Taking a few days out of my work in Baglung back in June, my boss, Paul, Mackenzie and I did a 4 day trip to Muktinath and back from Beni. It was during the rainy season so the journey to Muktinath was in itself an adventure. I decided to make this an experimental slideshow/podcast and not add in any narration to the audio that I took during the trip. I learned a lot on how to do a better job next time. More advice is welcome!

The COCAP radio show is well received but is currently in need of funding to cover the airtime for the shows once a week. I put together the following video to explain the need for the show in the Western region.

Jashoda Sharma. I heard her impassioned speech to political leaders, set against the backdrop of a village school. I witnessed her appearance as an honoured guest in the government office on International Torture Day. On both occasions she appeared as an advocate, a victims’ spokesperson. This evening, sitting on her daughter’s bed, sipping her Nepali tea, with a birthday card and Avril Lavigne plastered wall as her backdrop, the story I expected of poverty and injustice revealed instead a love story: a picture of a man, not an income-generating item. A man stolen by the government.

Surya Prasad Sharma: from the Baglung district, son to local farmers, blessed with the simple, comfortable life sought by many Nepalis. As a Brahmin, he did not have to face the discrimination felt by many from lower castes, but as a human he was deeply affected by the inequality he saw around him.

She told me, unprovoked, about the first time she met her husband. The tears of her damp eyes were not that of someone talking about the terrible injustice she suffered. The tears, contrasted by her smile, came as she relived moments of love. These are the moments that we cannot repeat but memories of which sometimes blissfully interrupt our routines – tending to the shop, cooking for the kids, bathing, cleaning, folding the laundry – allowing us to again understand the beauty that has been life and the beauty that will be life again.

It was Saturday, holy day, dawn. After the recent passing of his first wife, he was mournfully at the temple performing his weekly religious acts to the Goddess Kalika. Jashoda saw him through a tender lens never before used for this longtime family friend. She felt compelled to nurture him. The three kilometer walk home witnessed a respectful physical distance between them, but through the frequent locking of eyes they both understood an emotional closeness later sealed through marriage.

I could not bring myself to stop the slow creation of her husband in my mind and notebook, the chiseling of contours that formed his identity and theirs together, to ask her such questions as “What sort of monetary compensation do you want?”

The golden era of her life. Jashoda’s voice filled with pride as she spoke about the best qualities of Surya Sharma. As a husband, he is loving in ways that are striking in traditional societies in Nepal. For example, during her pregnancy, her husband made her get regular doctor check-ups, not a common practice in the area at the time. She is an equal partner, inputting her opinion in family decision-making. As a Nepali, he was equally loving to the community. When woman were raped by their husbands, and Dalits were assaulted by those around them, he would go out of his way to fight for justice to be seen. Once, she recalled, a Brahmin husband whose Chetri wife bore her four sons, suddenly turned on her, refusing to even drink the water she served. She appealed to the party for help and Surya Sharma acted, as he often did, as a mediator, successfully finding peace through dialogue.

He found peers within supporters of the communist ideals, also sick of the injustice wrought within Nepal based on circumstances of birth. His involvement in the CPNM (Communist Party of Nepal Maoist) was strictly ideological, and not to do with the PLA (People’s Liberation Army). In 1997, he was arrested by the police, then jailed, tortured and beaten for 15 days, as occurred to many supporters at the time. The police repeatedly checked in on him and his family, finally forcing him to go underground.

Nepali date Magh 1, 2058. Festival of Maghé Sankranti. It was 05:00. Her husband had snuck into the flat around midnight. She lay with him, fighting all their political boundaries, their social boundaries, by abolishing physical boundaries pressing her bare skin against his. When they banged on the door she remembers shouting at them to wait while she dressed. Her daughters, 11 and 12, both old enough to remember but young enough not to fully understand, were in the room next door, able to hear the final sounds of the golden era. The government’s army surrounded the flat, while Captain Krishna Bahadur Khadka and Jamadar Keshar Jang GC entered and searched every private corner of their small room. She ran after them to the army barrack’s gates pleading and demanding information about her husband, repeating her pleas day after day.

Seven years later, Jashoda is still demanding information about her husband. Her appeal, now public, is made government officials, at conferences, and in front of journalists and cameras. She waits for someone to tell her if her dreams, and nightmares of his face and his body are simply in her mind, or if they could be true.

Shubha Bala and Heather Gilberds

We recently met someone who is working in transitional justice, specifically the issue of disappeared persons, in post-war Nepal. Knowing very little about the conflict between the government and the Maoist Communist Party of Nepal (CPN-M), we were quickly drawn into the story of a country that is still very much living amongst the specters of its history. With the hope of gaining a small insight into the very real ghosts that Nepal is currently grappling with, we have together decided to examine the issue of disappeared persons more closely. In conducting preliminary research and speaking with a few people who are involved in the issue, we are coming to discover a confusing, poorly documented, tangled mess of something called “transitional justice” and “compensation” with respect to those whose lives were irreparably altered by the actions of two parties vying for control of the Himalayan Kingdom.

Although a great deal of international press coverage during the war focused on the inhumane, guerilla tactics of the PLA, on a quantitative scale, the estimated 3,000 murders perpetrated by the Maoists during this period were low compared to the 11,000 that are attributable to the Monarch. More than 1200 Nepalis are still missing as a result of the decades long state-Maoist conflict. Contrary to popular belief within the international community, it is estimated that 85% of people who disappeared were kidnapped by the state, and that only 15% of disappearances were perpetrated by Maoists.

Many of the missing persons were not politically affiliated. Those who were politically involved were CPN-M members and supporters from rural districts. Most were not involved with the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) - the Maoist rebel groups who perpetrated wide-spread violence throughout the country between 1996 and 2006 - but were peaceful supporters who disseminated the ideals and philosophies of the party to the villages. Many came from ethnic and cultural groups who are traditionally marginalized by the history of caste hierarchy and feudalism in Nepal. As such, the communist philosophy of the Maoists, which spoke of egalitarianism, the rise of the oppressed, and the end of caste-based social hierarchy, offered them hope and idealism for a life free from the severe disadvantage they faced under monarchical rule. Enforced disappearances are cases in which people were taken into custody by one or the other side of the conflict. The fate of these individuals has never been discerned as authorities denied all knowledge of their whereabouts. There are at least 1200 people on the disappeared persons list in Nepal. Although this number is based on a conversation we had with someone who is working on disappeared persons cases but prefers to remain unnamed, there is a great deal of discrepancy over the number of people who disappeared during the government’s war with Maoist insurgents. Human Rights Watch puts the number much higher than 1200 and attributes the lower numbers found in many reports to the obstacles faced in getting accurate information from remote villages. Nepal’s challenging terrain, coupled with inexperienced human rights organizations working in the early stages of the conflict, and a caste-based system that excludes people from social forums, have led many to believe that cases of disappearances are significantly underreported in Nepal.

In trying to bring to light the Nepali government’s counterinsurgency actions during the war and challenge the common perception that the majority of civilian abuses were carried out by the Maoists, it is nonetheless important to give due condemnation with regards to the Maoists’ actions. If Maoist-issued disappearances rank far less than government ones, it is, in part, due to the fact that the Maoists publicly tortured and executed many of their captives, forcing family members and friends to witness it. As such, there was no need to cover up civilian killings.

Clearly no one side holds the moral scepter in Nepal’s “People’s War”. The lack of awareness about the Nepali government’s abhorrent human rights record during the war on the part of the international community as well as the lack of governmental retribution and compensation for the victims’ families in the post-war climate are wrongs that need to be rectified for a ‘Naya Nepal’ to emerge from the ashes of its history. With the abolishment of the monarchy and the shift to a federal republic, Nepal is currently in a state of political reform. Previously disadvantaged groups are lobbying for an end to social marginalization and political exclusion. Many people are seeking retribution and transitional justice for losses suffered during the war. However, in this age of political upheaval where many previously unheard voices are shouting for their rights, the government is content to bury the mistakes of the past and look towards the future. Yet,the families of the disappeared persons cannot forget the errors of the past. As citizens, the wives and children of these victims are living in extreme poverty. As Hindus, they are unable to perform final rights without a body. As individuals, they want to know if their family members are dead or alive and they seek closure.

Shubha Bala and Heather Gilberds will be posting a series of blogs on the issue of transitional justice and disappeared persons in Nepal. Shubha plans to interview families of the victims, government officials, and NGO workers to bring to light the governments’ lack of response and compensation towards them. Heather hopes to explore issues of caste hierarchy and social marginalization and how these factors related to CPN-M membership and subsequent human rights abuses. She will also examine the role of journalists and the challenges they faced in reporting the abuses perpetrated by the government army during the conflict as well as the difficulties they continue to confront in post-conflict Nepal.

“Sure the other hotel is cheaper, but after a week of all the others being there, they found out it is run by lower caste people. I mean, now there was no point in them moving hotels since they had already been there a week, but had they known before they definitely would have stayed with us.” – Friends of mine at my hotel.

I am surrounded by NGO workers constantly discussing rights for the lower castes. Most of these conversations, I believe, have been with people of the lower castes themselves, and they have generally been pretty abstract and non-specific in terms of the current injustices. This often makes it hard to understand what it really feels like, and what the day-to-day impacts really are from an unbiased perspective.

For a couple of weeks now, Baglung has been hosting train-the-teacher classes for government school English teachers, so I’ve been lucky enough have two English speaking Nepalis staying at my hotel with me. I’ve had conversations about everything I can possibly think of before I lose this simple pleasure after they are gone. Last night, we were discussing how they came to stay in this hotel (the main hotel was full). Our hotel costs a bit more, and the service is worse (but the view and patio makes it worth it), and, they told me, the other hotel is owned by a lower caste. It is always a shock to find out people you are friends with, people you respect, are discriminatory. But it is interesting to realize that even these upper caste people, originally from villages but having lived in Kathmandu for a long time, have these feelings etched into their psyche. They admit quite freely that their thoughts are morally wrong, scientifically unfounded, yet, they say, the feeling is so strong in them it is quite hard to fight against. So, if even these educated Nepalis, living in the most urban city, can refuse someone their business based on caste, then how hopeless does it seem in the villages where there isn’t even an acceptance that their thoughts are possibly irrational?

Myself as someone whose family is from a high caste in India (I believe unnoticed by those I work with), I’m acutely aware of the anti-Brahmin sentiment that seems to exist in the circles I frequent. It makes me skeptical that an effort to achieve equality can be fought for by emphasizing the existing divide, for example by having a quota system. But even my seemingly prejudice hotel friends have pointed out that if you have a Brahmin decision maker in the government, he will ultimately only hire other Brahmins whether consciously or not, just as they themselves have these feelings worn into their bodies that are impossible to erase. They said that the next generation of minority castes in quota positions will most likely seek a sort of revenge and only hire from within their caste, but then after a generation of that, things will start to even out and people will start to become simply Nepalese. I wonder what India will look like then, in 20 years time?

I’m reminded of how little I know of how discrimination has been handled in America when they start to make various gay jokes making me cringe. It reminds me of my first corporate culture experience, an organization composed of mainly young people, where I happily observed that with my generation, in urban centres, it is finally worse to be labeled homophobic than it is to be labeled homosexual. We also have far to go, but change can happen, albeit very slowly.

(Note: For those who haven't heard of this and want to be shattered by their own subconscious discrimination, visit implicit.harvard.edu)

Today's unexpected adventure was a local Hindu temple. Just a 10
minute walk, it's supposed to be the most beautiful Hindu temple in
the Baglung district (the capital of which has only about three roads
but possibly an ATM). Many things, we learn, can be deceiving in
Baglung. For example breakfast at my hotel:
Me: Do you have breakfast here?
Guy: Yes ma'am (hands me the menu)
Me after perusing my options: Porridge and milk please
Guy: Oh we don't have that today
Me: Oh hm…how about the Indian breakfast?
Guy: Oh no. Not that either.
Me: Oh. Um. Well what do you have?
Guy: Simple breakfast (eggs and toast)
Me: Oh. I don't eat eggs. Ok toast and chia (chai) then.
This repeated for a couple of days until I realized the menu was for
display purposes only. He still does hand me the menu every morning,
but I'm smart enough just to ask for toast. Similarly my bathroom has
a "hot" and "cold" knob for the showers, where the hot one is
apparently also for display purposes only.

So when I agreed to go for a nice walk to the Hindu temple and look at
some Gods for a few minutes, I should have realized my already
not-so-positive expectations of a Hindu temple would also be
shattered. On the gorgeous forest path just inside the temple
grounds, we passed a family with two small children and a goat.
Yogendra said "ah they are cutting that". "Cutting…what?".
"Goat…cutting, yes?" "You mean sacrificing?" "Yes sacrificing. You
want to see?" "Um…no not really." Proceeded by a short discussion of
my astonishment that they still sacrifice animals sometimes in
Hinduism.

Finally, we show up at the temple grounds and take a little turn of
them. This watery red line, which I foolishly told myself must be the
stuff we put on our forehead, makes a perfect square around the Kali
pagoda in the centre. We return to the front of the temple and there
are two sectioned off squares specifically for goat AND PIGEON
sacrifices. Let me interrupt by saying this is not a big temple
grounds. It's about the size of a two-bedroom apartment in New York.
You cannot NOT see the sacrifices. They're averaging about one goat
every couple of minutes, and I think some of the younger people were
in charge of pigeons so they were even faster.

I shied my eyes away as we walked to the donation table, but there on
my path, immediately in front of me, lay a dark brown body with a big
dark red oval where the neck was. I walk calmly to the table and
start talking to another friend of mine, when glancing back at the
dark brown goat body I notice there is now a headless beige one added
to the mix, with its legs still twitching!! A boy walks by carrying a
goat head and two decapitated pigeons.

I have been struggling with the lack of Internet connection in Baglung, and how difficult that makes it to be an advocate, or even secure resources for grassroots projects. In preparation for my 2 days in Kathmandu, I told my mother that around 6 pm, I would finally be online to talk to her. This is the conversation she later emailed me, informing me she was worried someone had kidnapped me. Let this be a lesson on the importance of logging out of msn from a cybercafe!

Sheila says:
log on to skype
shubby says:
I am madhav
Sheila says:
who is madhav?
Sheila says:
where is Shubha?
shubby says:
I don't know i am from baglung nepal
Sheila says:
you are logged into my daughter's msn
Sheila says:
where is she now?
shubby says:
no automatically apper my email id
Sheila says:
mmm
Sheila says:
it shows to me as shubby !!!
Sheila says:
my daughter
Sheila says:
she is in baglung
shubby says:
oh mum where are you
shubby says:
where
shubby says:
i tried to meet him give her name---
hope you are OK. Please reply as soon as you see this
Amma

Link: http://www.shubhabala.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/PodcastThree.mp3

Please listen to my third podcast on the women's constituent assembly meeting that I attended here.

Link: http://shubhabala.com/2008/06/01/episode-two-new-republic-day/

Please listen to my republic day podcast here.

Two weeks ago I was anxious about living for 2 ½ months in a rural area with no internet access and a slow life pace. But then I arrived in Thammel, Kathmandu. Mostly Kathmandu reminds me of Madras but with friendlier people. Thammel is almost like Jaco, Costa Rica. It’s unlike any tourist strip I’ve ever been to in South Asia. If you’re lost in Kathmandu and wander around enough, eventually you will see a “Tattoos, Piercings, and Dreadlocks” sign and know you’re on the right track. After the week spent there, I now look forward to the peace and serenity of Baglung where I am headed next Monday. Until then, I’ve happily resigned myself to eating pizza in Nepal, recognizing how much I will soon miss it.

My second reason for being excited about Baglung is that, as someone who still can’t get her bearings in the New York grid system, the unnamed, windy streets of Kathmandu are a nightmare. And when every other store is a convenient type store, landmarks are impossible to come by. I bet even I can’t get lost down the one road in Baglung, although perhaps I overestimate myself.

Many things have surprised me here based on my expectations I formed with India as a baseline:
1. There is a dearth of cockroaches. I’ve only seen two so far and one was already dead
2. I have only used one non-Western toilet in the whole week I’ve been here, although I have mostly been in Thammel
3. Nepali food is sort of like North Indian food but with a few things forgotten. For example, they sell roasted corn on the street, but omit the chili powder. They make lassis with curd not buttermilk, so even the salt lassi is basically sweet
4. Kathmandu is much more expensive than I thought it would be. I’ve decided to push most of my shopping out to Baglung

However, on the predictable side, the Canadian-Indian issue has already come up many times. I receive looks of disbelief when I claim to be Canadian. Last night, out of pure exhaustion, I stopped explaining when people told me I was Indian and stumbled across a great secret: if I define myself as South Indian then it apparently explains away my funny accent, clothes, and lack of ability to speak Hindi. I dread the day when I get outed by a Tamil speaker, a mother tongue which sadly I don’t speak either.

This morning, I woke up again trying to figure out where, when, and why I am. The past 5 days have been hectic: moving my stuff into storage, packing for training, and preparing for my summer in Nepal. On the 29th, I will be in the village of Baglung where I can finally settle into a home for a couple of months. Until then, 8 homes in 13 days (including the cozy seat of Virgin Airlines). After that, I stop focusing on whether I forgot my toothbrush, and think about how to ensure minority and disadvantage groups in Nepal do not get overlooked during the next couple of years of political restructuring.

I am going to COCAP Radio, a new radio program promoting human rights and effective governance in the Western region of Nepal. Having done development work in the past, I go in with no expectations for my work. Or rather, I go with the expectation of slowness and having to figure things out for myself. My first audio podcast (details below) is a conversation I had in March about why I’m doing this, what I was worried about, and what my hopes were.

The past few weeks though have increased and decreased my anxieties. On the bright side: I don’t have TB, I got what is likely my 8th Hep B shot so I should be pretty immune to that, and I don’t have to take malaria meds so no hallucinations for me (but possible malaria)! On the dull side: after convincing me of the danger of rabies, the doctor then realized I have no time for my rabies shot and just advised me to stay away from rabid animals, I am already going through withdrawal in anticipation of not having Internet access, and I have come to the very sad decision to dye my hair black after a beautiful one year run of pink.

Podcast:
Click here to listen to my first podcast, which I intend to release when I have net access. You can also subscribe to it through RSS (the RSS link here will not pick up the audio audio) or by searching for it in iTunes eventually. Bear with me as I’m switching from Pro Tools and trying to find new editing software but haven’t settled on one yet.