just mentioned good CAs, good political scientists, our country is also full of professors/lecturers, we have some good engineers, and we have top tourism industry managers(or how else you explain the success of trekking industry?).It makes a lot of sense to be hopeful about Nepal.
Ashu,
I agree that things are not very great in Nepal. But pessimism is the last thing that Nepal needs now.And I am sure you agree that Nepal still has a lot of potential, once the two extremist forces are tamed.
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| ashu |
Posted
on 22-Sep-03 08:40 AM
Biswo,
No one is being pessimistic here. But let's accept that optimism, though good in and of itself, has its limits too, as shown by the well-documented research of psychologist Martin Seligman at UPenn.
Optimism needs to be tempered by realism, To use an obvious (in a 'real analysis' sense) example: You can't expect to jump out of the fifteenth floor of a building, and be optimistic that you are not going to get smashed on the asphalt below :-)
**************
Though Jogendra Ghimire says that more could be done for human rights by living in Nepal, I am not so sure about that. Human rights is one of those issues which is geography-neutral.
And that is why, Nepalis and friends-of-Nepal abroad can play -- and they have
played -- vital roles to raise the issue about the status of human rights conditions in Nepal in international forums, and those friends need NOT be card-carrying members of the International Human Rights NGO Circuit.
I say that because human rights activism remains, by and large, a mess in Nepal.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| shirish |
Posted
on 22-Sep-03 09:03 AM
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(http://www.kantipuronline.com/Nepal/Nepalmag.htm)
Thanks for posting the message.
I found one of the article about "OT bhitra Ko jeewan" a biased by Yashoda Timsina.
Dr. Manohar Lal Shrestha, the supretendent of Bir Hospital does consider Dr. Sumi Shrestha as the first nepali "female" surgeon on the basis of "where she works" (ie Bir hospital). I could not agree with the fact that the another female Dr.: Dr. Joshi who GRADUATED with Dr. Sumi Shrestha, is not the first female surgeon in Nepal, just because she is in ACADEMIC Institution.
I feel sorry for Dr. Joshi, who also is the first female surgeon like Sumi Shrestha.
Bravo Dr. Manoghar Shrestha. Bravo Yashoda Timsina for writing histories.
What it would take if both of the bright young women are given equal respect??
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| shirish |
Posted
on 22-Sep-03 09:05 AM
I had been writing Sumi instead of SUJI. Sorry!
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