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I just checked two popular online fundraising platforms and very quickly found more than 130 campaigns raising money for Covid-19 relief in Nepal. Nepalis and non-Nepalis alike are rallying to gather donations for oxygen, isolation centres, food and other daily needs, and much more to fight the devastating second wave, which is slowly seeping into villages. 

Leading the way is a group of people who, one year ago, were better known as victims of Covid-19: migrant workers from Nepal who were stranded in Persian Gulf countries when the first wave shut down international travel. Many were broke, crowded into single rooms or just sleeping on a floor in any empty space that had a roof. The Nepal Government was roundly criticized for doing too little to rescue this workforce, whose earnings sent home to their families has fuelled the country’s economy for decades. 

So it was great to read one week ago that 560 oxygen cylinders had arrived from Oman, purchased with money collected from Nepalis living and working in the Middle East. Today, we hear the story of that whirlwind fundraising effort, from the President of the Non-resident Nepali Association in Oman, Bikal Jha. 

Let us know what you thought of today’s chat via our social channels. We’re Nepal Now or Nepal Now Pod on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. You can email me at [email protected]. 

Don’t forget to like, follow or favourite the show on your usual podcast app — Apple Podcasts, Spotify, PocketCasts, and the others, so you don’t miss the next episode. 

Thank you this week to Chandan Kumar Mandal, Anand Rai and Jasmine for helping to track down today’s guest. 

Suraya Logan works on social media for Nepal Now. I’m Marty Logan. I produced today’s show. Talk to you next time.

Resources

Organizations in Nepal providing Covid-19 relief

NRNA Oman

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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These are terrible, painful days for many people in Nepal, and so I hesitated to post this episode. But then I thought, in the midst of the devastation and death caused by Covid-19 it is important to hear something positive and, in this case, not something cheery just for the sake of diverting our attention, like cat videos on social media. 

Rather, in today’s episode we’re talking about a positive, rising trend: the number of Nepalis who are reaching greater heights, both real — like the women’s team that recently climbed Mt Annapurna — and metaphorically — like Chef Santosh Sah, who, with his unique Nepali dishes, wowed judges and the UK audience en route to the final of MasterChef Britain. 

Speaking to me is someone who knows first-hand the highs, and lows, of attaining a mighty goal — Shailee Basnet, who was one of a 10-woman team that summitted Mt Everest in 2008, a team that went on to reach the top of the tallest peaks on seven continents. Shailee will help me untangle why so many accomplishments seem to be, paradoxically, occurring during the pandemic. She will also explain her one-of-a-kind email signature. 

If you enjoy what you hear today, please leave a review of Nepal Now on Apple Podcasts. Don’t forget to like, follow or favourite the show on your usual podcast player so you don’t miss an episode. To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn. You can reach me directly at [email protected]. 

Resources

Shailee Basnet's website

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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Welcome to Nepal Now. I’m Marty Logan.

Today is Thursday, April 29th. A few hours ago we started a second lockdown here in the Kathmandu Valley in response to a frightening rise in the number of Covid-19 cases. I’ve read reports that the intensive care units of many hospitals are full and projections that the number of cases in Nepal is growing faster than in neighbouring India, which of course has been devastated in recent days. 

Lockdown here basically means that except for food shops and pharmacies — which open only for limited hours in the morning and evening — all but essential business stops. Last year, when the entire country locked down, here in Nepal’s capital within days we saw many people on the streets after they ran out of food. Governments provided some support but it was civil society that stepped up and set up kitchens on the streets to cook hot meals and assemble food packs for families. 

Kusum Tamang of Hiteri Foundation led one of the many, many efforts that sprang up in the capital and across the country. Today we’re talking to her about how her tiny organization managed to contribute so much during the lockdown and about some of the people they supported and continue working with. She also has some ideas to better prepare for the next emergency. 

If you haven’t already, I highly recommend that you also listen to our very first episode, from July 2020, Community to the Rescue — Again: Covid-19 in Nepal. 

Thank you for listening. If you haven’t already, you can like, follow or favourite the show wherever you hear your podcasts, so you don’t miss our next episode. We are on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, where you can keep up with the show between episodes, ask us a question, or share an idea. You can always email me at [email protected]. 

Resources

Hiteri Foundation

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

Music: amaretto needs ice ... by urmymuse (c) copyright 2018 Licensed   under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial  (3.0) license.   http://dig.ccmixter.org/files/urmymuse/57996 Ft: Apoxode--- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/nepalnow/message

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In a country where mental health is often talked about in whispers — if it’s discussed at all — I was surprised, and happy, to recently see a photo of a new counselling room set up in a high school. It is one of two rooms established in schools in Melamchi, close to Kathmandu. 

Other rooms should be completed in coming months in Baglung District, says my guest on today’s episode, Ranjita Maharjan from Sambhavya Foundation. The three-year-old organization is already counselling students in 13 Nepali schools and aims to put a dedicated room in every school. A spike in mental health issues, and suicide, among Nepalis during the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated plans. 

“It’s about making students feel safe,” says Ranjita, “whether it’s a counselling room or a classroom or a playground.”

We would love to hear your feedback on this episode. It’s the first one we’ve recorded in a studio rather than online, so we hope you can hear an improvement. Thank you to Gobinada Khadka at the Community Information Network for making that happen, as well as to the Association of Community Radio Broadcasters. 

Share your feedback with Nepal Now on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. You can write to me at [email protected]. Also, don’t forget to follow, like or favourite the show on any podcast app, including Google and Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Radio Public and Anchor. 

Resources

Sambhavya Foundation

Kathmandu Post report on suicide during lockdown

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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Santosh Shah is a household name in Nepal after finishing runner-up on MasterChef. Sanjog Thakuri’s father was cooking the daily meals for his family decades ago, so it was natural for the son to grow up helping in the kitchen. But as a teenager, when he wanted to talk about cooking while his friends teased local girls he himself became a target for not being macho enough. 

Today, Sanjog talks to boys and men about how much better their lives, and society as a whole, would be if they didn’t conform to the pressure to constantly be aggressive leaders, responsible for protecting the women and girls in their lives. Society is changing, he says, with women taking on larger roles, but it’s going too slowly. For example, Sanjog says in today’s episode, look at how some men are wielding toxic masculinity online, trolling and threatening women. 

What do you think: do you agree or disagree with Sanjog? Let us know. Nepal Now is on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. You can also write to me at [email protected]. Like, follow or favourite the show on your usual podcast player if you don’t want to miss the next episode. If you’re really keen, give us a review on Apple podcasts. 

Finally, honks, barks and shouts are all part of the recording from home experience here in Kathmandu. However, from the next episode you might have to say goodbye to that 'taste of the street'. Stay tuned.

Resources

Hami Daju Vai on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram.

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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How do Nepalis put up with this government; they’re too patient! is a statement I’ve repeated regularly in the 15 years that I’ve been linked to this country. In fact, in 1990 and 2006 the people had had enough and launched movements, or revolutions, that contributed to dramatic redesigns of the country: in 1990, the return to democracy and in 2006, the creation of a republic that included Maoist rebels who had just signed a ceasefire.

Earlier this year a third movement was born after the prime minister, mired in a major crisis within his own political party, shut down Parliament. Like its predecessors, this movement signalled its arrival with street protests but they were much smaller than the ones I remember from 2006, and this time — perhaps because of Covid-19 — revolution was not in the air in Kathmandu. In fact, I only knew about the birth of the movement when someone tweeted it.

But after speaking to today’s guest from Brihat Nagarik Andolan, Bhaskar Gautam, it seems right that this movement is not bringing hundreds of thousands of chanting, banner-waving Nepalis to the streets. Yes, the previous revolutions were monumental but somehow this movement’s aim to create a fully participatory democracy with all of Nepal’s citizens as equal partners seems a much higher goal, requiring not an explosion of people power but a sustained, unrelenting push against the weight of history.

Just a reminder that we’re still recording remotely, from home, so you may hear sounds of Kathmandu in the background, among them vehicle horns honking, dogs barking and vendors calling.

With that in mind, I’m slightly reluctant to ask for your feedback. Just kidding. As always, you can email me at [email protected] or share your thoughts via the Instagram, Facebook or Twitter accounts of Nepal Now. If you haven’t already, don’t forget to like, follow or favourite the show on Anchor, Apple or Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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Building back better. The green recovery. Sustainable transformation. It seems I’ve been reading those phrases time and again during the past pandemic year. And sometimes I wonder if they’re just attempts to find a bright spot amid the devastation of Covid-19. Or are they a sincere recognition that something fundamental must change if we humans want to continue living life on this planet as we’ve known it till now?

I must admit that I’m scared for the future that my daughter and her friends will face, mainly because of almost daily images of climate catastrophes: melting glaciers, deadly cold snaps in places like Texas and bleak, brown Himalayan peaks that I can see from my home on a clear day.

But in positive moments I am heartened by reports of gigantic solar and wind farms replacing fossil fuel sources and the accelerating uptake of electric vehicles. That’s why I was happy to see a recent study about the positive and negative consequences of Covid-19 on Nepal’s quest to reach the global Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. Today’s guest, Sijal Pokhrel, is one of nearly four dozen experts who did that work. Recalling our chat, I think her clarity and optimism encourage me maybe as much as the study results themselves.

If you enjoy today’s episode, don’t forget to like, follow or favourite Nepal Now. We’re on most of the major podcast players, including Spotify — which just became available here in Nepal. Stay updated with the show on Instagram, Twitter or Facebook; you can write to me at [email protected].

Resources

Study: Covid-19 challenges and opportunities in Nepal

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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When I first moved to Nepal 16 years ago every few years I would read a report in the daily newspaper about the road network reaching a remote village. The driver and passengers would have garlands of marigolds draped around their necks, red tika pressed to their foreheads, and a celebration would follow. The reason was simple: most people were confident that more roads would bring more development.

Today’s guest has first-hand knowledge of the road-building phenomenon. Phurwa Dhondup is a native of Dolpo district who has studied the building of a major road in Humla district. Both places are in the Karnali, Nepal’s least developed region, and its most remote.

Phurwa is a Ph.D. student in geography at the University of Colorado Boulder, USA. He does research on state-building and socio-environmental change in the Himalayan borderlands, and focuses on the intersections of Indigenous environmental governance, national and international conservation agendas, and infrastructure development in Dolpo.

Phurwa is quick to point out that he is not anti-road, and that building roads like the Hilsa-Simikot route in Humla will lead to structural transformation and positive benefits like easier access to health care. But he wants more people to go beyond the bad-road/good-road discourse to examine the process of road-building, specifically to identify the winners and losers and how their lives are changed.

If you enjoy this episode, please like, follow or subscribe to Nepal Now wherever you listen to podcasts. You can reach me at [email protected] and chat with us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

One note: Phurwa uses the word bikas throughout our chat. It is the Nepali word for development.

Resources

Phurwa's paper — Challenging infrastructural orthodoxies: Political and economic geographies of a Himalayan road

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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Nearly 200 countries, Nepal included, are scheduled to meet in Scotland in November to discuss how to respond to climate change. One of the items on the agenda will be how much money wealthier countries will commit to transferring to so-called developing countries to adapt to the impacts of climate change and to ‘green’ their own economies.

Notably, rich countries haven’t come anywhere close to meeting their $100-billion-dollar pledge for 2020, an amount that they promised to provide yearly until 2025. An estimate from Oxfam tallies the dollars delivered in 2017-18 at, at most, $22 billion, as you’ll hear in today’s episode with Raju Pandit Chhetri of Prakriti Resources Centre.

The clock is ticking. On February 7th a glacier collapsed in the Indian Himalaya sending a devastating torrent of ice, water and mud downstream, where it flattened settlements, ploughed through roads and bridges, nearly destroyed two dams, and killed at least 26 people. Nearly 200 more are still missing. The exact cause of the event is being probed but one theory points to a high-altitude lake that burst its banks. This is known as a glacial lake outburst flood, or GLOF. Last September a report warned that 47 such GLOFs were at risk of occurring in the Himalaya, including 21 in Nepal.

Such climate disasters are costly. Each time a GLOF, flood or landslide happens, it is governments that must rescue and resettle those displaced, and rebuild infrastructure, spending precious resources that should be invested in health, education or other key development sectors. Which makes it more important than ever that wealthy countries deliver the resources that they promise.

Despite the existential challenge posed by climate change, Raju Pandit Chhetri is optimistic that rich and poor countries can cooperate to respond more effectively.

If you enjoy this episode, please like, follow or subscribe to Nepal Now. We’d also appreciate a review on Apple Podcasts. You can email me at [email protected] and chat with the show on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.

Resources

Prakriti Resources Centre (PRC)

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

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Advocates for women were excited last year when they heard that changes were coming to Nepal’s rape law, which has long been criticized as ineffective. On this show we spoke to youth activists who had met with the attorney general and other lawmakers and were energized and excited by the process. But when the ordinance containing the revisions was signed by the president, not all of the rumoured improvements were there. Left out was removal of the statute of limitations that says a rape charge must be filed within one year and broadening of the scope of victims of rape to include men, boys and persons of other genders.

So what happened? My reading and discussion afterwards led me to believe that entrenched women’s groups had been defending their turf: they didn’t want the focus to turn from women as the only possible victims of rape, and risk losing attention and resources for their work. But as today’s conversation with Anita Thapalia from the Legal Aid and Consultancy Centre reveals, it was more complex than that.

If you enjoy this episode, don’t forget to follow, like or favourite Nepal Now on your usual podcast platform. You’ll find us on Google, Spotify and Apple podcasts, and many more. You can learn more about the show on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, where you can follow us for updates. I’m at [email protected] if you’d like to send me an email.

Resources

Legal Aid and Consultancy Centre (LACC)

Nepal Now social links

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Thanks as always to Nikunja Nepal for advice and inspiration.

Music: amaretto needs ice ... by urmymuse (c) copyright 2018 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial  (3.0) license. http://dig.ccmixter.org/files/urmymuse/57996 Ft: Apoxode

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Nepal Now is produced and hosted by Marty Logan.