| Username |
Post |
| Anon |
Posted
on 14-Dec-01 05:20 PM
Prachanda Found Dead: A Fiction
By A Reporter, The Gorkha Chronicler.
BAISHAKH 17, 2061 BS, CHITWAN - Samyukta Janamorcha candidate for the upcoming House of Representatives elections from Chitwan Constituency no.4, Puspakamal Dahal aka Prachanda, was found dead at his Shivanagar house this morning a little after 4.30 am, police sources confirm. Mr. Dahal seemed to have sustained serious head injuries from a machete before bleeding to death. The machete with a clear ‘Bhojpur Irons, Dingla’ inscription was found lying next to an unconscious Mr. Dahal. The house, a modest two storied edifice roofed by green Hulas corrugated tin, was cordoned off as additional policemen from the district headquarters, Bharatpur, were summoned to the site, as were medical staff from the Yagyapuri-based BP Koirala Cancer and General Hospital. District Superintendent of Police, Resham Bahadur Gurung told reporters that the attack seemed “swift, orchestrated, and professional”. He declined to comment further citing ongoing investigation.
An orderly, well-behaved crowd gathered outside Mr. Dahal’s house after around 6am, but no disruption was reported. “People are curious about the incident, but are indifferent to the victim”, said Sumitra Pun, a neighbor. Another local resident, Chet Prasad Bajgain, a professor at the recently renamed alma mater of Prachanda’s, Rampur Agricultural University added, “While people welcomed his dramatic transition from a self-styled guerilla commander to a reluctant parliamentary candidate after last year’s dissolution of The Party, he clearly made many enemies during his adventurous flirtation with a flawed ideology, and a threat to his life had been known to have been issued through multiple channels.”
Mr. Bajgain’s referral to ‘The Party’ evokes memories of one of the most tragic events in Nepal’s modern history. Between 2053 BS and 2059 BS, Prachanda led a bloody insurgency against the people and state of the Himalayan Kingdom, poorest in the continent of Asia, seeking to overthrow the monarchy and radically alter the form of democratic polity. Initial popular support in remote areas for his movement waned as reports of indiscriminate violence, ideological corruption, extortion, and rogue indiscipline on the part of his activists became commonplace. The so-called ‘People’s War’ of the CPN (Maoist) claimed over 2000 lives before a belated intervention of the Nepal Army quelled and disarmed most of its cadres. Exact figures remain undisclosed, but the five-month long army operation reportedly killed over 1300 Maoist militias, and disarmed over 2500. Army and police casualty figures have not been revealed but defense sources privately admit around 140 sainiks may have fallen. Substantially weakened, the political wing of The Party was then forced to surrender arms, denounce violence as a ‘political strategy’ and negotiate a truce with the then Congress government’s embattled premier Sher Deuba. In return for the Party’s re-entry into the political mainstream, minor amendments to the constitution were promised, and a progressive land-reform ordinance was promulgated. A splinter group led by Comrade Agni branded Prachanda’s surrender a “grand betrayal” and “an act of deplorable revisionism”, and vowed to keep the “spirit of revolution” alive. The Agni faction with under 70 supporters was believed to have fled Nepal to take refuge in the Indian State of Jharkhand. Another Maoist leader, Baburam Bhattrai, a former architect described as an ‘ambitious charlatan and a dangerous eccentric’, has not been seen in public since the 2059 “Jiri Samjhauta”, named after the venue of last-minute negotiations in the Swiss-like Dolakha town between Maoist envoy Krishna Bahadur Mahara and Deuba’s number 2 in the cabinet, Chiranjivi Wagle. Bhattarai’s wife, Hisila Yemi, and daughter, are believed to have accepted the invitation “to live for as long as it took to feel safe” with a former nurse and part-time volunteer of the now defunct Revolutionary Worker’s Party, Priscilla Tits, in Newcastle, England, who Ms. Yemi befriended as a British Council funded graduate student a decade earlier.
While DSP Gurung declined to speculate, local residents believe it was a disgruntled cadre from the Agni faction, surreptitiously entering the Chitwan National Park from Bihar, who might have carried out the attack. “Everyone knew Prachanda would be killed one day – rebels loyal to Agni had issued unequivocal threats through their mouthpiece, ‘Saptahik Bidroha’, but this timing was unexpected”, said Mukti Ratna Piya of the Birendra Bahumukhi Campus. Believing it would be a public relations disaster, the government had declined to offer security to Prachanda, and he had resorted to protection of around eight of his former cadres, armed at best with Saal Latthis, who accompanied him on his guilt-ridden, low-profile campaign tours around south-west Chitwan. Later in the day, DSP Gurung was quoted as joking to his colleagues that a ‘clean and hygienic, or sinitta’ nature of the attack was only possible by a lone actor, and while Agni’s men are prime suspects, a bitter family member from one of the Maoists' many innocent victims during the people’s war cannot be ruled out. “The perpetrator could be an angry ex-serviceman inspired by tales of revenge in Hindi blockbusters” surmises Dilli Bhurtel ‘Michael’, a local tea-shop owner.
Civil society groups had objected to Deuba’s unconditional pardoning of the Maoist Party after their surrender in 2059 BS. Many had argued that Prachanda and his party had committed a grave crime against humanity, and ought to have been tried as per the laws of the land. Deuba had argued that the deal was a “realpolitik compulsion.” Police sources say, private threats to Prachanda’s life from citizens were also known to have existed. “There is of course a possibility that one of Prachanda’s own bodyguards could have been persuaded by the Agni faction to ‘safaya’ their former leader during, literally, one of his bouts of a krantikari sapana”, adds Mukti Ratna Piya with a broad grin that would ordinarily have been incongruous with an occasion of death, but on this unromantic and oppressively hot Chitwan day, seemed quite a befitting eulogy to a polite boy who, blinded by archaic politics, had turned into an evil man without, perhaps, quite realizing it.
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 14-Dec-01 05:20 PM
Prachanda Found Dead: A Fiction
By A Reporter, The Gorkha Chronicler.
BAISHAKH 17, 2061 BS, CHITWAN - Samyukta Janamorcha candidate for the upcoming House of Representatives elections from Chitwan Constituency no.4, Puspakamal Dahal aka Prachanda, was found dead at his Shivanagar house this morning a little after 4.30 am, police sources confirm. Mr. Dahal seemed to have sustained serious head injuries from a machete before bleeding to death. The machete with a clear ‘Bhojpur Irons, Dingla’ inscription was found lying next to an unconscious Mr. Dahal. The house, a modest two storied edifice roofed by green Hulas corrugated tin, was cordoned off as additional policemen from the district headquarters, Bharatpur, were summoned to the site, as were medical staff from the Yagyapuri-based BP Koirala Cancer and General Hospital. District Superintendent of Police, Resham Bahadur Gurung told reporters that the attack seemed “swift, orchestrated, and professional”. He declined to comment further citing ongoing investigation.
An orderly, well-behaved crowd gathered outside Mr. Dahal’s house after around 6am, but no disruption was reported. “People are curious about the incident, but are indifferent to the victim”, said Sumitra Pun, a neighbor. Another local resident, Chet Prasad Bajgain, a professor at the recently renamed alma mater of Prachanda’s, Rampur Agricultural University added, “While people welcomed his dramatic transition from a self-styled guerilla commander to a reluctant parliamentary candidate after last year’s dissolution of The Party, he clearly made many enemies during his adventurous flirtation with a flawed ideology, and a threat to his life had been known to have been issued through multiple channels.”
Mr. Bajgain’s referral to ‘The Party’ evokes memories of one of the most tragic events in Nepal’s modern history. Between 2053 BS and 2059 BS, Prachanda led a bloody insurgency against the people and state of the Himalayan Kingdom, poorest in the continent of Asia, seeking to overthrow the monarchy and radically alter the form of democratic polity. Initial popular support in remote areas for his movement waned as reports of indiscriminate violence, ideological corruption, extortion, and rogue indiscipline on the part of his activists became commonplace. The so-called ‘People’s War’ of the CPN (Maoist) claimed over 2000 lives before a belated intervention of the Nepal Army quelled and disarmed most of its cadres. Exact figures remain undisclosed, but the five-month long army operation reportedly killed over 1300 Maoist militias, and disarmed over 2500. Army and police casualty figures have not been revealed but defense sources privately admit around 140 sainiks may have fallen. Substantially weakened, the political wing of The Party was then forced to surrender arms, denounce violence as a ‘political strategy’ and negotiate a truce with the then Congress government’s embattled premier Sher Deuba. In return for the Party’s re-entry into the political mainstream, minor amendments to the constitution were promised, and a progressive land-reform ordinance was promulgated. A splinter group led by Comrade Agni branded Prachanda’s surrender a “grand betrayal” and “an act of deplorable revisionism”, and vowed to keep the “spirit of revolution” alive. The Agni faction with under 70 supporters was believed to have fled Nepal to take refuge in the Indian State of Jharkhand. Another Maoist leader, Baburam Bhattrai, a former architect described as an ‘ambitious charlatan and a dangerous eccentric’, has not been seen in public since the 2059 “Jiri Samjhauta”, named after the venue of last-minute negotiations in the Swiss-like Dolakha town between Maoist envoy Krishna Bahadur Mahara and Deuba’s number 2 in the cabinet, Chiranjivi Wagle. Bhattarai’s wife, Hisila Yemi, and daughter, are believed to have accepted the invitation “to live for as long as it took to feel safe” with a former nurse and part-time volunteer of the now defunct Revolutionary Worker’s Party, Priscilla Tits, in Newcastle, England, who Ms. Yemi befriended as a British Council funded graduate student a decade earlier.
While DSP Gurung declined to speculate, local residents believe it was a disgruntled cadre from the Agni faction, surreptitiously entering the Chitwan National Park from Bihar, who might have carried out the attack. “Everyone knew Prachanda would be killed one day – rebels loyal to Agni had issued unequivocal threats through their mouthpiece, ‘Saptahik Bidroha’, but this timing was unexpected”, said Mukti Ratna Piya of the Birendra Bahumukhi Campus. Believing it would be a public relations disaster, the government had declined to offer security to Prachanda, and he had resorted to protection of around eight of his former cadres, armed at best with Saal Latthis, who accompanied him on his guilt-ridden, low-profile campaign tours around south-west Chitwan. Later in the day, DSP Gurung was quoted as joking to his colleagues that a ‘clean and hygienic, or sinitta’ nature of the attack was only possible by a lone actor, and while Agni’s men are prime suspects, a bitter family member from one of the Maoists' many innocent victims during the people’s war cannot be ruled out. “The perpetrator could be an angry ex-serviceman inspired by tales of revenge in Hindi blockbusters” surmises Dilli Bhurtel ‘Michael’, a local tea-shop owner.
Civil society groups had objected to Deuba’s unconditional pardoning of the Maoist Party after their surrender in 2059 BS. Many had argued that Prachanda and his party had committed a grave crime against humanity, and ought to have been tried as per the laws of the land. Deuba had argued that the deal was a “realpolitik compulsion.” Police sources say, private threats to Prachanda’s life from citizens were also known to have existed. “There is of course a possibility that one of Prachanda’s own bodyguards could have been persuaded by the Agni faction to ‘safaya’ their former leader during, literally, one of his bouts of a krantikari sapana”, adds Mukti Ratna Piya with a broad grin that would ordinarily have been incongruous with an occasion of death, but on this unromantic and oppressively hot Chitwan day, seemed quite a befitting eulogy to a polite boy who, blinded by archaic politics, had turned into an evil man without, perhaps, quite realizing it.
|
| le chef du nuit |
Posted
on 15-Dec-01 05:57 AM
good fking riddance
|
| le chef du nuit |
Posted
on 15-Dec-01 05:57 AM
good fking riddance
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 15-Dec-01 03:19 PM
Prachanda Prataapi Bhoopati. What about him ?
Anon, you forgot to add this at the end of your fiction,
...... And, thereafter, Prachanda Prataapi Bhoopati, making a permanent alliance with corrupt politicians, mafia and elite, ruled Nepal happily for a very long long time. Sunnelaai sunko maalaa, bhannelaai phulko maalaa, yo kathaa baikuntha jaai jaalaa !!
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 15-Dec-01 03:19 PM
Prachanda Prataapi Bhoopati. What about him ?
Anon, you forgot to add this at the end of your fiction,
...... And, thereafter, Prachanda Prataapi Bhoopati, making a permanent alliance with corrupt politicians, mafia and elite, ruled Nepal happily for a very long long time. Sunnelaai sunko maalaa, bhannelaai phulko maalaa, yo kathaa baikuntha jaai jaalaa !!
|
| ashu |
Posted
on 16-Dec-01 06:14 AM
Hi Anon,
Whoever you are, I have become an instant fan of your creativity and your sense of humor, not to mention your writing style. This "news" was/is very, very interesting, and I took the liberty to forward this to many people in Nepal.
Hope you regularly come here with your "news".
BTW, do you visit http://www.satirewire.com too? :-)
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
|
| ashu |
Posted
on 16-Dec-01 06:14 AM
Hi Anon,
Whoever you are, I have become an instant fan of your creativity and your sense of humor, not to mention your writing style. This "news" was/is very, very interesting, and I took the liberty to forward this to many people in Nepal.
Hope you regularly come here with your "news".
BTW, do you visit http://www.satirewire.com too? :-)
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 16-Dec-01 12:34 PM
Dilli Bhurtel Denies Statement
By A Reporter, The Gorkha Chronicler.
Baishakh 20, 2061 Bikram Sambat, Kathmandu – Dilli Bhurtel ‘Michael’, a tea shop owner in Shivanagar, Chitwan, quoted in this newspaper in its Baishakh 17 exclusive on the death of former Maoist leader Prachanda denies the statement attributed to him that he guessed it was an “angry ex-serviceman inspired by Hindi blockbusters” who might have assassinated Prachanda.
“The quote is malicious, and continues with the time honored tradition among journalists based in Narayani Zone to practice ‘pitta patrakarita’, fabricate whimsical quotes, and attribute them to unsuspecting folks from the working class to sell their failing newspapers,” writes Mr. Bhurtel who is also the Ward General Secretary of the left-leaning Chitwan-based political party, The Mukti Dal. Mr. Bhurtel adds, “This is a tragic occasion for all progressive elements in the country. While we disapproved Prachanda’s past and his tactics, there are many who respected his good intentions of salvaging Nepal from the current morass – a direct result of an international Capitalist conspiracy and regional hegemonic tendencies.” He goes on, “This is a sad event for Prachanda’s family and his supporters, and they can do without Kathmandu media trying to market a private tragedy into a public gain.”
Mr. Bhurtel further alleges that this newspaper also intentionally distorted his ‘good’ name. He says, “It should have been Dilli Kumar Bhurtel ‘Shahrukh’, not Dilli Bhurtel ‘Michael’.”
---------------
Editor’s note: The Gorkha Chronicler stands by the veracity of Mr. Bhurtel’s statement as quoted, but corrects the faux pas over the transcription of his popular name. Our correspondent corroborates that Mr. Bhurtel is indeed Dilli Kumar Bhurtel ‘Shahrukh’, Esq. The error is regretted.
---------------
[San, could you replace the preceding version with this one please?]
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 16-Dec-01 12:34 PM
Dilli Bhurtel Denies Statement
By A Reporter, The Gorkha Chronicler.
Baishakh 20, 2061 Bikram Sambat, Kathmandu – Dilli Bhurtel ‘Michael’, a tea shop owner in Shivanagar, Chitwan, quoted in this newspaper in its Baishakh 17 exclusive on the death of former Maoist leader Prachanda denies the statement attributed to him that he guessed it was an “angry ex-serviceman inspired by Hindi blockbusters” who might have assassinated Prachanda.
“The quote is malicious, and continues with the time honored tradition among journalists based in Narayani Zone to practice ‘pitta patrakarita’, fabricate whimsical quotes, and attribute them to unsuspecting folks from the working class to sell their failing newspapers,” writes Mr. Bhurtel who is also the Ward General Secretary of the left-leaning Chitwan-based political party, The Mukti Dal. Mr. Bhurtel adds, “This is a tragic occasion for all progressive elements in the country. While we disapproved Prachanda’s past and his tactics, there are many who respected his good intentions of salvaging Nepal from the current morass – a direct result of an international Capitalist conspiracy and regional hegemonic tendencies.” He goes on, “This is a sad event for Prachanda’s family and his supporters, and they can do without Kathmandu media trying to market a private tragedy into a public gain.”
Mr. Bhurtel further alleges that this newspaper also intentionally distorted his ‘good’ name. He says, “It should have been Dilli Kumar Bhurtel ‘Shahrukh’, not Dilli Bhurtel ‘Michael’.”
---------------
Editor’s note: The Gorkha Chronicler stands by the veracity of Mr. Bhurtel’s statement as quoted, but corrects the faux pas over the transcription of his popular name. Our correspondent corroborates that Mr. Bhurtel is indeed Dilli Kumar Bhurtel ‘Shahrukh’, Esq. The error is regretted.
---------------
[San, could you replace the preceding version with this one please?]
|
| anepalikt |
Posted
on 17-Dec-01 08:09 PM
Anon:
I echo Ashutosh here! Brilliant!
|
| anepalikt |
Posted
on 17-Dec-01 08:09 PM
Anon:
I echo Ashutosh here! Brilliant!
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 17-Dec-01 09:33 PM
Manamati Rawal aka Bajure Bhunti, Dilli 'Shahrukh' Bhurtel's estranged wife in Aanbu Khaireni, Tanahu, is told about the famous 'denial' of her husband published in the influential broadsheet, The Gorkha Chronicler. Perversely proud of her old man's new found status as a local celebrity, she ponders reconciliation.
What is her strategy going to look like? I don't know yet. But whatever happens, Manamati will conclude the Prachanda-Bhurtel-Rawal trilogy grandly. Please stay tuned.
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 17-Dec-01 09:33 PM
Manamati Rawal aka Bajure Bhunti, Dilli 'Shahrukh' Bhurtel's estranged wife in Aanbu Khaireni, Tanahu, is told about the famous 'denial' of her husband published in the influential broadsheet, The Gorkha Chronicler. Perversely proud of her old man's new found status as a local celebrity, she ponders reconciliation.
What is her strategy going to look like? I don't know yet. But whatever happens, Manamati will conclude the Prachanda-Bhurtel-Rawal trilogy grandly. Please stay tuned.
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 07:09 PM
Sanu Gaunthali Says Women are like Bicycles
By A Reporter, The Gorkha Chronicler.
Aanbu Khaireni, Tanahun, 27 Baishakh, 2061 BS – Ms. Sanu Gaunthali, 34, estranged wife of Mr. Dilli Bhurtel, 37, who made legal history two years ago by filing for divorce from her husband in the Chitwan Jilla Adalat, has stirred up this obscure little town, eight kilometers west of Mugling, by declaring, “I want my man back.” Ms. Gaunthali received heavy press coverage two years ago when she cited an ‘irreconcilable difference’ as her reason for seeking separation from her college sweetheart. Pressed further by the court, Ms. Gaunthali had stunned the district by being very specific, “My husband has not consummated our holy union. He is a robust heterosexual for a fact, and we shared beautiful sexual encounters as long as we dated. But upon marriage, he has abstained from all carnal pleasures.” The court had then quashed the application citing it had no jurisdiction over matters of the bedroom. Unsuccessful in getting a formal divorce, Ms. Gauthali then moved to Aanbu Khaireni to join her sister, deputy leader of the Gorakhkali Rubber Udhyog Worker’s Union. “Isn’t it funny?”, she told reporters then, “After why I sought divorce, I should find myself in rubber land.”
Mr. Bhurtel and Ms. Gaunthali had met as student activists loyal to the Leftist outfit, Akhil (5th), of the Shahid Smriti Arts Campus, Darbung. They had fallen for each other instantly – her eyes and his firebrand speeches, friends said, made for a divine couple, not to mention that they were being exemplary by hosting a frugal inter-caste wedding reception. Ms. Gaunthali recalled later that Mr. Bhurtel began to model himself after Ho Chi Minh of Vietnam, voraciously reading on his nationalist struggles, after the very first hour of their engagement. “At first I thought he was just being harmlessly infatuated. Soon it became a disease. He began saying he was destined to be like Ho Chi Minh, and since Ho had been a celibate, he too had to be one in order to enhance his moral fiber,” Ms. Gaunthali recalled. She said, “I found out that Ho Chi Minh had actually kept two wives, a Chinese and General Giap’s sister-in-law who was later guillotined by the French. But he wouldn’t believe me. He branded my meticulous research a piece of American propaganda.”
Ms. Gaunthali also revealed that Dilly Bhurtel expected his body to be preserved for posterity, like Ho’s and Lenin’s, in Nasal Chowk, Hanumandhoka, at the exact spot where Nepali kings are enthroned. “After he had attained his greatness of course,” Gaunthali smirks adding his schizophrenia was worsening at a speed faster than a reckless Sajha bus that ran from Kathmandu to Dang. “I knew it was all fake, like his claim of the wonders of celibacy,” adds Ms. Gaunthali, “Because before he went to bed, he always sang a Shahrukh number, ‘Dil to pagal hai, dil diwana hai.’ He was into Hindi films, you know, not nation-building, and they are mutually exclusive.” Ms. Gaunthali says marriage corrupted Mr. Bhurtel in an unexpected way, and that she was forced to leave him because he wouldn’t perform. Dilli Bhurtel had resigned soon after from his teaching post to open a tea-shop, which he said gave him the same kind of independence that Ho Chi Minh yearned all his life.
Upon Mr. Bhurtel’s taking on the Kathmandu media establishment seven days ago over accuracy of this newspaper’s reporting, and the new found celebrity status of her old man, Ms. Gaunthali has been inspired to seek reconciliation. “I think I underestimated his prowess. His denial has changed my world view. Besides, in the two years, I have exhausted all my sexual appetite at undisclosable locations, and that issue is now a non-issue,” says Ms. Gaunthali. She says she believed Dilli was still destined for stardom, the denial being a modest beginning, and that it was up to her to make them both shine as a power couple. Probed further, Ms. Gaunthali says, “Call me sexist, but women are like bicycles – we are both driven best by masculine power.” The confusing analogy became clearer when she added with a suggestive smile, “You know, with my man by my side, I will rule, and as Mr. Kasingar said after the Vietnam fiasco, power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.”
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 07:09 PM
Sanu Gaunthali Says Women are like Bicycles
By A Reporter, The Gorkha Chronicler.
Aanbu Khaireni, Tanahun, 27 Baishakh, 2061 BS – Ms. Sanu Gaunthali, 34, estranged wife of Mr. Dilli Bhurtel, 37, who made legal history two years ago by filing for divorce from her husband in the Chitwan Jilla Adalat, has stirred up this obscure little town, eight kilometers west of Mugling, by declaring, “I want my man back.” Ms. Gaunthali received heavy press coverage two years ago when she cited an ‘irreconcilable difference’ as her reason for seeking separation from her college sweetheart. Pressed further by the court, Ms. Gaunthali had stunned the district by being very specific, “My husband has not consummated our holy union. He is a robust heterosexual for a fact, and we shared beautiful sexual encounters as long as we dated. But upon marriage, he has abstained from all carnal pleasures.” The court had then quashed the application citing it had no jurisdiction over matters of the bedroom. Unsuccessful in getting a formal divorce, Ms. Gauthali then moved to Aanbu Khaireni to join her sister, deputy leader of the Gorakhkali Rubber Udhyog Worker’s Union. “Isn’t it funny?”, she told reporters then, “After why I sought divorce, I should find myself in rubber land.”
Mr. Bhurtel and Ms. Gaunthali had met as student activists loyal to the Leftist outfit, Akhil (5th), of the Shahid Smriti Arts Campus, Darbung. They had fallen for each other instantly – her eyes and his firebrand speeches, friends said, made for a divine couple, not to mention that they were being exemplary by hosting a frugal inter-caste wedding reception. Ms. Gaunthali recalled later that Mr. Bhurtel began to model himself after Ho Chi Minh of Vietnam, voraciously reading on his nationalist struggles, after the very first hour of their engagement. “At first I thought he was just being harmlessly infatuated. Soon it became a disease. He began saying he was destined to be like Ho Chi Minh, and since Ho had been a celibate, he too had to be one in order to enhance his moral fiber,” Ms. Gaunthali recalled. She said, “I found out that Ho Chi Minh had actually kept two wives, a Chinese and General Giap’s sister-in-law who was later guillotined by the French. But he wouldn’t believe me. He branded my meticulous research a piece of American propaganda.”
Ms. Gaunthali also revealed that Dilly Bhurtel expected his body to be preserved for posterity, like Ho’s and Lenin’s, in Nasal Chowk, Hanumandhoka, at the exact spot where Nepali kings are enthroned. “After he had attained his greatness of course,” Gaunthali smirks adding his schizophrenia was worsening at a speed faster than a reckless Sajha bus that ran from Kathmandu to Dang. “I knew it was all fake, like his claim of the wonders of celibacy,” adds Ms. Gaunthali, “Because before he went to bed, he always sang a Shahrukh number, ‘Dil to pagal hai, dil diwana hai.’ He was into Hindi films, you know, not nation-building, and they are mutually exclusive.” Ms. Gaunthali says marriage corrupted Mr. Bhurtel in an unexpected way, and that she was forced to leave him because he wouldn’t perform. Dilli Bhurtel had resigned soon after from his teaching post to open a tea-shop, which he said gave him the same kind of independence that Ho Chi Minh yearned all his life.
Upon Mr. Bhurtel’s taking on the Kathmandu media establishment seven days ago over accuracy of this newspaper’s reporting, and the new found celebrity status of her old man, Ms. Gaunthali has been inspired to seek reconciliation. “I think I underestimated his prowess. His denial has changed my world view. Besides, in the two years, I have exhausted all my sexual appetite at undisclosable locations, and that issue is now a non-issue,” says Ms. Gaunthali. She says she believed Dilli was still destined for stardom, the denial being a modest beginning, and that it was up to her to make them both shine as a power couple. Probed further, Ms. Gaunthali says, “Call me sexist, but women are like bicycles – we are both driven best by masculine power.” The confusing analogy became clearer when she added with a suggestive smile, “You know, with my man by my side, I will rule, and as Mr. Kasingar said after the Vietnam fiasco, power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.”
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 07:19 PM
Anon, your writings if summed up in a book form will
be good reading material. Keep itup. This thread can
be worth keeping copy. How meticulous your writing
and series of events are.. Keep it up buddy.
GP
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 07:19 PM
Anon, your writings if summed up in a book form will
be good reading material. Keep itup. This thread can
be worth keeping copy. How meticulous your writing
and series of events are.. Keep it up buddy.
GP
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 08:22 PM
In case you are sick of the series, I wish to inform you that I am now done with my 'trilogy' project on Nepali politics and journalism that I randomly undertook out of boredom at 4 pm last Friday. This was solely aimed at selfishly pleasing myself. I disavow all side-effects.
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 08:22 PM
In case you are sick of the series, I wish to inform you that I am now done with my 'trilogy' project on Nepali politics and journalism that I randomly undertook out of boredom at 4 pm last Friday. This was solely aimed at selfishly pleasing myself. I disavow all side-effects.
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 08:38 PM
When you peoples are prasing your write ups and skills of presentation,
bro, why do you take it negatively. When peoples want to say
against you, they, don't make here drama that we are enjoying
to mean we are sick of you. At least, we are free here to tell
what we observe. Don't worry, at least, I am not considering
you as the emperor in the Emperor's cloth story. You write
things on Maoists, but, we don't consider you are so vulnerable
to be praised the way peoples did in Emperor's cloth.
Only, requirement is you should not SEARCHED AND CORDONED
by Maoists for your writings.
GP
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 08:38 PM
When you peoples are prasing your write ups and skills of presentation,
bro, why do you take it negatively. When peoples want to say
against you, they, don't make here drama that we are enjoying
to mean we are sick of you. At least, we are free here to tell
what we observe. Don't worry, at least, I am not considering
you as the emperor in the Emperor's cloth story. You write
things on Maoists, but, we don't consider you are so vulnerable
to be praised the way peoples did in Emperor's cloth.
Only, requirement is you should not SEARCHED AND CORDONED
by Maoists for your writings.
GP
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 08:39 PM
When peoples are prasing your write ups and skills of presentation,
bro, why do you take it negatively. When peoples want to say
against you, they, don't make here drama that we are enjoying
to mean we are sick of you. At least, we are free here to tell
what we observe. Don't worry, at least, I am not considering
you as the emperor in the Emperor's cloth story. You write
things on Maoists, but, we don't consider you are so vulnerable
to be praised the way peoples did in Emperor's cloth.
Only, requirement is you should not SEARCHED AND CORDONED
by Maoists for your writings. You writing can have negative
impact on common public who like emotional writings and
sentimental stuffs.
GP
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 08:39 PM
When peoples are prasing your write ups and skills of presentation,
bro, why do you take it negatively. When peoples want to say
against you, they, don't make here drama that we are enjoying
to mean we are sick of you. At least, we are free here to tell
what we observe. Don't worry, at least, I am not considering
you as the emperor in the Emperor's cloth story. You write
things on Maoists, but, we don't consider you are so vulnerable
to be praised the way peoples did in Emperor's cloth.
Only, requirement is you should not SEARCHED AND CORDONED
by Maoists for your writings. You writing can have negative
impact on common public who like emotional writings and
sentimental stuffs.
GP
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 09:12 PM
Hatteri, Emperor GP:
My note that I was done with my 'trilogy' project for now was independent of your observation. I was not taking your comment negatively. In fact having followed your web-career since 1994, I am pleased you are finally endorsing my writing. Sorry it looked like I was responding to your well-intentioned compliment. Again, my note was a general disclaimer. Thank you and numerous others who have said (in private email correspondece) very good things about my debut in humor writing. It is very encouraging. I will return with similar stuff when I am profoundly bored.
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 09:12 PM
Hatteri, Emperor GP:
My note that I was done with my 'trilogy' project for now was independent of your observation. I was not taking your comment negatively. In fact having followed your web-career since 1994, I am pleased you are finally endorsing my writing. Sorry it looked like I was responding to your well-intentioned compliment. Again, my note was a general disclaimer. Thank you and numerous others who have said (in private email correspondece) very good things about my debut in humor writing. It is very encouraging. I will return with similar stuff when I am profoundly bored.
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 10:26 PM
Bro,
I wish I were an Emperor in Dream, fulling everyone else of
being economically, socially better. Unfortunately, I have not
dreamt it yet. Anyway, thanks for your compliments.
BTW, you are Anoniumously reading my postings for last 8 years
and I don't know my fan. Arigato gozaimasu. mata yonde ne,
watkusi no postings wo. Yoroshiku.
GP
PS: the Japanese ma lekhya ho hai.
|
| GP |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 10:26 PM
Bro,
I wish I were an Emperor in Dream, fulling everyone else of
being economically, socially better. Unfortunately, I have not
dreamt it yet. Anyway, thanks for your compliments.
BTW, you are Anoniumously reading my postings for last 8 years
and I don't know my fan. Arigato gozaimasu. mata yonde ne,
watkusi no postings wo. Yoroshiku.
GP
PS: the Japanese ma lekhya ho hai.
|
| U2 |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 10:52 PM
Anon, More please! Enjoyed your humour pieces a lot.
|
| U2 |
Posted
on 18-Dec-01 10:52 PM
Anon, More please! Enjoyed your humour pieces a lot.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 12:35 PM
In this thread of a literary finesse and its admirers (no sarcasm intended), my poor little note, above, stands so misfit, that I am starting to feel embarrassed.
To confess, when I read this piece of satire, I was shocked to death, by its brilliance, by its portrayal of terribly ordinary future, by its powerful belittling of Maoists, and most of all, by its enormous potential use by monarchists as a tool of propaganda.
Without even knowing which camp (monarchist/republican, if it ever is) does this writer reside or side, I, uselessly tried to strip this piece off its suspected pro-monarchy caveat by countering with my lean note, what about the monarch, write about him too, belittle him too. I was hoping, naïve as I am, if he could not do that, I can label him as a pro-monarchist, and, thus, making his credibility questionable, prove this brilliantly crafted peace as a clever propaganda pamphlet. I was swinging a Quixotic sword. Wasn’t I ?
Or, was I ?
Nepe
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 12:35 PM
In this thread of a literary finesse and its admirers (no sarcasm intended), my poor little note, above, stands so misfit, that I am starting to feel embarrassed.
To confess, when I read this piece of satire, I was shocked to death, by its brilliance, by its portrayal of terribly ordinary future, by its powerful belittling of Maoists, and most of all, by its enormous potential use by monarchists as a tool of propaganda.
Without even knowing which camp (monarchist/republican, if it ever is) does this writer reside or side, I, uselessly tried to strip this piece off its suspected pro-monarchy caveat by countering with my lean note, what about the monarch, write about him too, belittle him too. I was hoping, naïve as I am, if he could not do that, I can label him as a pro-monarchist, and, thus, making his credibility questionable, prove this brilliantly crafted peace as a clever propaganda pamphlet. I was swinging a Quixotic sword. Wasn’t I ?
Or, was I ?
Nepe
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 01:16 PM
Nepe, the following abstract is dedicated to you. Hope you read between the lines, and that they allay your concerns. I am not terribly fond of any form of institution that has outlived its use, but I refuse to be beholden to the simplistic monarchist/republican dichotomy. These kind of reductions do severe injustice to the human faculty of flexible reasoning. Having said that I 'd humbly urge you to read my political pieces in the most apolitical way. Please see them as attempts at restrained humor. Please don't over-reach for subtle connotations, because I wrote them pretty spontaneously, without much thinking - three pieces in three evenings after work, from around 5pm to 7pm, plainly intended to amuse myself. Haven't polished them much since. Anyways, thank you so much for the warm compliment. It encourages me to ponder a side career.
"Ms. Gaunthali also revealed that Dilli Bhurtel expected his body to be preserved for posterity, like Ho’s and Lenin’s, in Nasal Chowk, Hanumandhoka, at the exact spot where Nepali kings are enthroned. “After he had attained his greatness, of course,” Gaunthali smirks adding his schizophrenia was worsening at a speed faster than a reckless Sajha bus that ran from Kathmandu to Dang."
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 01:16 PM
Nepe, the following abstract is dedicated to you. Hope you read between the lines, and that they allay your concerns. I am not terribly fond of any form of institution that has outlived its use, but I refuse to be beholden to the simplistic monarchist/republican dichotomy. These kind of reductions do severe injustice to the human faculty of flexible reasoning. Having said that I 'd humbly urge you to read my political pieces in the most apolitical way. Please see them as attempts at restrained humor. Please don't over-reach for subtle connotations, because I wrote them pretty spontaneously, without much thinking - three pieces in three evenings after work, from around 5pm to 7pm, plainly intended to amuse myself. Haven't polished them much since. Anyways, thank you so much for the warm compliment. It encourages me to ponder a side career.
"Ms. Gaunthali also revealed that Dilli Bhurtel expected his body to be preserved for posterity, like Ho’s and Lenin’s, in Nasal Chowk, Hanumandhoka, at the exact spot where Nepali kings are enthroned. “After he had attained his greatness, of course,” Gaunthali smirks adding his schizophrenia was worsening at a speed faster than a reckless Sajha bus that ran from Kathmandu to Dang."
|
| Kofi |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 01:28 PM
I know who anon is,
Kofi
|
| Kofi |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 01:28 PM
I know who anon is,
Kofi
|
| joie de vivre |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 01:52 PM
keep it to yourself, Kino. We really don't care who or what Anon is. We just enjoy his writing. Perhaps you could learn a thing or two from the rest of us who're least interested in divulging or digging into the identities of visitors here.
|
| joie de vivre |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 01:52 PM
keep it to yourself, Kino. We really don't care who or what Anon is. We just enjoy his writing. Perhaps you could learn a thing or two from the rest of us who're least interested in divulging or digging into the identities of visitors here.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 02:04 PM
Thank you Anon.
"These kind of reductions do severe injustice to the human faculty of flexible reasoning "
What can I say ? I am speechless. Add me in your admirers.
" Please don't over-reach for subtle connotations"
I accept I should not. But my concern was that you may be misinterpreted.
"It encourages me to ponder a side career"
I was imagining you as a professional writer. You are so polished. I was envious.
Good writing !
Nepe
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 02:04 PM
Thank you Anon.
"These kind of reductions do severe injustice to the human faculty of flexible reasoning "
What can I say ? I am speechless. Add me in your admirers.
" Please don't over-reach for subtle connotations"
I accept I should not. But my concern was that you may be misinterpreted.
"It encourages me to ponder a side career"
I was imagining you as a professional writer. You are so polished. I was envious.
Good writing !
Nepe
|
| arnico |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 09:38 PM
I am returning to kurakani after almost a week offline... took two days just to read what's been posted. Just want to say, Anon, that I enjoyed your fiction. Glad that you are back at kurakani, although I think you could have chosen a somewhat more creative pseudonym this time, hoina ra?
It's great that you have the time to write fiction after work. My incomplete attempts at fiction have been shelved away ever since I joined grad school, and I doubt that I will be able to pull them out any time soon.
On another note: I was in a town last week where the bookstore had both Manju Thapa's The Tutor of History and Samrat Upadhyay's Arresting God in Kathmandu. Finally got my hands on them! ...so if I don't post a lot in the next few days you know what I am reading!
|
| arnico |
Posted
on 19-Dec-01 09:38 PM
I am returning to kurakani after almost a week offline... took two days just to read what's been posted. Just want to say, Anon, that I enjoyed your fiction. Glad that you are back at kurakani, although I think you could have chosen a somewhat more creative pseudonym this time, hoina ra?
It's great that you have the time to write fiction after work. My incomplete attempts at fiction have been shelved away ever since I joined grad school, and I doubt that I will be able to pull them out any time soon.
On another note: I was in a town last week where the bookstore had both Manju Thapa's The Tutor of History and Samrat Upadhyay's Arresting God in Kathmandu. Finally got my hands on them! ...so if I don't post a lot in the next few days you know what I am reading!
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 20-Dec-01 10:09 AM
Arnico, you're quite right about the pseudonym. I feel like a father whose only regret in life is to have spoilt his already socially inept son's chances at romance by giving him a hopeless name like Kankro, or Jharpat, or Trotsky Das, or Suntali-ko-poi. But reincarnation remains a useful notion.
Haven't read Ms. Thapa's Tutor, but Samrat Upadhyay's Arresting God is a fine accomplishment well worth reading. I think I liked the final paragraph of "The Room Next Door" best. The theme is uniform, some more Koirala-esque (a la Karnel ko Ghoda and Pabitra) than others.
|
| Anon |
Posted
on 20-Dec-01 10:09 AM
Arnico, you're quite right about the pseudonym. I feel like a father whose only regret in life is to have spoilt his already socially inept son's chances at romance by giving him a hopeless name like Kankro, or Jharpat, or Trotsky Das, or Suntali-ko-poi. But reincarnation remains a useful notion.
Haven't read Ms. Thapa's Tutor, but Samrat Upadhyay's Arresting God is a fine accomplishment well worth reading. I think I liked the final paragraph of "The Room Next Door" best. The theme is uniform, some more Koirala-esque (a la Karnel ko Ghoda and Pabitra) than others.
|
| arnico |
Posted
on 20-Dec-01 11:48 AM
Regarding the pseudonym: reminds me of the warning that incoming MIT students get about choosing their e-mail username carefully, since they won't get to change it afterwards: apparently a few years back someone chose idiot as his username. As long as he was in school it was all cool and funny to be idiot@mit ... but the e-mail address did not exactly help in his job search...
Here you are not stuck with it. Looking forward to your next awatar...
---
Have not yet finished reading The Tutor of History (it's 400+ pages long)... will hopefully write about it once I have.
|
| arnico |
Posted
on 20-Dec-01 11:48 AM
Regarding the pseudonym: reminds me of the warning that incoming MIT students get about choosing their e-mail username carefully, since they won't get to change it afterwards: apparently a few years back someone chose idiot as his username. As long as he was in school it was all cool and funny to be idiot@mit ... but the e-mail address did not exactly help in his job search...
Here you are not stuck with it. Looking forward to your next awatar...
---
Have not yet finished reading The Tutor of History (it's 400+ pages long)... will hopefully write about it once I have.
|
| Shahrukh |
Posted
on 21-Dec-01 11:49 AM
Arnico: Idiot@MIT, huh? that's one classic oxymoron :) Talking of avatars, having been cruel to my protagonists, I think I ought to repent by ridiculing myself by renaming moi Shahrukh at least this one time. Gaunthali remains my inspiration, of course. As she says:
“I knew it was all fake, like his [Bhurtel's] claim of the wonders of celibacy,” adds Ms. Gaunthali, “Because before he went to bed, he always sang a Shahrukh number, ‘Dil to pagal hai, dil diwana hai.’ He was into Hindi films, you know, not nation-building, and they are mutually exclusive.”
The beauty of discussion boards like this - a new discovery of active playground for me I must admit - seems that one can reincarnate more frequently than Winona Ryder changes her boyfriends, and yet avoid the baggage to remain sane. Plain Monogamy or Serial Monogamy, that's the question. But whatever lifestyle one chooses, it's good to be faithful (and a responsible poster).
On a different note, having followed the debate on 'social capital' by the likes of Bob Putnam and Fukuyama, one of their examples of a new form of civic interaction was chatroom discussions and board postings such as these. I'd dismissed that idea as silly at first. But I am now experiencing first hand that the 'virtual camaraderie' as the new Viagra in social discourse, even among unknown people from unknown lands, is actually quite real a concept after all.
|
| Shahrukh |
Posted
on 21-Dec-01 11:49 AM
Arnico: Idiot@MIT, huh? that's one classic oxymoron :) Talking of avatars, having been cruel to my protagonists, I think I ought to repent by ridiculing myself by renaming moi Shahrukh at least this one time. Gaunthali remains my inspiration, of course. As she says:
“I knew it was all fake, like his [Bhurtel's] claim of the wonders of celibacy,” adds Ms. Gaunthali, “Because before he went to bed, he always sang a Shahrukh number, ‘Dil to pagal hai, dil diwana hai.’ He was into Hindi films, you know, not nation-building, and they are mutually exclusive.”
The beauty of discussion boards like this - a new discovery of active playground for me I must admit - seems that one can reincarnate more frequently than Winona Ryder changes her boyfriends, and yet avoid the baggage to remain sane. Plain Monogamy or Serial Monogamy, that's the question. But whatever lifestyle one chooses, it's good to be faithful (and a responsible poster).
On a different note, having followed the debate on 'social capital' by the likes of Bob Putnam and Fukuyama, one of their examples of a new form of civic interaction was chatroom discussions and board postings such as these. I'd dismissed that idea as silly at first. But I am now experiencing first hand that the 'virtual camaraderie' as the new Viagra in social discourse, even among unknown people from unknown lands, is actually quite real a concept after all.
|
| Paschim (formerly Anon) |
Posted
on 23-Dec-01 11:25 AM
Letter to the Editor
Jestha 2, 2061 BS, The Gorkha Chronicler.
Dear Madame Editor,
My attention has been drawn to the generous coverage granted in your Baishakh 27 issue to my declared intention of reconciling with my husband Dilli Bhurtel of Chitwan. I appreciate your newspaper’s long-standing sympathy to progressive and feminist causes. I however felt that your otherwise thorough feature omitted two of my crucial assertions, leaving readers to open interpretation about the relative values, I, Sanu Gaunthali, attach to sex and power.
1. In quoting me after the court debacle two years ago, you only focus on feigned impotence on the part of my husband. You missed my more important statement. I had said that the issue was not my dissatisfaction over unclaimed satisfaction, but the fact that upon getting married, after Radio Nepal finished playing the national anthem after the 11 pm news, I used to approach my husband wearing nothing but a smile. In response he would yawn. It was not the non-reciprocity of gesture that bothered me, it was the yawning. Yawning, like power, is an important concept in political science. All graduate students in political science should learn about yawning. If I am talking to you and you yawn, Madame Editor, you are indicating to me that you have power over me, and vice versa. If my husband approached me wearing nothing but a beard, and I yawned in response, I would have objected to myself too. So the issue here is one of power asymmetry between the genders. That was what I sought to redress. By focusing on the sex part more, your reporter made me look like a sex maniac, which, of course, I am, but is irrelevant to my central desire of wanting my Dilli back.
2. Another strategic omission was in the last paragraph when you quote me quoting a former Harvard professor-turned-Ameriki-Bidesh-Mantri. You quote me incompletely there. I had also said that power, and aphrodisiac for that matter, are not sufficient for pleasure. But who would deny that they are not necessary? Would you? Would you, Madame Editor, would you? The necessity but insufficiency claim is central to my hypothesis about power and pleasure, would you not think?
I would be grateful if you gave my dui sabda some space in your next edition.
Sanu Gaunthali (Mrs.)
Aanbu Khaireni, Tanahun.
Editor’s note : Ms. Gaunthali’s letter contained more than dui sabda (two words). But against newspaper policy, we did NOT edit it for brevity.
|
| Paschim (formerly Anon) |
Posted
on 23-Dec-01 11:25 AM
Letter to the Editor
Jestha 2, 2061 BS, The Gorkha Chronicler.
Dear Madame Editor,
My attention has been drawn to the generous coverage granted in your Baishakh 27 issue to my declared intention of reconciling with my husband Dilli Bhurtel of Chitwan. I appreciate your newspaper’s long-standing sympathy to progressive and feminist causes. I however felt that your otherwise thorough feature omitted two of my crucial assertions, leaving readers to open interpretation about the relative values, I, Sanu Gaunthali, attach to sex and power.
1. In quoting me after the court debacle two years ago, you only focus on feigned impotence on the part of my husband. You missed my more important statement. I had said that the issue was not my dissatisfaction over unclaimed satisfaction, but the fact that upon getting married, after Radio Nepal finished playing the national anthem after the 11 pm news, I used to approach my husband wearing nothing but a smile. In response he would yawn. It was not the non-reciprocity of gesture that bothered me, it was the yawning. Yawning, like power, is an important concept in political science. All graduate students in political science should learn about yawning. If I am talking to you and you yawn, Madame Editor, you are indicating to me that you have power over me, and vice versa. If my husband approached me wearing nothing but a beard, and I yawned in response, I would have objected to myself too. So the issue here is one of power asymmetry between the genders. That was what I sought to redress. By focusing on the sex part more, your reporter made me look like a sex maniac, which, of course, I am, but is irrelevant to my central desire of wanting my Dilli back.
2. Another strategic omission was in the last paragraph when you quote me quoting a former Harvard professor-turned-Ameriki-Bidesh-Mantri. You quote me incompletely there. I had also said that power, and aphrodisiac for that matter, are not sufficient for pleasure. But who would deny that they are not necessary? Would you? Would you, Madame Editor, would you? The necessity but insufficiency claim is central to my hypothesis about power and pleasure, would you not think?
I would be grateful if you gave my dui sabda some space in your next edition.
Sanu Gaunthali (Mrs.)
Aanbu Khaireni, Tanahun.
Editor’s note : Ms. Gaunthali’s letter contained more than dui sabda (two words). But against newspaper policy, we did NOT edit it for brevity.
|
| arnico |
Posted
on 23-Dec-01 12:22 PM
BhutPURVA Anon, ahile Paschim... I guess now you have given enough clues for people to figure out your identity.... I am surprised that Ashu hasn't figured it out yet! (jdv, he's a good friend of mine who is usually not this shy...hence the teasing!)
|
| arnico |
Posted
on 23-Dec-01 12:22 PM
BhutPURVA Anon, ahile Paschim... I guess now you have given enough clues for people to figure out your identity.... I am surprised that Ashu hasn't figured it out yet! (jdv, he's a good friend of mine who is usually not this shy...hence the teasing!)
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 26-Dec-01 05:24 PM
Uma Chand, the editor of The Gorkha Chronicler, is quite amused by Sanu Gaunthali's confidence and her public imploring. She is wondering if she should communicate with Gaunthali privately, and share with Sanu her own colorful past re. men, life and the universe....
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 26-Dec-01 05:24 PM
Uma Chand, the editor of The Gorkha Chronicler, is quite amused by Sanu Gaunthali's confidence and her public imploring. She is wondering if she should communicate with Gaunthali privately, and share with Sanu her own colorful past re. men, life and the universe....
|
| ashu |
Posted
on 26-Dec-01 11:02 PM
Arnico wrote:
*************
hutPURVA Anon, ahile Paschim... I guess now you have given enough clues for people to figure out your identity.... I am surprised that Ashu hasn't figured it out yet!
*************
Array Baba, Arnico, I do know who Paschim is.
He sent me an email recently.
Too bad that Paschim and I could not meet when he was
in Nepal last August :-)
It's a small world, after all.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
|
| ashu |
Posted
on 26-Dec-01 11:02 PM
Arnico wrote:
*************
hutPURVA Anon, ahile Paschim... I guess now you have given enough clues for people to figure out your identity.... I am surprised that Ashu hasn't figured it out yet!
*************
Array Baba, Arnico, I do know who Paschim is.
He sent me an email recently.
Too bad that Paschim and I could not meet when he was
in Nepal last August :-)
It's a small world, after all.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
|
| 93454475 |
Posted
on 26-Dec-01 11:51 PM
Nasakine Babba!! Harvard Graduates Patting Each Others Behinds!
I enjoyed the peices- so keep up the good work. Maybe a regular column on Nepalitimes could be a part-time job.
|
| 93454475 |
Posted
on 26-Dec-01 11:51 PM
Nasakine Babba!! Harvard Graduates Patting Each Others Behinds!
I enjoyed the peices- so keep up the good work. Maybe a regular column on Nepalitimes could be a part-time job.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 28-Dec-01 11:15 AM
From the Editor in Chief
The Gorkha Chronicler
5 Jestha, 2061 BS
PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL
Dear Ms. Gaunthali,
Actually, can I call you Sanu? Mind nagarnus hai. I have been following your stories with interest and it has been hard for me not to appreciate your courage and sincerity of character. Call it solidarity between women in a man’s world, but I have been inspired to write to you.
I once took a walk with my father for two hours along the Seine. He didn’t utter a word for the first hour. Then when I saw the Eiffel Tower, I said, “Bua, that’s a nice view, don’t you think?” When we reached home, he said, “that was a foolish remark you made an hour ago.” I learnt later that he’d been reading about Benjamin Jowett, a 19th century don at Balliol, Oxford, who had translated Plato’s Republic. My father modeled his eccentricity on Jowett, and I grew up with a man like that in a family with five sisters. Naturally, I dislike anything ordinary. My father used to say, since the unification in 1769, the kingdom had produced just two gentlemen – one was himself, and the other was the king’s older brother, who had appointed him the royal envoy to The Elysee. The year was 1983 AD. Mitterand was in office, Thatcher hadn’t yet won her second term, Jacques Chirac had been Mayor of Paris for six years, Nancy Reagan ran the White House, Indira was India, and the little Algerian boy who worked in our kitchen had daringly whispered in my ear the eighth day we got into town, “Let’s do it.” He was cute. I still wonder what would have happened if I had done it. But I didn’t do it. Some doings are destined, Sanu, and some are not. The doing proposed by the Algerian was of the latter category - risky and momentarily shameful. But as Madame Merteuil tells a virgin in an adaptation of Les Liaisons Dangereuses, “Shame is like the pain. You only feel it once.”
After four years in France, we returned to Nepal to find a decaying Panchayat that was busy faking a rejuvenation. “Pacchis Basanta” was playing at Biswo Jyoti Hall. I remember a cousin who had a crush on Ms. Shahi after seeing the movie. He paid 120 rupees for an issue of Kamana that carried her on the cover. These days his fantasies have taken an international flavor: a Bengali named Rani. Anyway, I enrolled at TU, wrote my thesis on the “Growth of Early Nepali Prose”, joined the Gorkhapatra Sansthan, and disgusted with a boss who snored in Sanskrit, I quit to give independent media a try. After 15 years I have become the first female editor of a major national broadsheet.
I have triumphed in romance, but my first marriage failed because I married for the wrong reason – to please my mother. My husband attended a Jesuit school in India, hadn’t kissed a girl until the age of 25, and was basically a wimp. His only claim to fame was that his grandfather had led a protest against the import of banaspati ghee from India when BP Koirala was Prime Minister in 2016 BS. He, the grandfather, later managed the Russian-built Janakpur Cigarette Factory. His loot was so legendary that the factory itself looked like a cancer patient in two years. Anyway, I disliked my husband. He had little substance. You could tell from this that he was my mother’s choice, her criterion being that our surnames needed to rhyme. She thought grooms were like Hatti chaap chappals – the quality of the chappal didn’t matter as long as the name was arresting. Upon divorce, my family said I’d brought disrepute, but I didn’t give a damn. I told them they were unpleasant bigots and that marriage was not like buying a towel in Bishal Bazaar. In Nepal we don’t buy towels to dry ourselves. We buy it to show people that we own a certain brand of towel. The purpose is aesthetic, not functional, and you can’t throw the towel away. I envy you, Sanu, because you bought the towel of your choice, had the courage to discard it, and also the humility to claim it back.
These days because of my profession, I hobnob a lot with politicians. This is not healthy, but I must tell you about them. Congress guys are interesting in an unflattering sort of way. Thinking to them is as alien a concept as celibacy is to Bill Clinton. Worse, they stink. They stink more than the communists. Yes, corrupt they are, but here I mean to say, they stink literally. They don’t wash, you know. Once, returning from Osaka, I stopped by the Hong Kong Duty Free and bought fragrance by Giorgio Armani. Mr. Armani is a designer from Milan. I gave that as a present to a Congressi who visited me with Saptahik Bimarsha in his hand every Friday. After I gave him the gift, he said, “Thanks for this thingy, Uma. But you should really have got me some Paan Paraag from Osaka. You know, the jumbo size in a tin bucket. Kisun-ji says Paan Paraag is good for making speeches about democracy. When you speak with Paan Paraag in your mouth, you apparently look more stupid than you actually are. So you can surprise people later by coming off as smarter than you appeared earlier. Sandaju and Ganeshman-ji didn’t like this, but there are many who have made a fine career in the Congress both by actually being stupid and pretending to be so.”
Leftists in Nepal are also quite pathetic. They grew up reading a lot of garbage and I assume your Dilli is one of them. There is this innate sweetness about them though – they believed at one point in their lives that communism actually works. I took a lover after my divorce, Shishir, a left-handed Leftist from Dhankuta. He is now my fiancé. He insisted on taking a shower with his under-wear on before entering my bedroom. I teased him if that was to stop him from looking down at the unemployed. He didn’t get the joke. Nepali Leftists are too serious. They were apparently punished for drinking Coca Cola, and if you laughed, one of your comrades would report to the politburo saying, “Comrade Jwala laughed like Lyndon Johnson the Capitalist.” But women like you and me are gifted enough to turn boring men into funny creatures. Like dining table etiquette, humor too is an acquired taste.
continued...
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 28-Dec-01 11:15 AM
From the Editor in Chief
The Gorkha Chronicler
5 Jestha, 2061 BS
PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL
Dear Ms. Gaunthali,
Actually, can I call you Sanu? Mind nagarnus hai. I have been following your stories with interest and it has been hard for me not to appreciate your courage and sincerity of character. Call it solidarity between women in a man’s world, but I have been inspired to write to you.
I once took a walk with my father for two hours along the Seine. He didn’t utter a word for the first hour. Then when I saw the Eiffel Tower, I said, “Bua, that’s a nice view, don’t you think?” When we reached home, he said, “that was a foolish remark you made an hour ago.” I learnt later that he’d been reading about Benjamin Jowett, a 19th century don at Balliol, Oxford, who had translated Plato’s Republic. My father modeled his eccentricity on Jowett, and I grew up with a man like that in a family with five sisters. Naturally, I dislike anything ordinary. My father used to say, since the unification in 1769, the kingdom had produced just two gentlemen – one was himself, and the other was the king’s older brother, who had appointed him the royal envoy to The Elysee. The year was 1983 AD. Mitterand was in office, Thatcher hadn’t yet won her second term, Jacques Chirac had been Mayor of Paris for six years, Nancy Reagan ran the White House, Indira was India, and the little Algerian boy who worked in our kitchen had daringly whispered in my ear the eighth day we got into town, “Let’s do it.” He was cute. I still wonder what would have happened if I had done it. But I didn’t do it. Some doings are destined, Sanu, and some are not. The doing proposed by the Algerian was of the latter category - risky and momentarily shameful. But as Madame Merteuil tells a virgin in an adaptation of Les Liaisons Dangereuses, “Shame is like the pain. You only feel it once.”
After four years in France, we returned to Nepal to find a decaying Panchayat that was busy faking a rejuvenation. “Pacchis Basanta” was playing at Biswo Jyoti Hall. I remember a cousin who had a crush on Ms. Shahi after seeing the movie. He paid 120 rupees for an issue of Kamana that carried her on the cover. These days his fantasies have taken an international flavor: a Bengali named Rani. Anyway, I enrolled at TU, wrote my thesis on the “Growth of Early Nepali Prose”, joined the Gorkhapatra Sansthan, and disgusted with a boss who snored in Sanskrit, I quit to give independent media a try. After 15 years I have become the first female editor of a major national broadsheet.
I have triumphed in romance, but my first marriage failed because I married for the wrong reason – to please my mother. My husband attended a Jesuit school in India, hadn’t kissed a girl until the age of 25, and was basically a wimp. His only claim to fame was that his grandfather had led a protest against the import of banaspati ghee from India when BP Koirala was Prime Minister in 2016 BS. He, the grandfather, later managed the Russian-built Janakpur Cigarette Factory. His loot was so legendary that the factory itself looked like a cancer patient in two years. Anyway, I disliked my husband. He had little substance. You could tell from this that he was my mother’s choice, her criterion being that our surnames needed to rhyme. She thought grooms were like Hatti chaap chappals – the quality of the chappal didn’t matter as long as the name was arresting. Upon divorce, my family said I’d brought disrepute, but I didn’t give a damn. I told them they were unpleasant bigots and that marriage was not like buying a towel in Bishal Bazaar. In Nepal we don’t buy towels to dry ourselves. We buy it to show people that we own a certain brand of towel. The purpose is aesthetic, not functional, and you can’t throw the towel away. I envy you, Sanu, because you bought the towel of your choice, had the courage to discard it, and also the humility to claim it back.
These days because of my profession, I hobnob a lot with politicians. This is not healthy, but I must tell you about them. Congress guys are interesting in an unflattering sort of way. Thinking to them is as alien a concept as celibacy is to Bill Clinton. Worse, they stink. They stink more than the communists. Yes, corrupt they are, but here I mean to say, they stink literally. They don’t wash, you know. Once, returning from Osaka, I stopped by the Hong Kong Duty Free and bought fragrance by Giorgio Armani. Mr. Armani is a designer from Milan. I gave that as a present to a Congressi who visited me with Saptahik Bimarsha in his hand every Friday. After I gave him the gift, he said, “Thanks for this thingy, Uma. But you should really have got me some Paan Paraag from Osaka. You know, the jumbo size in a tin bucket. Kisun-ji says Paan Paraag is good for making speeches about democracy. When you speak with Paan Paraag in your mouth, you apparently look more stupid than you actually are. So you can surprise people later by coming off as smarter than you appeared earlier. Sandaju and Ganeshman-ji didn’t like this, but there are many who have made a fine career in the Congress both by actually being stupid and pretending to be so.”
Leftists in Nepal are also quite pathetic. They grew up reading a lot of garbage and I assume your Dilli is one of them. There is this innate sweetness about them though – they believed at one point in their lives that communism actually works. I took a lover after my divorce, Shishir, a left-handed Leftist from Dhankuta. He is now my fiancé. He insisted on taking a shower with his under-wear on before entering my bedroom. I teased him if that was to stop him from looking down at the unemployed. He didn’t get the joke. Nepali Leftists are too serious. They were apparently punished for drinking Coca Cola, and if you laughed, one of your comrades would report to the politburo saying, “Comrade Jwala laughed like Lyndon Johnson the Capitalist.” But women like you and me are gifted enough to turn boring men into funny creatures. Like dining table etiquette, humor too is an acquired taste.
continued...
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 28-Dec-01 11:16 AM
Continued...
Well, Sanu, it’s no secret that I am not fond of both the Congress and the Left. They have completely squandered the moral authority they earned in 2046. But I can’t stand the rest either. I dislike the extremists, and find sakriya monarchists as well as former Maoists revolting. Water is scarce and toilets don’t flush in Kathmandu. Former Panchas remain clowns. They never got it and never will. But I don’t see a point in just bitching about all this. Let’s castrate the bastards if we find them guilty. Metaphorically I mean. But it is time to start anew. The only group that remains untested is that of young women. We are not organized yet. When individual women join mainstream parties, they become invisible. Our movement will be different: men may join us, but the character will be defined by values we cherish. We should not submerge ourselves in false nostalgia. We never really had a golden phase in our history. Our forefathers built the Changu Narayan, resisted the Brits, translated Ramayan, and walked on bare feet at 4000 meters, but they also had a life expectancy of 37 and burnt women alive. The period between 2053 BS and 2059 BS when a lot of people died needlessly was sad, but looking ahead, we can only do better. It is with this belief, Sanu, that I am inviting you to join me and my colleagues to start afresh. Forget about accessing power by piggybacking on Dilli Bhurtel. That bicycle analogy of yours was demeaning.
When you are in Kathmandu next, please drop by my house. It’s the big red bungalow with a blue gate near Thapathali Bus Stop. We’ll talk then. If it takes nine months to make a baby, helping build a nation might take nine years, or even ninety. I don’t want to sound pious and all, because ‘desh banaune’ stuff is not so much about religion as it is about physiology, i.e. getting a body to function. But I suggest, Sanu, people like us should get started. Definitely bring Dilli along if you manage to woo him back. Does he keep a neat goatee like Ho Chi Minh? I want to meet him. He must be quite a character.
See you soon,
Uma Chand.
p.s. You can call me by my first name.
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 28-Dec-01 11:16 AM
Continued...
Well, Sanu, it’s no secret that I am not fond of both the Congress and the Left. They have completely squandered the moral authority they earned in 2046. But I can’t stand the rest either. I dislike the extremists, and find sakriya monarchists as well as former Maoists revolting. Water is scarce and toilets don’t flush in Kathmandu. Former Panchas remain clowns. They never got it and never will. But I don’t see a point in just bitching about all this. Let’s castrate the bastards if we find them guilty. Metaphorically I mean. But it is time to start anew. The only group that remains untested is that of young women. We are not organized yet. When individual women join mainstream parties, they become invisible. Our movement will be different: men may join us, but the character will be defined by values we cherish. We should not submerge ourselves in false nostalgia. We never really had a golden phase in our history. Our forefathers built the Changu Narayan, resisted the Brits, translated Ramayan, and walked on bare feet at 4000 meters, but they also had a life expectancy of 37 and burnt women alive. The period between 2053 BS and 2059 BS when a lot of people died needlessly was sad, but looking ahead, we can only do better. It is with this belief, Sanu, that I am inviting you to join me and my colleagues to start afresh. Forget about accessing power by piggybacking on Dilli Bhurtel. That bicycle analogy of yours was demeaning.
When you are in Kathmandu next, please drop by my house. It’s the big red bungalow with a blue gate near Thapathali Bus Stop. We’ll talk then. If it takes nine months to make a baby, helping build a nation might take nine years, or even ninety. I don’t want to sound pious and all, because ‘desh banaune’ stuff is not so much about religion as it is about physiology, i.e. getting a body to function. But I suggest, Sanu, people like us should get started. Definitely bring Dilli along if you manage to woo him back. Does he keep a neat goatee like Ho Chi Minh? I want to meet him. He must be quite a character.
See you soon,
Uma Chand.
p.s. You can call me by my first name.
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| joie de vivre |
Posted
on 28-Dec-01 11:22 AM
You're a riot, Paschim. Keep them coming.
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| joie de vivre |
Posted
on 28-Dec-01 11:22 AM
You're a riot, Paschim. Keep them coming.
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| concerned |
Posted
on 29-Dec-01 10:37 PM
Paschim, your extensive knowledge in different fields has simply amazed me. This is one of the very few threads I constantly look at and learn new things every time I visit. I think you should seriously consider writing in some widely circulated Nepali newspapers/magazines. People will enormously benefit from your insights. Every sentence in your writings seem to have some deeper meanings.Keep it up, Paschim! I hope to see your writings (as well as your real name) in that paper. Good luck!
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| concerned |
Posted
on 29-Dec-01 10:37 PM
Paschim, your extensive knowledge in different fields has simply amazed me. This is one of the very few threads I constantly look at and learn new things every time I visit. I think you should seriously consider writing in some widely circulated Nepali newspapers/magazines. People will enormously benefit from your insights. Every sentence in your writings seem to have some deeper meanings.Keep it up, Paschim! I hope to see your writings (as well as your real name) in that paper. Good luck!
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 30-Dec-01 05:40 PM
Thanks Concerned, JDV and others. It is public encouragement like yours as well as the numerous private emails that I have been receiving that has kept me going. Don't worry about my identity. At this stage, let me just say I am as Nepali as Gundruk. I hope the irrepressible characters of Gaunthali and Bhurtel keep amusing you.
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 30-Dec-01 05:40 PM
Thanks Concerned, JDV and others. It is public encouragement like yours as well as the numerous private emails that I have been receiving that has kept me going. Don't worry about my identity. At this stage, let me just say I am as Nepali as Gundruk. I hope the irrepressible characters of Gaunthali and Bhurtel keep amusing you.
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 30-Dec-01 05:57 PM
Gaunthali Writes to Bhurtel
16 Jestha, 2061 BS
Dearest Dilli,
The extraordinary coverage this past month has been quite overwhelming. Since everything is out in the open I need not add anything, except perhaps that I must tell you about a remarkable overture from a ‘thulo manchhe’ in Kathmandu that I have just received. Neither can I disclose the identity of the correspondent nor the content of the correspondence at this stage. But let me just say, destiny beckons, Dilli, and we need to get back together to talk about a future of promise. I know some hard feelings remain, but if it is any consolation, I send you below the same poem that you wrote for me years ago when I was still playing hard to get at college. Bottom line? Come embrace me, Dilli Bhurtel.
Prem ma andho ma, herera pani kehi dekhna sakdina
Asakta chhu, aafnai awaaz ko lalakaar sunna janina
Tyo timro moha ko bhumari ma fasayau kasari preyasi
Niriha nabani aanfai prati gara nyaya ma bhanun kasari
Khula chha aau, joban ko maidan, ajhai timle aante dekhi
Kehi bitya chhaina mayalu bujhine kuro ajhai bujhe dekhi
We need to meet soonest. Could you possibly take the 9 o’clock Narayanghat – Gorkha bus next Thursday? It's fairly reliable, doesn’t stop in Mugling for hours and gets to Khaireni by noon. The ‘Saptari Express Video Coach’ from Rajbiraj to Pokhara is also convenient though they tend to overcharge bald people with moustache. Just so you know, my dear.
Timro sano mutu ko thulo tukra,
SG.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 30-Dec-01 05:57 PM
Gaunthali Writes to Bhurtel
16 Jestha, 2061 BS
Dearest Dilli,
The extraordinary coverage this past month has been quite overwhelming. Since everything is out in the open I need not add anything, except perhaps that I must tell you about a remarkable overture from a ‘thulo manchhe’ in Kathmandu that I have just received. Neither can I disclose the identity of the correspondent nor the content of the correspondence at this stage. But let me just say, destiny beckons, Dilli, and we need to get back together to talk about a future of promise. I know some hard feelings remain, but if it is any consolation, I send you below the same poem that you wrote for me years ago when I was still playing hard to get at college. Bottom line? Come embrace me, Dilli Bhurtel.
Prem ma andho ma, herera pani kehi dekhna sakdina
Asakta chhu, aafnai awaaz ko lalakaar sunna janina
Tyo timro moha ko bhumari ma fasayau kasari preyasi
Niriha nabani aanfai prati gara nyaya ma bhanun kasari
Khula chha aau, joban ko maidan, ajhai timle aante dekhi
Kehi bitya chhaina mayalu bujhine kuro ajhai bujhe dekhi
We need to meet soonest. Could you possibly take the 9 o’clock Narayanghat – Gorkha bus next Thursday? It's fairly reliable, doesn’t stop in Mugling for hours and gets to Khaireni by noon. The ‘Saptari Express Video Coach’ from Rajbiraj to Pokhara is also convenient though they tend to overcharge bald people with moustache. Just so you know, my dear.
Timro sano mutu ko thulo tukra,
SG.
|
| Gandhi |
Posted
on 30-Dec-01 08:54 PM
Paschim
Quite amusing thread in this forum after a long time. Artistic choice of words ..... Keep it up.
|
| Gandhi |
Posted
on 30-Dec-01 08:54 PM
Paschim
Quite amusing thread in this forum after a long time. Artistic choice of words ..... Keep it up.
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| villageVoice |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 12:10 AM
Paschim:
I have been reading your postings regularly. Your humor is breathtaking, and your grasp of the subject at hand - and language - just amazing. Sure, you have a strong sense of place and time.
Of course, you have already refused to divulge your identity. But I still hope you will change your mind. Some day.
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| villageVoice |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 12:10 AM
Paschim:
I have been reading your postings regularly. Your humor is breathtaking, and your grasp of the subject at hand - and language - just amazing. Sure, you have a strong sense of place and time.
Of course, you have already refused to divulge your identity. But I still hope you will change your mind. Some day.
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| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 12:26 AM
Paschim is West of everything. He might be distant relative of Baburam- since they are both from Gorkha, but they are like North and South poles when it comes to politics. He is the ultimate voice of democracy in Nepal. He excelled in SLC board examination (I think he was on the top ten or board list) and then went of to LSE and then to Harvard. He is a genious by every count. He is good looking hunk with long legs twice the size of his upper torso and I heard he is quite affluent in French. Girls just dream to be in his arms. As Chris Rock said when asked about President Clinton- 'I would have slept with the man if I was a woman', I would say the same thing about this flamboyant hunk. May I say more....
I would vote for him as the next Prime-Minister or Finance Minister of Nepal- I can bet he has the ability to turn the country around.
|
| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 12:26 AM
Paschim is West of everything. He might be distant relative of Baburam- since they are both from Gorkha, but they are like North and South poles when it comes to politics. He is the ultimate voice of democracy in Nepal. He excelled in SLC board examination (I think he was on the top ten or board list) and then went of to LSE and then to Harvard. He is a genious by every count. He is good looking hunk with long legs twice the size of his upper torso and I heard he is quite affluent in French. Girls just dream to be in his arms. As Chris Rock said when asked about President Clinton- 'I would have slept with the man if I was a woman', I would say the same thing about this flamboyant hunk. May I say more....
I would vote for him as the next Prime-Minister or Finance Minister of Nepal- I can bet he has the ability to turn the country around.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 08:43 AM
An Indun Poet ji, fasaad pardinu bho ni yaar gopyata bhanga garera. But I wish I resembled the person you portray. You got one thing absolutely right - I am from Paschim. As for the rest of the information, well, let's just say it ranges from fantasy to truth, economy class. And if that poem above by Dilli Bhurtel is of any indication, I am a failure on the most important thing in life. As a friend of mine from Siraha used to recite:
prem, prem, ooph prem
bihana uunthe
bathroom gayen
dhara kholen
pani aayo
tara timi aainau!
Thank you all for your words of support. Do stay tuned for Dilli's response to Gaunthali.
I wish all Kurakani loyalists a fun-filled New Year.
p.s. I do have long legs, poet mitra, but twice the size of my turso? Come on, that's stretching my legs a bit too far!
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 08:43 AM
An Indun Poet ji, fasaad pardinu bho ni yaar gopyata bhanga garera. But I wish I resembled the person you portray. You got one thing absolutely right - I am from Paschim. As for the rest of the information, well, let's just say it ranges from fantasy to truth, economy class. And if that poem above by Dilli Bhurtel is of any indication, I am a failure on the most important thing in life. As a friend of mine from Siraha used to recite:
prem, prem, ooph prem
bihana uunthe
bathroom gayen
dhara kholen
pani aayo
tara timi aainau!
Thank you all for your words of support. Do stay tuned for Dilli's response to Gaunthali.
I wish all Kurakani loyalists a fun-filled New Year.
p.s. I do have long legs, poet mitra, but twice the size of my turso? Come on, that's stretching my legs a bit too far!
|
| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 01:19 PM
>p.s. I do have long legs, poet mitra, but
>twice the size of my turso? Come on, that's
>stretching my legs a bit too far!
My fault, I could have wrote: almost the twice the size.... My apology.
I think your friends poetry succumbs to the girls you have melted than for yourself.
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| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 01:19 PM
>p.s. I do have long legs, poet mitra, but
>twice the size of my turso? Come on, that's
>stretching my legs a bit too far!
My fault, I could have wrote: almost the twice the size.... My apology.
I think your friends poetry succumbs to the girls you have melted than for yourself.
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| Nepe |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 04:30 PM
Now that this superb fiction finds its originator with legitimacy of intimate insight of the characters themselves (not that I had any doubt) and an infallible resume, I am more than betting for a shockingly accurate fiction with awesome imagination. My only concern that remains is if Anon/Paschim can escape the trap of a his acquaintance ‘s expectation to ‘please’ them- an unavoidable disadvantage of ‘business class’ privilege, Pashim appears just promoted to by Indun Poet, and also by Arnico and Ashu on earlier postings.
And I would consider Paschim an untested gem until he reveals the story of ‘sab bhanda thulo manchhe’.
I am reading this fiction with great joy and anticipation . Disclaimer- No intention to influence the fiction. I am not sure of the later, though.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 04:30 PM
Now that this superb fiction finds its originator with legitimacy of intimate insight of the characters themselves (not that I had any doubt) and an infallible resume, I am more than betting for a shockingly accurate fiction with awesome imagination. My only concern that remains is if Anon/Paschim can escape the trap of a his acquaintance ‘s expectation to ‘please’ them- an unavoidable disadvantage of ‘business class’ privilege, Pashim appears just promoted to by Indun Poet, and also by Arnico and Ashu on earlier postings.
And I would consider Paschim an untested gem until he reveals the story of ‘sab bhanda thulo manchhe’.
I am reading this fiction with great joy and anticipation . Disclaimer- No intention to influence the fiction. I am not sure of the later, though.
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 08:25 PM
Great thread I almost missed (cause I thought the title was too catchy!)
Golden words by the writer of almost same name in Sanskrit, right? I know he
is a genious.Didn't take much for me to figure out who is so familiar with both
Chitwan, and Gorkha. And is still such a master of words:-)
A guy from Tandi asked me some days ago if I knew Anon . Well, my clue to you, I
think there is a school with the name of the writer. Correct me if I am wrong.I
don't know him personally, but I know about him.And if you want to be a finance
minister, my vote will be to you.After all, I am from the same constituency! Correct
me if I am seriously wrong.
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 08:25 PM
Great thread I almost missed (cause I thought the title was too catchy!)
Golden words by the writer of almost same name in Sanskrit, right? I know he
is a genious.Didn't take much for me to figure out who is so familiar with both
Chitwan, and Gorkha. And is still such a master of words:-)
A guy from Tandi asked me some days ago if I knew Anon . Well, my clue to you, I
think there is a school with the name of the writer. Correct me if I am wrong.I
don't know him personally, but I know about him.And if you want to be a finance
minister, my vote will be to you.After all, I am from the same constituency! Correct
me if I am seriously wrong.
|
| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 11:07 PM
Biswo?
Are you Biswo N Poudel?? If you are, I have been reading some of your work at suskera.com. Pretty impressive I say, specially 'Life Cycle of Terror' in the November issue.
Somebody called him a 'gem', I think it will be more appropriate to call him 'Gold', just so that it matches portions of his name.
BTW Paschim, I take back my second comment regarding your legs (almost) being twice as long as your torso. After doing some research on myself and others near me, I concluded that most people do have their legs almost twice as long as their own torso. In your case, I am sure I rather underestimated. My apology still stands if I am mistaken.
torso: The human body excluding the head and limbs; trunk
|
| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 31-Dec-01 11:07 PM
Biswo?
Are you Biswo N Poudel?? If you are, I have been reading some of your work at suskera.com. Pretty impressive I say, specially 'Life Cycle of Terror' in the November issue.
Somebody called him a 'gem', I think it will be more appropriate to call him 'Gold', just so that it matches portions of his name.
BTW Paschim, I take back my second comment regarding your legs (almost) being twice as long as your torso. After doing some research on myself and others near me, I concluded that most people do have their legs almost twice as long as their own torso. In your case, I am sure I rather underestimated. My apology still stands if I am mistaken.
torso: The human body excluding the head and limbs; trunk
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| nepali |
Posted
on 01-Jan-02 01:48 AM
I would have preferred if the writer himself/herself had revealed his/her name. Admitedly, there is a different charm in writing as anonymous. I am afraid that the person who you are all referring to might not be the one who is writing all these. I think he does not visit this site very often. However, I would prefer if we don't discuss about about the writer per se, but his/her writings. We don't want that person to be discouraged from writing more brilliant pieces!
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| Biswo |
Posted
on 01-Jan-02 08:42 PM
AIPji:
Thanks for good words about my story in Suskera.
>Somebody called him a 'gem', I think it will be more appropriate to call him 'Gold',
>just so that it matches portions of his name.
I agree!
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 02-Jan-02 08:48 AM
Nepali is right. The pleasure of writing fiction under anonymity is supreme. I have been publishing in the national press since the age of 15 under my real name, often accompanied by my photograph (without the legs). But on discussion boards like these where accountability for the written word on the part of both the writer and the reader is nil, I find anonymity constructively comforting. Anyways, I second nepali by saying let's talk about the interesting characters of Gaunthali and Bhurtel, not the boring author whose only ambition is to be as good as Gundruk. Believe me, if I were to choose between being an Artha Mantri and acquiring a year's stock of Gundruk made in Paschim, I'd opt for the latter :)
Nepe: Thulo tauko nai chahiyo?! Please be patient :) As for your other concern, I request you to have faith in my intellectual honesty. The only thing that sways me irrationally is a woman between the age of 22 and 27 who says on the phone, “timi mero sano mutu ko thulo tukra…”
Biswo: Gold means soon in Nepali. While I am no Soon Bahadur, brother of Khum Bahadur, you are not wholly wrong about your speculation :)
Indun Poet: My legs are exactly as long as my torso. I just measured. But I suggest we drop this subject. Torso of Venus or legs of Winona Ryder – now, they deserve a few doctoral dissertations, but my hairy limbs? Kathai bara…
Thanks for all your encouragement. Moving on to the topic, Bhurtel has just received Gaunthali’s letter. He is positive about the proposed reconciliation, but is keen to attach three non-negotiable conditions before going to Khaireni. What conditions is he going to set for his re-union with Gaunthali? I don’t know yet, but perhaps in a day or two, we will all know…
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| NK |
Posted
on 02-Jan-02 01:30 PM
so many times i attempted to read this piece but today, finally i did it! really enjoyed it. don't know who you are, and no interest to find out. but keep on writing and posting, bro.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 02:09 PM
Episode 7: The Commandments
27 Jestha 2061 BS
Meri Gaunthali,
You know as much as I do that all this destiny nonsense is a charade. The fact is, it was love at first sight in Professor Rai’s biology class. You sat on the third row and I used to be two benches behind. All that giggling and pencil dropping to take a peek at me – that was when we both knew our fates had been sealed. The last two years were just an aberration, and frankly sundari, I’m not surprised that your life has been hollow without me. But times have changed and so have I. No longer am I an extra portion of iodized salt that you order at will at a restaurant in Maitighar. Let me make it clear: I can only return if you agree to honor my following three conditions.
The Bhurtel Commandments
1. Thou shalt not cook.
Let’s face it Sanu, you can’t even boil a packet of Wai Wai properly. Your culinary skills are a disaster and as I grow old I want to be better fed. You can retain the nominal title of home minister, but I will take charge of the kitchen. I don’t care if I’m called ‘joi-tingre’ by chauvinists. I am no longer celibate and I will re-introduce my college list of preferences which you shall respect with somber awe. As you’ll recall, the order was, i) food, ii) sex, and iii) news read by Rama Singh on NTV. The first two preferences remain intact, but the third will now be replaced by the ‘Legal and Political Writings of Gyaneshwor Pokharel (GP) from Japan’. Ms. Singh is getting old and her diction is no longer sexy. I’m told GP’s legal discourses are far more seductive.
2. Thou shalt not ridicule Ho Chi Minh of Vietnam and Gandhi of Gujarat.
I was dismayed by your selective use of evidence. You know that my vow of celibacy was jointly inspired by Ho Chi Minh and Mohandas Gandhi. By not mentioning Mohandas, you offended me. He took a vow of abstinence without consulting his wife at the age of 37, while Ho claimed celibacy throughout. Let’s not get into the accuracy of the claims, but both men were moral, and morality inspires me. Long before it cost a lot of money to keep Gandhi-ji in poverty and little money to keep Monsieur Ho in affluence, and long before they became saints, they were both simple men like me. Mohandas went to London to become a lawyer and was active in the Vegetarian Society. Ho Chi Minh went to Paris to work menially. And I went to Jhapa for my apprenticeship under Comrade Bhimsen. We are all men of peculiar appearance. Gandhi was called a ‘seditious half naked fakir’ by Churchill; French spies described Ho as ‘awkward with mouth half open’, and you have always made fun of my moustache. But these thin men, Sanu, brought down empires. Gandhi humbled the British in India and Ho made the French flee from Indochina. The defining date in both their lives was 1930 AD. It was then that Gandhi began the Salt March and Ho Chi Minh formed the Indochinese Communist Party. Now, mark my words. By the 100th anniversary of this august date, by the year 2030 AD, conditions would have been ripe for something big to happen in Nepal too. I am referring to my republican aspirations, Sanu, and you already know where I want to be buried. Let there be no doubt: when future historians study the three greatest Asians after Siddhartha Gautam, who at some point practiced celibacy it will be Mohandas Gandhi of Gujarat, Ho Chi Minh of Vietnam, and Dilli Bhurtel of Chitwan. So, don’t you dare ridicule this trinity, Sanu, don’t you ever.
3. Thou shalt not fake any form of sensual pleasure.
No attire of yours shall be padded. You will present parts of your anatomy the way Lord Vishnu the Creator intended them to be displayed at your age, in their natural shape, size, and texture. I know it’s cruel, but that’s life. At night, if it is absolutely necessary to dramatize the occasion you may improvise some moaning, but there will be no screaming, and I won’t stand it if you fake the real thing. More importantly, the day when my performance is really good I want you to say to me, “Dilli, you were better than Baikuntha Manandhar the marathon runner.” You will say this twice, and the second time you say these words, it will be louder than the first time. There is no restriction on when you may compliment me. That will be discretionary, but what will be binding is whenever you do decide to praise me, the words have to be exactly as stated above. Just so it is imprinted in your brain, I repeat what you will need to say: “Dilli, you were better than Baikuntha Manandhar the marathon runner.”
These are my three conditions. No compromise, no halla, no negotiation. If they are acceptable to you, I am yours to be claimed, and like the famous gaffe, “it could be déjà vu all over again.”
Timro nidhar ko chamkane tika,
Dilli Kumar Bhurtel.
|
| sparsha |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 03:04 PM
Paschim ji or Kendriya ji (since Chitwan lies at the center ilaka of Nepal).
Lekhai ta dhnuwadar re chha...dhun dhan nai ramro lagyo.....
Anyway, please keep on writing. I have registered myself as a devoted fan of your writings. You are certainly a mighty perosn of words.
Ani, k bhanera dukha manna maile naparos bhane ni..
lekh, lekh, ooph lekh
bihana uunthe
bathroom gayen
dhara kholen
pani aayo
tara timro lekh aayena.
Siraha ko sathi ko kabita ta bullet re chha...kha..tttta..ra!
|
| NK |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 04:03 PM
:] :] :]
|
| NK |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 04:03 PM
:] :] :]
|
| sunakhari |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 04:05 PM
HIM HIM HIM HIM
why can't Paschim be a SHE!!!!
;)
I don't know about your legs but I'm sure your brains cells are much more active than our dead ones (murdered by alcohol and age!)
|
| sunakhari |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 04:07 PM
hmmmmm NK
those reserved smiles make me curious and nervous:
soon ko anuhar :)
am I close? hot or cold?????
|
| NK |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 04:08 PM
pssst Sunakhari, can you come to the chat room if you have nothing better to do?
|
| GP |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 07:54 PM
Hatti ayo ayo Fussa bhanya ke ho ? anon turned to be Paschim
now turned to be an enemy hunter? He is getting personal and
his writings will end up messy and seductive, just a matter of time.
Lets just keep on watching and reading his writings, it will not take much time
to understand him. It will be hard for him to continue the smashed success.
I can smell you have started to downgrade your writings towards drain,
it won't take much writings to disclose your ultimate destination.
Keep it up buddy.
GP
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 04-Jan-02 08:51 PM
The sequel is funny and sometimes 'koiralaesque'. But the wrath of GPji?
UNDERSTANDABLE!
|
| sunakhari |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 09:15 AM
OH OH
I smell a rat!!
|
| sunakhar |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 09:15 AM
OH OH
I smell a rat!!
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 01:18 PM
GP-ji, I intended that particular reference to be funny in a very good-natured way. Because I don't know you personally, there was a little risk that you would perhaps not take it well. Since that seems to be the case, I sincerely apologize, and will write an email immediately to San to request him to amend the reference.
But please be assured that it was not written out of malice. And the allegations that I am 'getting personal' and am 'enemy hunting' are untrue and ridiculous. I don't know you at all except through your occasional writings (neither political nor legal) since 1994. As this site in the past has hosted the dirtiest of personal battles, I understand your forewarning. But I am not here with that intention. Since humor is often place, people and context specific, that reference just had a very light-hearted purpose. Since it did not serve the purpose, the responsible thing for me to do is apologize to you profoundly for a completely unintended offence. In hindsight, it was perhaps an error of judgment on my part.
About the quality of the writing, I appreciate the caution and have tremendously benefited from all the positive as well as negative comments. It is indeed the reader's prerogative to find something either humorous or plain trash. And I totally respect that. Just for general information, I didn't PLAN to write this series as you can guess from the very inorganic nature of the growth. Any suggestion of a disguised agenda is farcical, and the sole intention of the series was to entertain.
As it happens, after spending two very fulfilling years in the United States, I am leaving this country for good in five days to be much closer to home. As a loyal GBNC alumnus, I will be visiting this site whenever possible, but the Gaunthali series would have had to come to an end in any case.
So moving on to the topic, Gaunthali has just received Bhurtel's conditional offer of reconciliation. One thing that strikes her is that although Dilli ostentatiously packages the deal as 'three simple conditions', she has unpacked the offer to reveal that there are actually 11 distinct conditions. Gaunthali is angry that Dilli is playing hard ball. Will she accept or reject the deal? I don't know yet, but in a day or two we will all find out how the FIRST PHASE of the Gaunthali-Bhurtel saga concludes. Please stay tuned.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 01:42 PM
I have written privately to San, but unsure of whether that will reach him, let me post the content of that for everyone else's benefit as well.
---------------
San,
In the thread on "Prachanda Found Dead", could I kindly request you to please change the name "Gyaneshwor Pokharel (GP) from Japan" in one of the later postings to "Darshan P. Harsha from Kalikot" and "GP's legal" in the line that follows to "Harsha's legal"?
Since that specific reference has displeased and perhaps offended Mr. Pokharel, I'd like to change it because that was not at all my intention. I have publicly apologized to him as well.
Thank you.
Paschim.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 05:09 PM
Actually, given my work and travel schedule this week, I realized that I may not be able to return to this thread before leaving the country if I didn't do it now. So here goes the final episode. Let me say it's the final episode of Part One, just in case I choose to continue the story at a much later date from a location much closer to the one inhabited by Bhurtel and Gaunthali.
I genuinely thank everyone who publicly encouraged me to continue this series, and for appreciating the humor. Part of the reason why I kept going was I think we in Nepal are perhaps a little too serious about everything all the time. Having myself published serious pieces for the past 12 years, I just thought it is perhaps okay to laugh once in a while, for laughing is not exactly a crime. I must say I have been very encouraged to now develop my debut humor writing further in other fora too. If the response to the first piece (which was not intended to be terribly funny) had not been enthusiastic, I would not be writing the 61st posting to this thread now. Thank you again, and I hope you enjoy the concluding episode for now.
---------------------------------
Episode 8 and End of Part I
Sanu Refuses to be Bull-dozed
5 Asaar, 2061 BS.
Dilli Bhurtel,
Having known you for over ten years, I thought I’d figured you out by now. But you never cease to amaze me. What on earth were you thinking by packaging a hideous deal with eleven outrageous conditions? Worse, you are negotiating in bad faith by ostensibly presenting a complex deal as a simple ‘tin sutriya samjhauta’. If you were thinking I am as dumb as you, well, you don’t know me good enough, Mr. Bhurtel. Demystify your letter a bit, moron, and see for yourself what a clown you appear by proposing the following:
1. The kitchen is out of bounds to me.
2. I am not to disturb you when you are eating, having sex, and reading Darshan P. Harsha. I cannot even propose to talk about ‘real’ love, nation-building, or marital bliss.
3. You are suppressing my freedom to reason and critique. I will evaluate Ho, Mohandas, and Dilli the way I see fit. You can’t ban me from either ridiculing or praising them. This is no Stalin-raj.
4. I cannot wear a bra of my choice.
5. You want my breasts to be presented for your observation and use in a way that I might find perverse. I might actually enjoy doing that, but where’s the option to opt out if I find it distasteful?
6. You are placing constraints on when and for how long I can moan.
7. There is an outright ban on screaming.
8. How can I decide to fake or not fake something that is entirely dependent on you?
9. Why must I drag Mr. Baikuntha Manadhar into our bedroom matter? Why can’t I name more, umm, interesting names?
10. Why must I say whatever nonsense you want me to say twice, and that too louder the second time. Are you deaf?
11. Your refusal to negotiate smacks of dictatorial tendencies. Remember, I am Gaunthali, Sanu Gaunthali, the woman version of Bond, James Bond. You can never bull-doze me.
You have categorically said that the deal in non-negotiable. Well, if that’s the case, listen to me you dimwit: I have my own reputation to keep. Unlike most prominent women in South Asia, power, position and self-esteem to me are not a residual ‘birta’ that a father, husband, or mama leaves behind. Despite crushing oppression of women by men for centuries, there are a few stars like me who have risen on their own merit and earned their own honor, men, and prestige. My revolutionary credentials are impressive, and my circle of friends is more witty and intelligent than your dull, unhealthy, idealistic pigs with grim personal lives. I live for the future and my friends are all proven change-agents while yours are boring hypocrites who take life too seriously and don’t know how to laugh. It was a folly on your part to have interpreted my genuine extension of friendship as weakness. Now get this straight Dilli Bhurtel: if you want to come back to me, drop this macho posturing at once, and reduce your number of conditions to a reasonable three. Unless you do that I will neither reject nor accept your offer. It’s the 5th of Asaar today, so I will give you another two months to revisit your position. After the monsoon is over and Dashain arrives, we will talk. Until then, let’s call the result of my warmest overture ‘inconclusive’ for now.
Angry, puzzled, and bored in Khaireni,
Sanu Gaunthali.
p.s. And get your facts right in addition to your attitude, Dilli. It was not in Professor Rai’s biology class that we first saw each other. We went to an Arts College – there was no biology class. As much as I would like to forget, it was the cafeteria where we first met. I was drinking a cup of Illam tea and you were messily eating a Samosa. It was you who approached me and said, “Hi, I’m Dilli from Chitwan, 26, and desperately available.” Can’t believe now I fell for that crap.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 09:06 PM
Paschim wrote-
>As it happens, after spending two very fulfilling years
>in the United States, I am leaving this country for good
>in five days to be much closer to home. As a loyal GBNC
>alumnus, I will be visiting this site whenever possible,
>but the Gaunthali series would have had to come to an
>end in any case.
For a moment, I felt a strange melancholy to learn that Paschim is leaving and that Gaunthali-Bhurtel saga is ending. I had developed an addiction to this fabulous fiction. I was relieved only when I read Paschim’s signal that he might continue to give us further sequel to this story.
>Let me say it's the final episode of Part One, just in case
>I choose to continue the story at a much later date from
>a location much closer to the one inhabited by Bhurtel
>and Gaunthali.
Now that sounds awesome. Please do continue. Together with other loyal fans, I will be impatiently waiting for the next part. Apart from the content and form of your writings, I have specially developed a yearning for poignant poetic phrases (there must be better words, but I am not familiar with literary technical terms) you invent. Here are my samples:
“I used to approach my husband wearing nothing but a smile.”
“Shame is like the pain. You only feel it once.”
“who snored in Sanskrit”
“Cigarette Factory. His loot was so legendary that the factory itself looked like a cancer patient in two years”
“..marriage was not like buying a towel in Bishal Bazaar..The purpose is aesthetic, not functional, and you can’t throw the towel away. I envy you, Sanu..”
“..there are many who have made a fine career in the Congress both by actually being stupid and pretending to be so.”
“Former Panchas remain clowns. They never got it and never will”
“We should not submerge ourselves in false nostalgia. We never really had a golden phase in our history. Our forefathers built the Changu Narayan, resisted the Brits, translated Ramayan, and walked on bare feet at 4000 meters, but they also had a life expectancy of 37 and burnt women alive”
“..‘desh banaune’ stuff is not so much about religion as it is about physiology, i.e. getting a body to function.”
“All that giggling and pencil dropping to take a peek at me – that was when we both knew our fates had been sealed.”
“No longer am I an extra portion of iodized salt that you order at will at a restaurant in Maitighar”
“you can’t even boil a packet of Wai Wai properly”
“I’m told GP’s (okey, Harsha’s) legal discourses are far more seductive.”
“Demystify your letter a bit, moron,”
“This is no Stalin-raj.”
‘’..inorganic nature of the growth.”
“Long before it cost a lot of money to keep Gandhi-ji in poverty and little money to keep Monsieur Ho in affluence..”
The last one was priceless. It equals an epic. I can’t wait for more.
I wish you a very pleasant journey back home and expect to see you here more often.
-Nepe
P.S. Please do save yourself from the temptation of becoming finance minister or prime minister if you have developed it from the encouragement of your fans posting in this thread. I would like to quote a Shlok of Pralhad Pokharel’s poem “Kina ?” from the latest issue of Madhaparka.
Sattaa-swaada milyao ki Sadhu takaley girnai pareko kina ?
Chauka haandachha choraley tara sudho marnai pareko kina ?
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 09:13 PM
Read the Shlok as:
Sattaa-swaada milyo ki Sadhu takaley girnai pareko kina ?
Chauka haandachha choraley tara sudho marnai pareko kina ?
|
| An Indun Poet |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 10:19 PM
Paschim- Please remember you've created a fan-base now and have succeeded quite a bit with your repertoire. Although you are leaving the States, you will never be leaving GBNC (or sajha).com, so hope to hear from you soon. Keep us posted. And don't forget us when you need those VOTES for your premiership or ministership.
An extended version of your friend's recital:
Oooph Prem, Oooph Prem!!
Bihana Unthe
Bathroom Gaye
Dhaara Khole
Paani Aaayo, tara timi Aaainau
(Now the extenstion)
Toilet Chire
Paaint Khole
Paad Aaayo, Aaachi Aaayo
Tyahipani Priya, timi ajhai Aaainau
Good Luck!
ps: Stride With Your Long Legs In Nepal and FulFill Your Dreams
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 10:30 PM
Nepe, your warm compliments, healthy skepticism, and genuine loyalty to the series mean a tremendous lot to me. Thank you.
And it's good to see the list of my quotes too. I just wanted to say though that all the quotes above are my own creations and purely original, except the two that follow that were extracted from other sources which I clearly acknowledge in the write-up, but the way Nepe kindly reproduced it, it might mislead people into thinking that I created these two too:
1. "Shame is like the pain. You only feel it once." This is a quote from Christopher Hampton's adaptation of a 1792 French novel, Les Liaisons Dangereuses. The week before I make my character Uma Chand quote him, I and a friend drove all the way to Philadelphia to see that play at the famous Wilma Theater there. I'd remembered that quote from the play which I thought would be apt to reproduce in the context of Uma's innocence.
2. It was Sarojini Naidu who said "it costs a lot of money to keep Gandhi in poverty." But the Ho juxtaposition and the overall construct that I make Dilli Bhurtel say is my own creation.
I just thought I should clarify these because one of the things I have learnt to value in America is intellectual honesty. Both these statements appear as quotes attributable to a source in the original write up. It's just that Nepe's list might give the impression everything that appeared above was mine. Just wanted to say, everything but the one and a half sentences that appear above. If I get time, I will pull out some other quotes that are my own personal favorites, but just off my head, I'm surprised Nepe left out the most 'republican' phrase of the series :)
Ms. Gaunthali also revealed that Dilli Bhurtel expected his body to be preserved for posterity, like Ho’s and Lenin’s, in Nasal Chowk, Hanumandhoka, at the exact spot where Nepali kings are enthroned. “After he had attained his greatness of course,” Gaunthali smirks adding his schizophrenia was worsening at a speed faster than a reckless Sajha bus that runs from Kathmandu to Dang.
“I knew it was all fake, like his claim of the wonders of celibacy,” says Ms. Gaunthali, “Because before he went to bed, he always sang a Shahrukh number, ‘Dil to pagal hai, dil diwana hai.’ He was into Hindi films, you know, not nation-building, and they are mutually exclusive.”
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 05-Jan-02 10:49 PM
And, An Indun Poet, different ways to laugh I guess. Interesting extension - I will relay that to my friend in Siraha. Rajniti tira laagi nahalaun sathi, pahila gharjham garnu parla. Budesh kaal ma pani single rahanu parera nai hola, the series developed the way it did. Rajniti ma poltis ghusya jastai, Dilli, Uma ra Sanu ko katha ma katai lekhak ko pida pani ghuseko chha ki ?!
Subha Raatri.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 06-Jan-02 12:34 AM
Paschim, thank you for your note of clarification on those two quotes. Anyway, you have placed them where they shine most.
I knew that you would remark I did not pick up that ‘republic’ quote given my earlier brawls. In fact, there is another line too that catches my eye. Bhurtel writes to Gauthali, “Now, mark my words. By the 100th anniversary of this august date, by the year 2030 AD, conditions would have been ripe for something big to happen in Nepal too.”
To be honest, I did not pick up those quotes not to appear dragging you or better not to appear indulging in ‘Aatma-rati’ (I can see some royalists applauding my statement right now). Besides, I have my own fictional time line and story too. But I am not going to write here. It’s your lime light. I do not want to steal. Plus I have no difficulty enjoying the fiction you have created.
>..pahila gharjham garnu parla. Budesh kaal ma
>pani single rahanu parera nai hola, the series
>developed the way it did. Rajniti ma poltis
>ghusya jastai, Dilli, Uma ra Sanu ko katha
>ma katai lekhak ko pida pani ghuseko chha ki ?!
????????
Please stay away from Gharjam until you finish the Burtel-Gauthali saga (Am I being cruel ?)
-Nepe
|
| Kancho |
Posted
on 09-Jan-02 01:51 PM
Reading Gaunthali/Dill saga was extremely fun.
And now I seem to miss the writing. I hope Paschim will come back to add more to this excellent katha.
|
| Fan number 101 |
Posted
on 10-Jan-02 05:26 PM
Hey Paschim, you can't just give us a glimpse of a masterpiece and suddenly quit. That's called teasing. you say you are leaving for home and you are on your way now i guess but we want more bro - this is rrrrrrreally cool!
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 29-Jan-02 02:29 AM
friends, greetings from purba. great to return to this site after quite a while. wanderlust got hold of me these past few weeks, and i 've been traveling. just back from bhurtel's chitwan, thought i owed it to this dedicated redership to inform that a whole new cottage industry of jyotish-shastra has emerged there to predict what is to happen to the much anticipated union between bhurtel and gaunthali. as you know, the story is set in 2061, and we are now in the year 2058.
one jyotishi, mahila baaje from phujel, gorkha, said bhurtel will be pretty upset that sanu shunned his offer. but the complicating part is, expecting dilli to pretend that his letter was misinterpreted, sanu apparently is to pre-empt that by sending dilli an adjoinder with the following warning: "you, of course, have a tendency to change your position more frequently than that Koirala girl changes her men, and still have the audacity to never admit that you are a third-rate pendulum."
she is to write further, "and just in case you are considering it, don’t even think of quoting that banker fellow whose name escapes me right now, saying, “i know you believe you understand what you think i said, but i am not sure you realize that what you read is not what i meant.”
so as you can see, the plot is to thicken, but unlike first-rate weathermen and third-rate economists, one can say very little about how this saga is to evolve. in the meantime, a warm hello to everyone from a sunny rajdhani.
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 29-Jan-02 02:12 PM
Hi Paschim:
Welcome back. The delayed sequel exhibits anachronistic trait, somewhat Quentin
Tarantino's movie- like. Needs to press the mind to find where the Jyotishi of
Chitwan of 2058 fits in the narration of 2061.
Also, be aware of Real Prachanda going after you. As you probably know, he is
a dedicated reader of this site. His mundane interests has long stopped surprising
me, specially after his divulging of his devotion to dear Karishma's movies, and his
inordinate affection for Bhaisiko Milk.
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 25-Feb-02 06:04 PM
Welcome back to Sajha.com!!! Good to see that you have
changed from Paschim to Purba, you location. Now in Madhya Nepal.
Biswo ji wrote:
Also, be aware of Real Prachanda going after you.
------
ARe you joking or serious. Do you think the Maoists are
hooked to internet? I don't think, otherwise, they must
be using Internet as their propaganda tool and also in
the context of censored Journalism/reporting in Nepal,
I think they could have used it for their sake. Since they
were borned in Jungle, I don't think they will ever get
hooked to Internet. Some of their propaganda sites
created by their supporters usually, have very old
propaganda material or stolen material (without valid
copy right payment: well, they migh be against copy
right / intellectual property right. I heard that the communists
especially, hadline communists, have no word "Buddhijibi"
in their dictionary. "Buddhi-jibi" are not the people who
take Bancharo (tauko forna) and Hasiya (ghati katna),
but, who look like doing nothing infront of peoples whom
communism stands: workers) .
---
Now, Purba, are you OK in Chitwan? I think you should
revise your stories and re-write them as Version 2.
It seems your stories will be outdated by 2059, quite before
2061. My guess.
Your XP
HahooGuru
Do you Hahoo!? Join Sajha.com
(Why don't you ask Cyber Cafes in your town to introduce or put a banner
of Sajha.com to ask their customer to surf Sajha.com to discuss things
with our fellow Sajha.com)
|
| NK |
Posted
on 26-Feb-02 03:10 PM
HahooGuru,
Biswo is darn right about Prachandey being the reader of this site. I think you missed one of the threads, thankfully except one person, nobody replied. It was under some benign heading, "interesting mao , what ever..." It was apparent that it was nothing but a maoist propaganda posting. Do they have a ministry of "propaganda and how to propagate it?" It sure looks like it.
|
| The fan |
Posted
on 27-Feb-02 12:20 AM
kudros for your creativity
very creative and well written. Hope, every thing comes true.
Keep your creativity up and running. It is very interesting to read fictiona like that.
The FAN
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 27-Feb-02 04:41 AM
NK,
Thanks for the info. I missed that guy who posted ... "inter... Mao"
stuffs, and especially, I feel disappointed that I missed Nepali
MaoGod Prachanda in this forum. I just want to read his postings,
can anyone let me know the URL.
Hey Mitra San,
I don't find the SEARCH Box? What happened? to it.
Do you Hahoo!? with
Hahoo!Guru @ Sajha.com
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 03-Mar-02 12:22 AM
LETTER FROM HANOI
Guoman Boutique Hotel
83 Ly Thuong Kiet Street
Hoan Kiem District, Hanoi
Socialist Republic of Vietnam
28 August 2004
Pyari Sanu,
I know that you know that I know you’re overreacting. You’ve metamorphosed into a feisty feminist in the two years I’ve let you go astray, but come on, couldn’t you take a little humor from an ex-lover? My proposals were really intended to cheer you up - just like a cup of Horlicks that you used to make for me when I was down and needed an uplifting drink with a naughty ad: drink it now to become a pilot later. Anyway, to settle the issue once and for all, of course I will return to you. I have always been yours. You only had to ask. Unlike Nehru’s pursuit of Lady Edwina, ours is a tryst that has been destined.
Sorry it has taken a while to get back to you, as my brother Jhalak only today faxed me your letter from Chitwan to Vietnam, where I have been partaking in functions to mark the 35th anniversary of Ho Chi Minh’s demise in September 1969. I am the sole non-governmental delegate from the subcontinent. My unflinching subscription to the values espoused by Uncle Ho, including celibacy, was deemed unselfishly loyal for a person of alien origin by the Vietnamese Embassy in Delhi, which asked its Foreign Ministry in Hanoi to fly me business class from Kathmandu. I had to rush because every September, Ho Chi Minh’s embalmed body is taken to Moscow for maintenance. So, I am in Hanoi now. My Palpali Dhaka Topi - worn more to hide my balding head than for nationalist reasons - is as much an object of curiosity here as my thinly trimmed mustache. By the way, the airhostesses on Thai Airways were really hot.
You are, of course, aware of my fetish to observe acutely the shapes and sizes of female body parts wherever I go. Traveling from South Asia to East Asia, I saw a distinct pattern emerging. My hypothesis is this: in South Asia, women’s friendliness to strangers is directly proportional to their breast size. Go to the southern parts of the subcontinent, women there are buxom, and consequently friendlier to strangers. In Indochina, however, although the breast size shrinks with increasing latitude, women become friendlier as you head north. I urge you to call this “Bhurtel’s Law of Latitudes and Sex Appeal”. Between the Asian longitudes 88 E and 98 E, women’s friendliness is positively tied to increasing breast size, while between the Asian longitudes 98 E to 112 E, the relationship is inverse. The secondary supposition here is that breasts are bigger in warmer and coastal climates, and conversely, smaller in cool, landlocked countries. While I know from basic econometrics that correlation is not causality, I ask you Sanu how else could you explain the fact that women in Bangalore smile more than women in Baglung, and those in Bac Ha more than in Bangkok?
I met a Nepali gentleman in Hanoi, an IMF advisor to the Vietnamese Government. He said he was from Sankhuwasava, and called himself Kautilya, after the Indian Machiavelli who helped Chandragupta Maurya ascend to the Nanda throne, circa 321 BC. Quite presumptuous I thought at first, but the chap turned out to be sharp. He received his doctorate from Ball State University, and at 31, was already on an illustrious career path. But he confessed that his scholastic achievements rung hollow, as he hadn’t yet met a woman he could worship. Two of his past goddesses, he claimed, had eloped with old Sikh men from Ludhiyana. He had his own guess about why deceptively decent Nepali girls prefer colorful Punjabi turbans to the disarming simplicity of Nepali men, but he didn’t elaborate.
Like my hypothesis about geography and sex appeal, Kautilya also had a theory about what he called “The Body Index of Chaos”. He said, “Dilli-ji, the best indicators of how a country is doing are not GDP per capita, or literacy rates, or size of the fiscal deficit, but really the number of able-bodied men between the age of 16 and 34 that you find wandering around doing nothing.” He said if I were to pick in any poor country an urban location with population of 1 lakh and over, and just count the number of people between ages 16 and 34 for exactly 3 afternoon hours who seem to be doing nothing, i.e. smoking outside a ‘cold drinks’ shop, gossiping about last night’s TV at a government office, or tastelessly eves teasing outside a college campus, you can compute the “Body Index of Chaos” that can predict the likelihood of social upheaval in that country. The form of discontent can range from one-day riot to a coup d’etat to guerilla warfare. The index, he said, can be computed by multiplying the number of loafers randomly observed in those 3 hours multiplied by 120 and divided by the city’s population. If the index exceeds 1 (unity), the country is in trouble. He arrived at the number 120 by dividing 3 hours by 1% of 12 hours of daylight multiplied by 1/5, the appropriate demographic share of young men between 16 and 34 to the overall population.
I found this index intriguing because Kautilya used it to explain both the 1990 movement and the 1996 Maoist insurgency. He said ideologies were like different ways to garnish an onion soup. The real issue was the quality of the ingredients that go into making the soup - the actual well being of the citizenry. Kautilya said, there were some methods of garnishing that were better than others but onion soups in the right quantity and quality were only made in countries where a socially responsive state distributed the recipe equitably but never attempted to make the soup itself. The goodness of the soup alone did not suffice, however, if one couldn’t drink it the way one wanted - straight off the bowl, or with a spoon wearing purple shorts in a bathroom. This, Kautilya says, is democracy.
Continued...
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 03-Mar-02 12:33 AM
If you didn’t grow onions in your country or knew how to process them, you should be open enough to borrow onion technology from elsewhere. As an illustration, Kautilya said, China’s Ming emperors arrogantly shut the then world’s most advanced economy in 1433 AD. When Comrade Deng opened it up 545 years later, in 1978 AD, it had become one of the poorest. But since then, even with rude cooks at the helm, the country has grown almost at the rate of 9% per annum. At such a ridiculously fast rate of growth, Kautilya said, a country doubles its national income every 8 years. This, he taught me, was the magic of logarithms. The value of log 2 is almost 0.7, which when divided by a country’s annual growth rate gives you the number of years it will take to double the stuff that’s growing. If Nepal grew at the rate of 3.5% a year, holding everything else constant, GDP per capita would double every 20 years. But you can’t hold everything else constant because not much stays the same in time, like population, which in our case has quadrupled from 6 million to 24 million in the past fifty years. Condoms were only invented late in the last century, and in Nepal, only the royals used them till the seventies.
Kautilya told me that in our country, we need to screen by providing incentives the right corpus of actors who can produce a variety of quality onion soup across the country, increasing production at the rate of around 7% a year. The state should supervise from a distance but not prescribe how the soup should be produced and consumed. All agents would be subject to civic scrutiny for their performance in this onion economy. Kautilya thinks after 1990 we have acquired the right equipment and crockery to produce and consume the best onion soup in the region, but have kept on grumbling about the right recipe. Also an incentive regime to reward and punish people who obstruct the production and consumption of onion soup has not been fully put in place. Kautilya says Nepal’s main challenge today is not to forcefully break the soup making utensils, or even alter the recipe, but just establish some discipline in the kitchen. I may not have followed all of Kautilya’s logic, but I surely knew by kitchen he meant government, which by extension makes the prime minister the head chef.
Kautilya mentioned that he was a Socialist Capitalist - a category unheard of before - but he definitely converted me. I found his onion vision for Nepal impressive; and being the failed lover that he is, I really think we should hook him up with your aunt’s second daughter from Palpa. He will make us proud in-laws one day. Anyway, we’ll continue the serious talk later. In the mean time, just tell me, Sanu lai Vietnam bata ke leraun? They wear these cute conical hats here, but I think I will get you special conical bras. This outfit will lead to an optical illusion on my part. If you recall my theory about small-breasted women making friendly wives in East Asia, I should hope that the conical bras would have the property of reducing the actual size and rotundity of your breasts. This apparent diminution of your assets will make us a blissful couple once again. Also I hope the airhostesses on my return flight on Thai will be as pretty as the previous lot. I just loved the way one of them gently whispered in my ear, “Mr. Bhurtel, what can I serve you today?” Of course, I couldn’t really tell her what I wanted there and then. But in the Royal Executive Class, where I sat sipping my Sherry and eating warm pistachio, the aisle was not exactly narrow, if you know what I think you know you think what I thought then.
Mero pratikshya garnu,
Bhurtel, D. K.
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 03-Mar-02 06:51 PM
Hi! Paschim,
I don't know why but, I did not feel like reading your
new article with the same charm as I read the first few
(earlier pieces in this series). I understand you tried to
correct your mistake of indulging non-relevant person
in your series, but, its how you get blow when you
make a mistake deliberately that you could have avoided.
I am writing these things to let others know, when you change
your track to wrong one especially, when you start indulging in
blasting your personal enemies or trying to misuse others
who had made no mistakes to get the punishment you imposed
on him the way you portrayed one character in your early
piec. (Though you corrected that you had no personal stuffs with him,
but, a third person who reads this thread will surely find it,
thata you had some conflict or disagreements with him so that
you wanted to misuse his name and disgrace him. Well, peoples
with quality writing will surely avoid it. Its true, if you would
have portrayed him in postive reference, there could be no
problem, none would have even noticed it. The problem starts
when you use others name in -ve side (the words you have
selected were clear proof of that), and you finally, lost
the charm, at least, I did not read your new postings, simply,
I lost interest with it, because FLASHBACK image on you does
not push me spend time reading your article. My postings
will surely discredit your postings at least in the eye of
new readers. I am sorry to write, but, you deserve this
posting. Another thread has already emerged citing this fact).
For you there is one option where you start a new thread
with new nickname, the way you forced me to come up with
new nick name. As Ashu posted it already, but, my new
nickname is perfectly matching with my new series of
postings, where I am involved in just Hahoo! And, I could
not do any Hahoo! with your new writings. I feel sorry
for that.
Join Hahoo! Bhajan Mandali.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 03-Mar-02 11:22 PM
Thank you so much to hmmm for his/her comments. I found them very sincere and constructive. One thing dedicated readers of this thread will have noted by now is that three consistent and recurring themes plaster the series right from episode one: i) political-economic stuff, ii) maturely humorous (I think so, anyway) references to sex, and iii) Nepaliness in the characters and contexts. I wanted the latest episode to comply with this framework, but to change track and tweak the falvor slightly, I bring in Kautilya, just like I brought in Uma Chand (these two episodes are incidentally my personal favorites). In terms of sexual content, I thought people would have found some of the earlier episodes, such as 3 and 4, more problematic than the later episodes. I disagree that I’m watering down the series. I think talking lightly, intelligently, and funnily about sex is not cheap. It’s normal, and a healthy habit. But I do greatly appreciate your very constructive remark, and I assure you that while I am aware of the divide between honest writing and explicit pornography, I will be more mindful of the matter to honor, and not let down, my well-wishers’ best wishes. Again, thank you hmmm - I need readers like you to warn me when I cross the line. I hope you will agree that this hasn't really happened yet.
And, GP-ji, I appreciate your feedback too. I am surprised that even under the enthusiastic, self-deprecating, and funny avatar that you say I propelled you to assume under the wonderful new alias of Hahooguru, you still find that earlier reference to you, for which I have apologized, offensive. I will repeat again, I named you specifically because I respected your sheer passion and dedication to the world of discussions, and wanted to recognize that in my own way. Unfortunately it backfired because you took it the wrong way. But you must by now be convinced that I didn’t do that out of malice. If you were more familiar with the “Anglo-Saxon” school of wit, humor, and satire, perhaps you would have forgiven me more easily. Anyway, the peripatetic me has now moved to your part of the world, and maybe we'll get to meet one day. Although I haven’t been able to frequent this site as often as I used to when based in the US, you should know that I remain a big fan of yours, and find all your postings enormously amusing.
|
| uks |
Posted
on 04-Mar-02 08:09 AM
HahooGuru, I did not know that you grumble so much. Try to look at things from an unbiased perspective. Don't try to convince(falsely) that there is a conspiracy to demafe you. No sane man has the time to do that. This accusation will only ruin your fan base. Your last posting is pathetic, to say the least.
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 04-Mar-02 08:26 AM
If anything, I found Paschim's mention of GP a recognition of his penchant for
lively discussion in web forums.
GPji has right to object the use of his name, but I would have been glad had my
name been there in stead of his ones:-)
I think the interest generated by initial parts of PFD was so high, that it was
hard to placate everybody with the sequel. But I liked it. Esp the economic
rambling is a tasty digression.
|
| Kancho |
Posted
on 04-Mar-02 10:48 AM
Hahoogoru ji,
Kati chitta dukhai rakhnu bhako? Enough already. Now that Paschim has cleared his point and can we move on w/ the story?
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 04-Mar-02 10:58 PM
Paschim,
I liked this sequel as much as your previous ones. Same craftmanship, same connectivity to space and time, same resolve and same unrestrained humor. I am sorry to say this, but those who found ‘a CHEAP sexual connotation’ in this piece must be sexually inhibited people. Inhibition often magnify things. Osho Rajanish made a lot of money explaining that to the west. (my own theory on Osho’s success is that he succeeded not because he gave the west something new, but because he justified which they already were practicing. I have also an interesting theory on Deepak Chopra’s success, but this is not a right context to talk about that. Let’s stick to Bhurtel’s theories here.)
“Bhurtel’s Law of Latitudes and Sex Appeal” was very appealing. People are free to condemn Bhurtel if they like, but I can only praise him for bringing forth such an extra-ordinary theory from otherwise reportedly ‘cheap’ hobby of his. How many of us can think of turning iron into gold ? If this theory turns out to be true, who knows, someday it may pave a way for geopolitical engineering. Sounds a great potential to me. We better hurry up, verify it and think about patenting it before the west discovers it, as they discovered Neem, Besar and Basmati dhaan.
Similarly, a new character, Kautilya’s “The Body Index of Chaos” theory is also very compelling. It is indeed intriguing that such a simple algebric multiplication and division can explain such a hard-to-understand phenomenon as Maoist insurgency (lately there has been an explosion of discussion on Maoists in this forum, and many posters are confessing they could not understand Maoists at all). My amazement is less to its claim to explain Maoist insurgency and more to the simplicity of the math. I recall Gokul equating Hinduism and Budhism to integral and differential equation. I gave up, because that was too hard for me to hope to comprehend them. But here the situation is different.
Kautilya’s Onion soup is for a healthy and tasty consumption. He has made a good prescription of Onion economy for our country. The only, and most serious, flaw I found in his understanding is that he thinks we already have everything necessary to make the best soup. Bhurtel writes:
>Kautilya thinks after 1990 we have acquired the right equipment
>and crockery to produce and consume the best onion soup in the
>region, but have kept on grumbling about the right recipe.
>Also an incentive regime to reward and punish people who
>obstruct the production and consumption of onion soup has
>not been fully put in place. Kautilya says Nepal’s main challenge
>today is not to forcefully break the soup making utensils, or
>even alter the recipe, but just establish some discipline in
>the kitchen.
What Kautilya failed, I don’t know whether naively or by self-interest, to recognize is that the Chef and the cook in our kitchen are not totally free to decide about the recipe of the soup. There are three mandatory and non-negotiable spices in their fundamental recipe. While first two spices are undoubtedly essential and universally accepted, the third mandatory spice is rather controversial, historically sickness causing and antagonizing to many drastic recipes that are needed so badly to cure some chronic illness of Nepali people. Kautilya failed to see that some consumers who are rebelling are demanding nothing more than removal of that spice or at least a democratic decision about that, AT LEAST FOR NOW.
More as it develops ....
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 04-Mar-02 11:04 PM
Well, I was not a happy with the word "SEDUCTIVE" and as suggested
by Paschim, and other friends here, let me switch to new avatar and
and stick to this new one. Biswo ji, is that true?
Paschim wrote:
If you were more familiar with the “Anglo-Saxon” school of wit, humor, and satire, perhaps you would have forgiven me more easily.
--------
I am really dumb as long as you expect me to have some basic
literary knowledge and I really skip all the discussions on the
literary works, just remain a passive readers and "HO ho tyo
ramro chha ... I like it .. type of comments". I don't know why, either
its because of my time-shortage or because of lack of patience
on me, I really don't read Novel, Poems, Fictions, .. that are
lengthy in nature. Well, I had recently purchased the Harry Potter Part I,
after watching its Ad. in TV, but, has no patience to read even 1st page, but,
I spend sometime to read things in Internet if their length is
short-n-sweet, like the one Paschim posted here at the beginning.
After reading Paschim latest posting, I must realize that his
intentions were not to harm me. ("I must realize" ... means,
I need more time to realize the things others suggested).
OK? Lets end the issue right here. I will be OK. You might find
my writing look like hypocrit, esp. on Paschim's writings. Some one
very close to me in real world, once told me that I am personality
good for "one man show" and he added " you should make habit
of listening to others". I told him, whether vice versa is true,
and I listen to everyone and I am trying to please everyone, fnally,
I select my space at corner and when I find it at center I feel
unsecured. I had a friend who always wanted to be at the center
even in small and informal group photograph, and I always expect
others to get the center when I find my self there. Thats why
when Paschim, with good intentions (?), put me very close
to the center of his write ups, I felt it unsecured and had to
defend myself that I did not deserve the center. I just want to
be on background, the last bench. The last bench used to my
90% occupied seat in my school to college to univ. days. From
last bench, you can see what others are doing, and you can
enjoy it. and no one (other than in same bench) else will know what
you are doing at the last bench. Thats the advantage of
being at the last bench even here in Sajha.com. Please, don't
force me to leave the last bench and move ahead. Let me
enjoy the last bench.
Keep it up.
hGxP
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 05-Mar-02 12:34 AM
Nepe, always a delight to read your feedback. In pointing out that flaw, just wanted to know if you were referring to, i) durbar, or ii) hindustan. I'm sure Kautilya's diagnosis was inspired more by self-interest than naivete. Remember, he works for the IMF? They carry a baggage of neo-classical rearing you know. Besides, all my characters are flawed by design (thus very human). Kautilya is informed, and sincere in his views, but quite impatient with alternative analyses. But I will have him respond to you later.
GP-ji, your exemplary passion, honesty, and sincerity warrant you a dignified life at the center stage. For humanity's sake, please don't hide in the back benches; you are Sajha.com's best ambassador, and I think you should allow us to appreciate you. But if you ask us to leave you alone at the corner, we should and we will, but only with a heavy heart.
Biswo-ji, just sent you an email. Since we don't know each other but seem to have a common provincial loyalty to Chitwan, was just thinking if we should form a "Dilli Bhurtel Fan Club"? He is after all a better export from Chitwan to the rest of Nepal than Prachanda, Muktilal Chuke, Gunaraj Pathak, J.P. Bhetwal, and Mausami Malla combined, don't you think? :)
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 05-Mar-02 08:42 PM
> if we should form a "Dilli Bhurtel Fan Club"?
I thought I was already a member of DBFC! Dilli Bhurtel memorabilia, Dilli Bhurtel
drinks series (in stead of Coke and Beers of Gondryang, drinks like Dilli drinks for
(Romantic) Dil, Bhurtel Beer with Bhuteko Maasu etc.), Dilli Bhurtel theme park
(With Dilli's gigantic bespectacled statue hugging small kids in front of ticket
counter) etc are natural next step!
And hey, it was nice to read Nepeji's informed comment. Sometimes he little bit
disappoints with his dogged opposition to monarchy:-) Reminds me article of
Modanath Prashrit. Whatever subject he is talking about, finally will say '.. .that
is why communist are good', be it fashion or be it Pashupati Nath.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 05-Mar-02 10:15 PM
Biswoji wrote:
>And hey, it was nice to read Nepeji's informed comment.
Thank you for a nice word.
>Sometimes he little bit disappoints with his dogged opposition to monarchy:-)
I wish I had something nice to say. Anyway, the three mandatory spices for Nepali Onion soup I was referring earlier were 1. People’s sovereignty, 2. Multiparty democracy and, 3. Constitutional monarchy. If you read what I wrote about the third spice, I am afraid I am still a disappointment to you. I am sorry for that.
>Reminds me article of Modanath Prashrit. Whatever subject
>he is talking about, finally will say '.. .that is why communist
>are good', be it fashion or be it Pashupati Nath.
I am not surprised. He is a politician first, then a writer. I wish he were the other way round. Perhaps he was that way in ‘Devasur Sangram’ ? Anyway, I am not a fan of ‘Pragatishil sahitya’ most communist writers serve. Most of them can be best described as crap. I will love to read an honest literature from a monarchist than a dishonest one from a sworn republican like me. That much I can say.
Nepe
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 05-Mar-02 10:58 PM
Nepe wrote: I will love to read an honest literature from a monarchist than a dishonest one from a sworn republican like me.
---
I like you, NEP't'E, not because you are republican, but, because you
are honest, and you don't speak JIBRO CHAPAYERA. We need honest
replicans to hear and realize the facts and advantages turning Nepal
into Republican state, and with their input, how the current state
can be improved will be one great feedback, for those who are honestly
and desperately looking for feedbacks or honest criticisms.
No flattering, and I am flat.
Yours XP
HG
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 06-Mar-02 10:23 AM
HahooGuru ji,
I admire your genuine openness. And I am grateful for your nice words. Believe me my opposition to monarchy is not dogmatic like that of communists. If somebody can convince me that monarchy is right for Nepal, I will have no problem accepting it. I might be wrong, but my own assessment is that monarchy is just not compatible with the jump we have to make in order to get rid of backwardness that what we are now. Nepal can not afford walking, not even running. It must jump. It must take many big leaps. By its inherent nature, monarchy can not be a partner in such leaps. May be I am a dumb, but years and years of my observation and cogitation convince me that monarchy is an inhibitory force in Nepal. However, I am open and ready to learn anything which I do not know or which I am wrong about. I am a learner and will always remain so. And as Ashu often reminds us, a relentless open debate is what leads us to the best resolution. We will continue to do so in Sajha chautari.
While that happens, let’s enjoy ’Gaunthali-Bhurtel saga’ from an honest and gifted pen of our darling Paschim.
Nepe
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 06-Mar-02 11:33 AM
Nepeji:
> If somebody can convince me that monarchy is right for Nepal, I will have no
>problem accepting it.
Actually, I think the other way. If someone can convince me the benefit of
killing thousands, smashing telephone towers, killing kids, looting banks just for
throwing up monarchy, I will support the move.
I am not a monarchist. They try to defy one Darwinian theorem: survival of fittest.
They cling to power by not letting others compete for supreme post of Nepal. In
Nepal's history, dumbest of the kings have survived the most ruthless of civilian
leaders.
However, for any kind of economic progress, a dictator is not such obstruction.
China, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan made huge progress in
dictatorship. We can always throw these people, but development is our priority
now. In this abject poverty, killing and fighting and looting can only generate
chaos and take the country backward.
I don't support the monarchy, or the active role of monarchy in Nepal's polity.
But let it sleep in its own iron cage, until people are rich, literate and capable
enough to declaw it if need arises. I also don't think that Kings are opposing Nepal's
development. I strongly believe that our three previous kings were sincere in
their desire to see Nepal developed. It is only that they used wrong system.
Now, we have right system in place. It is time to move ahead to make the onion
soup!
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 06-Mar-02 04:57 PM
Biswoji wrote:
>Actually, I think the other way. If someone can convince
>me the benefit of killing thousands, smashing telephone
>towers, killing kids, looting banks just for throwing up
>monarchy, I will support the move.
You have every reason to oppose excesses, atrocities, vandalism and terrorism committed by Maoists. It is inhuman not to do so. However, if your point is that Maoists should take a peaceful, non-violent, Gandhi-Martin L King way to overthrow monarchy, I completely support it. I just wonder, will that work ?
>I am not a monarchist. They try to defy one Darwinian
>theorem: survival of fittest. They cling to power by not
>letting others compete for supreme post of Nepal. In
>Nepal's history, dumbest of the kings have survived
>the most ruthless of civilian leaders.
Good comment. Indeed monarchy defies Darwin’s theory. However, I would look it in this way- because monarchy is unfit, they are extinct from the most part of the world. In Nepal, the process of ‘natural selection’ is going on.
>However, for any kind of economic progress, a dictator
>is not such obstruction. China, South Korea, Malaysia,
>Singapore, Taiwan made huge progress in dictatorship.
>We can always throw these people, but development is
>our priority now.
True. And the monarchy in Nepal is not in the form of dictatorship, nor it should be. Nepal should be led by a ‘janata ko chhora/chhori’. I am for strict discipline and accountability. If that is a dictatorship, let’s have it. We should not worry just looking at the present flock of khattam/jhoor leaders. A new crop of good leaders will emerge once the right system is in place.
>In this abject poverty, killing and fighting and looting
>can only generate chaos and take the country backward.
True. The war should end as soon as possible.
>I don't support the monarchy, or the active role of monarchy
>in Nepal's polity. But let it sleep in its own iron cage, until
>people are rich, literate and capable enough to declaw it
>if need arises.
Immediately after 2046, that was my idea too. But past 12 years of our stagnant history essentially similar to Panchayat kal convinces me that we are not going to get more than ‘Marich man’ brand of wolf prime ministers, so long as there is a lion (even when it is declawed and deactivated) next to it.
>I also don't think that Kings are opposing Nepal's
>development. I strongly believe that our three previous
>kings were sincere in their desire to see Nepal
>developed. It is only that they used wrong system.
They did not use wrong system. They WERE wrong system.
>Now, we have right system in place. It is time to
>move ahead to make the onion soup!
I am not sure. We have ALMOST right system. Sometimes ALMOST is just not enough. Our ALMOST did not work. It’s time to go for FULL. We are not talking about one day meal. We are not talking about one night stand. We are talking about a life long commitment. We better be careful about our choice. Let’s us not surrender to the ‘arranged marriage’. Let’s go for the ‘love marriage’.
Nepe
|
| Gandalf |
Posted
on 06-Mar-02 10:44 PM
A refreshing read Paschim! Alas, this version seems oddly biographical. Could it be that Dilli Bhurtel's professed knowledge of the Latitudinal Breast theory and his continued interest in the fiery, resolute, otherwise "unfit" of a Nepali-wife, be intertwined somewhat with Paschim's own adventures in life? :-) Well, in any event, thanks for demystifying the "Let's talk about sex, baby" scenario in contemporary Nepali literature (for I do truly consider this contemporary Nepali Literature), which even though HahooGuru might not approve, is lacking (at least in straight-talk form) in much of our writings, except perhaps Samrat's.
Sex, after all, according to Jim Watson of the Nobel-prize fame, is in most people's mind 95% of the time, including his own!
An aside: a female friend once asked me if I was a boob-man or an ass-man? Surprised at this query, and not wanting to alienate myself to the respective boob-lovers or ass-lovers (and somewhat wary of myself being labeled as either), and to not deprive myself of the bliss of either, I replied, rather diplomatically, "I'm a total package person". :-)
On a more political front, Dilli Bhurtel, at this point in time, would do well to make a detour into Angola from Vietnam, where the Angolan Prachanda has really been killed, ending (perhaps) a terrorism-based "civil war" much like ours that lasted for nearly sixteen years!
It certainly was fun reading your latest version.
|
| Brook |
Posted
on 06-Mar-02 11:33 PM
Paschim bro, I just sent you an email through this Sajha.com arrangement. I don't know if it works since this is the first time I am using this. Please let me know if you don't receive it.
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 04:35 AM
Gandalf, thanks for your interesting response. I wish my love life was half as exciting as that of Dilli Bhurtel's. Those who get it, do it, those who don't, imagine. Dilli Bhurtel is the former (underworked and oversexed), I happen to be the latter. Ke garne? :)
Brook, I didn't receive your email, probably because I hadn't specified my address. If you reply to this particular posting, you might reach me.
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 05:09 AM
Interesting exchange between Nepe and Biswo on the monarchy. Since this is a topic I’ve given much thought to privately, I’d like to join in. The way I understand it, the Maoists oppose monarchy on the grounds that their utopian vision of society is founded on egalitarianism. This requires that feudalism of any form be scrapped, and because the monarchy is seen as the supreme patron of all feudals, it needs to go. This is a fundamental reasoning of theirs in theory. Realistically though, they know that once their revolution succeeds they are the new feudals. Recall the Orwellian quip: “everyone is equal, but some are more equal than others”. For the new to replace the old, the old has to be uprooted, and if the comrades are to reign, the House of Gorkha has to fall. Maoists have read their account of the Bolshevik Revolution well enough to know that you can’t topple a regime if you don’t strike at the heart. Behead the Tzar, claim his throne, and take care of the messy consequences later. Even with under 50,000 cadres, and a shockingly low level of popular support, the Bolsheviks managed to grab a grand empire in 1917. It was basically Moscow and Petrograd that they had their foothold in. As for the rest of the country, as Leon Trotsky famously said, “it was revolution by telegraph.”
Having said this, I don’t believe for a moment that the Nepali Maoists oppose monarchy either for genuine ideological reasons, or as a realistic next step of the revolution. If you put together the following two facts together, it becomes clear that the question of monarchy is a mere tactical dice for them. First, they said they had an ‘understanding’ with the then king through Dhirendra, and Second, they couldn’t argue convincingly why after agreeing to drop the demand of a republic their call for a constituent assembly was rational (barring a ploy to save face). Except the three non-negotiable provisions in the existing constitution: i) monarchy, ii) multi-party polity, and iii) guaranteed civic rights, everything else can be changed in the parliament. Going by their own propaganda, Maoists tell us that ii) and iii) will stay almost intact after they come to power (recall Baburam’s stupidly contradictory interview given to the Nepali Times, whose editors drew our attention to the Comrade’s “own handwriting”). Regarding i) they said they can be patient. All this makes me wonder what the bloody carnage is for? But then they didn’t mean what they said.
[After failing so utterly at the negotiations, they had no choice but to return to the jungles to pacify the robots they’ve groomed to polish the ‘bharuwa’. I hear though that mercenaries from LTTE and the PWG, recently made redundant by cease-fire in Andhra and Ceylon have been brought to operate the loot from the army, as in Mangalsen on Feb. 17. Not that the Maoists were negotiating in good faith. A senior Deuba advisor told me in Kathmandu last week that during the last talks, the Maoists were softening, when suddenly a call was received by Mahara on his cell phone after which their position changed dramatically. Attack in Dang was ready to be launched and the internal tussle had reached a new height. The political wing had lost to the military wing. The former relocated to India, as confirmed by a telephone interview that a journalist friend in London took of one of their politburo members. The Comrade was reached in Delhi.]
The rest of the communists, notably the UML, have already settled for a position of cozy adjustment with the monarch. The Congress remains clueless as to why it supports a ‘constitutional monarchy’. It may have been a prudent outcome of a tripartite power struggle in 2007 and 2046, but at least they need an ideological underpinning beyond the customary, “Oh, BP said this is how it should be; and we are the folks who brought back and re-enthroned a king who had thrown it away in Saat Saal.” Attempts by the likes of Narahari to trigger a fresh debate on royal issues were suppressed last year.
And what do we know about what the monarchy itself feels about its longevity especially now that they are severely de-populated? Gyanendra is rumored to have said privately, “I’ll be happy to go for a referendum.” Ironically, I don’t think Gyanendra can just dissolve the institution even if he wants to. It’s up to us – the citizens. If Gyanendra or Paras are bored with the job, we will find the next in line if we want the institution to survive. But, of course, one should think there are two good reasons why the royals feel they should continue. First, being royalty is often nice – you live in rent-free state property, you have an army of staff as well as elements of the real army that works for you, you draw a salary to the tune of 54 crores a year without doing much, and the pomp goes with good food and pretty wives (sometimes). The second reason is, they might seriously feel that as descendants of the dynasty that founded the kingdom, they have anobligation to continue reigning as legitimate rulers; but in doing so, change with the times by honoring the wishes of those being ruled even if that implies curtailment of powers as in 2046.
On the point re. legitimacy, it is interesting to read what Chandra Shumsher thought about the matter. His advisor, Ram Mani Dixit, has recorded the Rana’s thoughts in frank detail in his diaries published as “Purana Samjhana” by Dixit’s son in 2029 BS. The book is out of print now, but it should be available in libraries. Anyway, given this situation of confusion and complacency on the part of all those who by virtue of their organized capacity are in a position to do something about the monarchy, how should citizens like Nepe, Biswo, Paschim, and others who are reading this, advance and inform the debate?
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 05:23 AM
I am of the opinion that, true to the spirit of the 2046 movement, a reformed constitutional monarchy is what we should have in Nepal for a few more years, say at least a generation or so. If reformed further, the monarchy can do a much better job at being a stable anchor around which the diverse nations of Nepal can rally. But there are preconditions for this to happen meaningfully: i) Nepal should become secular, ii) the royals should concentrate on social purposes and be popular, and iii) they should give up all political ambitions, make themselves powerless by placing the army firmly under the executive, and make all interaction with politicians non-strategic. Presently, the king meets the PM every week, exactly a day before cabinet meetings are held.
If the monarchy reforms itself along Scandinavian, Thai, or even English models, I wouldn’t feel the urgency to get rid of them for a few more years. Seven of the past eleven Shah Kings have been wimps anyway, and I don’t see most of them as having been a fundamental obstacle to our progress. We did have troubles with the last two. Mahendra was insecure - he could have done all of what he did without alienating nodes of potent political capital, and Birendra was just plain slow. The reason they were particular disappointments is that their reign coincided with a period when the project of post-war modern development efforts was fully underway. Even without the pre-requisites that the Ranas deprived us of, we could have done much better than what we did between 1950 and 1990, and after. Post June 1, amidst all the turmoil, two good things happened in Nepal - the most underexposed Nepali institutions, the palace and the army, got demystified. They knew they were no holy cows, but now they know we know too. Gyanendra’s wisdom will be tested by how carefully he balances his constitutional obligations of non-interference in executive matters with his personal instincts of a micro-managing businessman. Let’s give the gentleman the benefit of the doubt for now.
But the beauty of the system we have in place now is, we can practically do away with royal indulgence while actually keeping them. We really have that luxury. What does it take? Good behavior on the part of the political parties, and a bold prime-minister who stands tall on the strength of his/her popular mandate. Believe it or not, between 1991 and 1994, Nepal actually almost exercised a text-book version of constitutional monarchy. The royals lay low after 1990, and King Birendra knew the basics of constitutional governance. The Congress and the Communists hadn’t completely wasted their moral authority, and the first elected government of Koirala actually ran the show with virtually no extra-constitutional interference. It was during this period, that he also delivered the highest economic growth rate in the history of the kingdom – at around 9% per annum. But sadly, it is the same man’s poor management of intra-party dissent that propelled most of the adverse developments in the country since 1995 - the coalition fiasco, instability, and Maoist terror. It is exactly then that the palace began to resurrect itself. As a senior aide who worked for Girija during 1991-94 and also 1998-99 noted comparing the two periods, by 1998, things had worsened to such levels that the palace didn’t consult the government for anything, it did things its own way. This was not the case in 1991-1994, when even three line messages that the king delivered were approved by the PM’s office. And in theory, the cabinet is the sole official advisor to the king. Lesson? When the legitimate powers don’t deliver, the illegitimate powers rear their ugly heads. Can we redress this? Of course we can, by cleaning up the democratic channels of authority and restoring the dignity of the offices of our elected leaders, while reserving the right and act to castrate the bastards (to borrow Uma Chand’s phrase) if they betray our mandates.
These are the usual growing pains in an emerging democracy like ours. But the system is here to stay and it will, in my opinion, withstand all attacks that it is bearing from the extreme left and the right. As for the monarchy, well, let’s preserve them for a while, and progressively make them ‘harmless’. Why fix something that is not irretrievably broken? Note the emphasis on the word irretrievably. If they start being a real nuisance, we have the option to fix them by throwing them away. The process of disposal may be messy. We don’t care. Maybe they will outlive their use and wither away voluntarily. Their gene pool too is being rather constricted. But as long as they behave, let’s not bother.
The problem with pushing for a republic in haste is that it’s like ejecting toothpaste out of the tube - you can’t put it back if you discover soon that dental hygiene is really not your most important concern. In today’s Nepal, the challenge is to defend ourselves from armed robbery, not brush our teeth. Many say, the toothpaste attracted the robbery, but I find that unconvincing. The greed, ruthlessness, and the ambition of the robbers triggered the robbery, not the toothpaste. If and when we kill the robbers, we should go for a good night’s sleep, and decide the next morning on how best to extract the toothpaste out of the tube if indeed dental hygiene remains our top concern then.
My character, Kautilya, said earlier that he was a Socialist Capitalist. Now, do I - Paschim - sound like a Republican Royalist? I hope I do.
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| Biswo |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 06:38 PM
I generally agree with Paschim, and actually, I have been saying this same thing a
lot of times: that even for anti-monarchists, it is not bad to support the existence
of monarchy for now.
Nepal is scourged with a lot of other problems,and those problems,like providing
basic education and primary health to everybody, should be made focal point
of any political agitation. Attacking king is easy and beneficial business in Nepal:
it shows you are are revolutionary (ask Lila Mani Pokharel!), and it relieves you
from the responsibility to provide ( in case of parliamentary opposition: the detail
of) good governance to citizen. Blame the king and you can get rid of your
responsibility: "Yes, because of this feudal system, we have this bad, that bad,..".
Paschim says in 1991-94 our system was precisely executed from script of
constitutional monarchy.Evidence supporting this abounds, but I doubt the growth
rate (9%). I think 1994 growth rate was officially 5.4%, and it was the best one in
south asia then.(provided it was not manufactured data!) Though Girija's regime
was good at keeping king at distance,it was very vindictive in its dealing with
opposition supporters (esp Karmachari andolan wallas, and Govinda Raj Joshi's
failed attempt to recruit 'Congress only' primary school teachers defied norms of
democracy and meritocracy!) which contributed to gaping rift among political
parties, And subsequently Girija himself became the singlemost
divisive factor in Nepali politics. But , as long as king-government relation was
concerned, it was constitutional. King evinced no desire to overreach his authority.
But as weak governments came, king started nominating his own people to
Rashtriya Shabha, and then other regal disobedience ensued. Unfortunately,most
of royal snubs(like vetoeing Achyut Kharel's nomination, soliciting supreme court's
opinion in citizenship bills and other executive decisions) were popular with
intellentsia and hoi polloi too.
So, King is nuisance in some way: His popularity encourages his staunch followers
to demand his direct rule,and ignore democracy and his non-popularity encourages
extreme lefts to go ahead with their pipe dream. Extreme lefts always find it
beneficial to deal directly with king rather than government. By trying to popularize
king and provoke him to come forward in public life, some people tried to overlap
the role of constitutional monarch and active monarch in mid to late 90s. Maoists
seized the moment, and thus monarchy is forced to be a moot subject in current
day Nepal.Critics like Nepe, whose disillusion with monarchy and whose excessive
zeal to overthrow monarchy, often comes with their infatuation with some of
Maoists policy, demonstrating a classic example seen everywhere in the world: of
intellectuals falling in trap with extremist views, and getting wrong friends for
promoting their ,perhaps right, cause until it is too late for them to realise that
their friend in revolution were not the true blue-friend in nation building. The best
thing for modern day Nepal is to ignore king. Let him sleep in palace. Let's not
seek his active involvement for now. We are too immature for that. And to
repeat what Napolean once said for China, "Let king sleep in palace. The day
he wakes up, the nation will be sorry!"
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| Biswo |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 06:39 PM
I generally agree with Paschim, and actually, I have been saying this same thing a
lot of times: that even for anti-monarchists, it is not bad to support the existence
of monarchy for now.
Nepal is scourged with a lot of other problems,and those problems,like providing
basic education and primary health to everybody, should be made focal point
of any political agitation. Attacking king is easy and beneficial business in Nepal:
it shows you are are revolutionary (ask Lila Mani Pokharel!), and it relieves you
from the responsibility to provide ( in case of parliamentary opposition: the detail
of) good governance to citizen. Blame the king and you can get rid of your
responsibility:
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 11:21 PM
Highly valuable inputs, Biswo; Thanks.
On your doubt regarding that statistic, just want to assure you that while I am usually sloppy in my arguments, I am careful with my facts. Real GDP at market prices in the fiscal year 1993-94 was 8.2%, according to the International Monetary Fund (please see Nepal: Recent Economic Developments, IMF Staff Country Report No. 99/18, March 1999). And I said “almost” 9%. By 1998, this rate had dropped to around 1.9%. I urge people not to read too much into the numbers, burdened with caveats as they always are, but they are helpful indicators, and the report I cited from the IMF that comes out regularly is considered to be the most authoritative on economic data.
The point I was trying to make was much larger but simple: strong governments with fresh mandates, in a stable environment, can do a lot, i) socio-economically (push through reforms successfully), and ii) politically (keep extra-constitutional interference at bay). Of course I need not go into the hundred other things that were not done right. They’re well known and to list them again will be boringly repetitive. But I am glad we speak the same language on the more important issues. Madhya Terai ko paani hola!
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 07-Mar-02 11:41 PM
Since this seems to be the 100th posting of this thread, I just wanted to wish Dilli Bhurtel of Chitwan and Sanu Gaunthali of Khaireni a very pleasant reunion, and burden them with a gender insensitive blessing in Sanskrit:
"Sau Putro Bhava"
May you have a hundred children.
Paschim.
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| Nepe |
Posted
on 08-Mar-02 05:54 PM
I am glad to see Paschim encouraging and joining in this non-fictional diversion about monarchy inside the thread of a great fiction. It is apparent that Paschim has given a great deal of thought on the subject and I consider his views as honest, mature, serious, informed and very compelling. So are the views of Biswo ji with whom I am having a very healthy and enlightening kurakani in this and several other threads since my introduction to this forum.
Let me admit that I almost totally agree with the accuracy of the observation, be it historical account or international development or philosophical questions, made by these two well-informed gentlemen. Defienitely Bishow and Paschim have more superior knowledge than that of myself in these areas. I have learned a lot from reading Biswo. So, as I said I agree with their observation. I only differ in some aspect of interpretation and of course the final conclusion. Most of my views on monarchy are already scattered in various threads of kurakani, so I will not reproduce them here. I will rather give my quick comments on a few points/notes Paschim and Biswo have put here.
Paschim writes:
>the Maoists oppose monarchy on the grounds that their utopian
>vision of society is founded on egalitarianism. This requires that
>feudalism of any form be scrapped, and because the monarchy
>is seen as the supreme patron of all feudals, it needs to go. This
>is a fundamental reasoning of theirs in theory...
True. But let us not give Maoists the sole right to interpret monarchy. Let Monarchy have a fair trial and be questioned on its own merits. Even if Maoists are wrong lawers, let us not give our verdict solely based on that.
>If you put together the following two facts together, it becomes
>clear that the question of monarchy is a mere tactical dice for them.
>First, they said they had an ‘understanding’ with the then king
>through Dhirendra, and Second, they couldn’t argue convincingly
>why after agreeing to drop the demand of a republic their call for
>a constituent assembly was rational (barring a ploy to save face).
All these are basically true. But I can imagine to understand why. For a radical party like Maoists, for whom the end justifies the means, there is a three layered action plan- goal, strategy and tactics. These three layers exist in a form of a pyramid, characterized by increasing flexibility and responsiveness to the developing situation. ‘Goal’ is fixed. ‘Strategy’ a is long term plan and the ‘tactics’ is the immediate game plan which includes all kinds of overt, covert, clean and dirty games. All these ‘understanding through Dhirendra’, praising the ‘patriotism of Birendra’ and similar things are their tactical part. ‘Constituent assembly’ is their change in the strategy. But the republican state is their fixed and unchanged goal. They have not dropped it, nor ever will. Their ‘talk’ with the government is often misinterpreted by Nepali intellectuals and badly misunderstood by the government. I do not think for a moment that Maoists came to the table hoping an agreement. Clearly, the king was not negotiating and the government does not have power and mandate to negotiate on monarchy. Maoists were fully aware of this. The purpose of their participation in the talk was to publicize their ‘republic’ agenda from the state domain which they succeeded. However, they did not see enough public enthusiasm, so they made strategic adjustment. They put forward a ‘softer’ demand of constituent assembly. Maoists calculated that they can eventually use constituent assembly to reach to their goal or at least greatly benefit from what happens during public debate, election etc. Interestingly, it is also a ‘trap’ for liberal intellectuals, whose support means a lot to Maoists. My own observation is that it has started to work. People are dismissing the the question of the constituent assembly less and less and some already see it as a viable alternative to otherwise an extended bloodshed in the country. You can hear such voices in every formal discussion and seminars in the country and abroad. If you see the shift in the atmosphere in the country- where ‘republic’ was an unheard of, taboo, a dangerous and an underground word until recent past, now it is a buzz word – you realize that Maoists are gaining the ground.
contd...
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| Nepe |
Posted
on 08-Mar-02 06:00 PM
Cont...
>After failing so utterly at the negotiations, they had no
>choice but to return to the jungles…
As I said, it depends how we interpret things. I rather see the failure of the government. Deuba is often praised for his effort to bring Maoists to the table. He certainly deserves the praise, especially when we look at the outcome of Girija policy. However, Deuba naivete is no less dangerous. Deuba utterly failed to understand and estimate Maoists. His success would have been keeping Maoists engaged in the ‘talk’ with some cleverly designed baits. But the table was empty. It seems that Deuba was thinking that Maoists are disparate to throw arms and make peace with the establishment. So providing a ground for a ‘safe landing’ or ‘saving face of Maoists’ was all he had to do. He was utterly wrong. In addition, allowing state propoganda that Maoists have failed to ‘provide satisfactory logic’ for their demands etc, which appeared to work for demoralizing Maoists, was also not the brightest idea. Basically, the government was poorly equipped to deal with the Maoists. It shows the lack of intelligent people in the government and the bureaucracy. On the other hand, Maoists seems to have clever and cunning people in their rank and file.
>A senior Deuba advisor told me in Kathmandu last week
>that during the last talks, the Maoists were softening,
>when suddenly a call was received by Mahara on his
>cell phone after which their position changed dramatically.
> Attack in Dang was ready to be launched and the internal
> tussle had reached a new height. The political wing had
>lost to the military wing. The former relocated to India, as
>confirmed by a telephone interview that a journalist friend
> in London took of one of their politburo members. The
>Comrade was reached in Delhi.
Well, I am not an insider of Maoists. But I do not think that any wing of Maoists can soften so much as to forget their goal. There may be difference in the part of strategy and tactics, but not in the part of the goal. Therefore, I do not think there is much to gain from such differences until the government is well equipped for a total solution. A total solution is either wipe out the Maoists or make peace with them with certain compromises. The government is experimenting with the first method. And to our dismay, it is not working. At least, it is clear that Maoists were heavily underestimated by the government. And that is not a good sign.
>The rest of the communists, notably the UML, have already
>settled for a position of cozy adjustment with the monarch.
>The Congress remains clueless as to why it supports a
>‘constitutional monarchy’. It may have been a prudent
>outcome of a tripartite power struggle in 2007 and 2046,
>but at least they need an ideological underpinning beyond
>the customary, "Oh, BP said this is how it should be; and
>we are the folks who brought back and re-enthroned a king
>who had thrown it away in Saat Saal." Attempts by the likes
>of Narahari to trigger a fresh debate on royal issues were
>suppressed last year.
Good points. Monarchy does not have ‘good’ ambassadors in the country. Another good thing for Maoists.
>Gyanendra is rumored to have said privately, "I’ll be happy to go
>for a referendum." Ironically, I don’t think Gyanendra can just
>dissolve the institution even if he wants to.
Well, who can stop him ?
>t’s up to us – the citizens. If Gyanendra or Paras are bored
>with the job, we will find the next in line if we want the institution
>to survive.
That’s sounds interesting. Even better idea will be reviving old royal dynasty, perhaps Malla or Sen. This idea is really exciting for me. A clean monarchy. Great option. Since there are too many royal dynasties, there could be some difficulty. For that, I am even ready to go for ‘election for the king’, you know something like for every 15 years or so. Isn’t that a great idea ? We will have our king, the king whom we choose. I think such king will be truly revered by the people (things our future king Paras is never going to get) and hence it will do the job what it is supposed to do. Very cool.
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| Nepe |
Posted
on 08-Mar-02 06:03 PM
Contd….
>one should think there are two good reasons why the
>royals feel they should continue. First, being royalty is
>often nice – you live in rent-free state property, you have
>an army of staff as well as elements of the real army that
>works for you, you draw a salary to the tune of 54 crores a
>year without doing much, and the pomp goes with good
>food and pretty wives (sometimes). The second reason
>is, they might seriously feel that as descendants of the
>dynasty that founded the kingdom, they have an obligation
>to continue reigning as legitimate rulers; but in doing so,
>change with the times by honoring the wishes of those
>being ruled even if that implies curtailment of powers as
>in 2046.
The first is indeed an eternal reason. And the point of pretty wives, as you acknowledged by putting ‘sometimes’ in bracket, is not always true, a fact that might surprise people who have only seen royals of other countries. Our royals emphasized not on the personal quality of women, but on keeping marital relation to their trustworthy familes. Though I am a pro-choice person, I can not overlook what that means. It means, our royals had no respect for the very people they ruled. They had deep fear and mistrust to the people. Royal carnage is a telling story.
And the second reason is their life line. I do not think things like honoring the wish of people is in their blood. But they did ‘honor’ when people were strong/brave enough to force them to do so. In a separate thread, I was arguing that if now is the finest moment in the history for Gyanendra to make monarchy immortal by sacrificing itself to bring Maoists to the mainstream. One more step in fuller democracy and we will have Maoists as a democratic party running for election, destroying the street railing, picketing the rostrum but slowly learning to accept and practice democracy, just like UML. Nepali commies are to be trusted. I don’t think Maoists are going to establish a Pol Pot state in Nepal. They will end up in democracy like other commies of Nepal did. The only difference between other commies and Maoists is their take on monarchy. Maoists ending up in democracy ? Are you kidding ? No, I am not kidding. Here is my theory (of course in a crude form):
Nepali communists never fought for establishing a communist state. Fortunately or unfortunately, we had monarchy to fight against FIRST. This shaped Nepali communists to desire, love and defend democratic values. They had to use 99% of their time defending democracy which left only 1% for communism. If you study their literature, training, discussion etc. you will find 99% of them devoted for democracy and only 1% for purely communist theme. 99% of motivation of 99% of their cadre comes from the idea of eradicating monarchy and establishing FULL democracy. Communism does not motivate them, democracy does. Communism is a distant dream, democracy is their tomorrow. They practically revolve around democracy, not around communism. What is communism to them, then ? Communism for them is an organizational gadget, a binding device, a discipline, an oath, a guarantee of their revolutionary zeal, that’s all.
Do you know why Prachanda/Baburam are not telling about the details of the communist system they envision ? BECAUSE THEY DON’T HAVE ANY.
All they know is there should be no monarchy. And they have some slogans of social reforms and economic stuff. The later is mostly garbage and the former is not a communist stuff. We all are demanding that.
So, the Maoists are not yet pure communists. That’s only Hahoo. And the other communists are even less so. In Nepal, nobody can go beyond democracy.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 08-Mar-02 06:08 PM
Paschim further writes:
>I am of the opinion that, true to the spirit of the 2046 movement,
>a reformed constitutional monarchy is what we should have in
>Nepal for a few more years, say at least a generation or so. If
>reformed further, the monarchy can do a much better job at
>being a stable anchor around which the diverse nations of
>Nepal can rally. But there are preconditions for this to happen
> meaningfully: i) Nepal should become secular, ii) the royals
>should concentrate on social purposes and be popular, and
>iii) they should give up all political ambitions, make themselves
>powerless by placing the army firmly under the executive, and
>make all interaction with politicians non-strategic.
A valid argument. I can not disagree. If those preconditions are met, yes, I can live with monarchy. But will they ? And where’s the guarentee that they will never be voilated ? Keep in mind that we are talking about monarchy, not an elected government which you can throw out every five years if you want. For all practical purpose, monarchy is like keeping a tiger as a pet animal at home. He may be good, but you are at his mercy. And that is where I don’t want to be. Besides, whatever job we are talking about of monarchy, they can be done by the president or by dethroned monarchy. Monarchy is not indispensable. Nor monarchy is a rosy picture. To me, monarchy is like an unloved husband the wife could not get divorce from. And Paschim and Biswo are trying to convince her that perhaps she can get along, perhaps he is harmless. There is something fundamentally wrong here. You can not deny a nation a happy love life, can you ?
>..the beauty of the system we have in place now is, we can
>practically do away with royal indulgence while actually
>keeping them. We really have that luxury. What does it take?
>Good behavior on the part of the political parties, and a bold
>prime-minister who stands tall on the strength of his/her
>popular mandate.
Yes, a ‘bold prime-minister who stands tall on the strength of his/her popular mandate’ is all what we need. This is exactly where we failed these whole 12 years. And I blame monarchy. Let me reproduce one of my posting from another thread (DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC AND PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC) here:
"My theory is pretty simple. Let’s start with the fact. A whole decade of our political exercise did not produce a single leader. By leader, I mean somebody like Mustafa Kemal Ataturk who did, against all odds, what it takes to turn Turkey into a modern, secular and vibrant nation, or like Lee Kuan Yew, who turned a poor and resourceless Singapore into what it is today. The question is why we do not have any Mustafa Kemal or Lee Kuan. I think we have our Mustafa and Lee somewhere hidden amongst today’s nalayak leaders of Nepal. I mean we do have many potential Mustafa and Lee in the country. The problem is that there is something that hinders them to be Mustafa and Lee. What is that ? It might not look obvious at a first glance to those who take monarchy and many other traditional institutions for granted, but the hindrance is indeed monarchy. What makes Mustafa and Lee the Mustafa and Lee ? Their patriotism ? Their sensing of the pulse of the time ? Their far-sightedness ? Their vision ? Yes, of course. But the most important element is the authority, supreme authority, absolute authority, nobody except their goal was above them. And exactly that’s what is absent in Nepal. I know what is written in the constitution about the king. But that’s somehow did not matter. What mattered is what is written in the psyche of the nation, what is written in the psyche of our leaders. Our national psyche is still under the shadow of monarchy. How much constitutional power it has did not matter. The fact that it is there, it’s presence mattered. We still carry the psyche of a slave, psyche of a subject. Do you know, our victorious leaders of Jana-andolan, when met ‘defeated’ king Birendra at the palace at that victorious night of 2046, their legs were trembling, trembling by awe, by fear, by reverence, by being belittled by the majestic presence of his majesty. That continues. The subject psyche of our prime minister does not allow him to feel that he is the supreme authority of the nation. His aura, his energy, his supremacy, his authority is neutralized by that of his majesty, not constitutionally, but by virtue of psychology of sub-conscious mind. We are never going to see our Mustafa and Lee until and unless we get rid of the presence of his majesty next to them. We will only see new edition of Surya Bahadur and Marich Man, nothing more. Many people can give many hypothetical reasons for keeping monarchy in the country. That is not the point here. The point is, you have to choose between Lee and monarchy. You can not have both. Not in Nepal. Last twelve years are my witnesses. I rest my case."
contd..
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 08-Mar-02 06:14 PM
Contd...
From Paschim:
>The problem with pushing for a republic in haste is that it’s
>like ejecting toothpaste out of the tube - you can’t put it back
>if you discover soon that dental hygiene is really not your
>most important concern.
That’s a cute metaphor typical of Paschim. But I think it misfits. I rather incline to see monarchy as a pet tiger. So I prefer a dog now. Somehow, someday if we felt need of a tiger (very unlikely though), we will see to it.
>My character, Kautilya, said earlier that he was a Socialist
>Capitalist. Now, do I - Paschim - sound like a Republican
>Royalist? I hope I do.
You said this to keep my mouth shut, didn’t you ? Okay, I shut up.
Biswoji,
As always, it was a delight to read you. I will perhaps write more later, for now my eyes caught the following lines of yours:
>So, King is nuisance in some way: His popularity encourages
>his staunch followers to demand his direct rule,and ignore
>democracy and his non-popularity encourages
>extreme lefts to go ahead with their pipe dream.
What can I say ? No win situation, ah ?
>Critics like Nepe, whose disillusion with monarchy
>and whose excessive zeal to overthrow monarchy,
>often comes with their infatuation with some of
>Maoists policy, demonstrating a classic example
>seen everywhere in the world: of intellectuals falling
>in trap with extremist views, and getting wrong friends
>for promoting their ,perhaps right, cause until it is too
>late for them to realise that their friend in revolution
>were not the true blue-friend in nation building.
Thank you for your friendly warning. It is true that I find something intriguing in Maoists. But I promise I will never fall in their trap. Actually, I was thinking the other way - to make them fall in our trap. I will explain it some other time.
Nepe
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 09-Mar-02 02:00 AM
Nepe, you draw on an impressive combination of reliable knowledge of the communist movement and a non-dogmatic, albeit impassioned, frame of mind regarding how we as a nation should advance. I benefited greatly from your informed, comprehensive response. Both of us share the best of intentions, but the way we have groomed ourselves intellectually forces us to make some interpretations more nuanced than others - you know, assign different weights to perceived importance of observed events and claims. I think we agree broadly on issues of content, and maintain a civil, respectful disagreement on some issues of form (aptly captured by the Nepali phrase “rajya samyantra ko khaka”). I particularly appreciated your novel claim about communist loyalty to democracy and references to Ataturk and Lee. On the monarchy, interestingly and ironically, I find you attaching to it far more importance than it deserves. You liken it to a pet tiger. I insist that we see it as a second grade toothpaste.
A real pleasure indeed conversing with you and Biswo!
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 15-Mar-02 02:31 AM
While on the topic of monarchy, and to indicate that my claim of being a “republican royalist” is not entirely out-of-context, just wanted to share an article written last summer. I’ve tried to be dispassionate, and while a BBC team that produced and aired a well-researched documentary on the royal massacre called “Murder Most Royal” on January 6, 2002, cited this piece for “a commendable lack of bias”, I’m afraid, I disagreed with them, for born in Gorkha from where the kingdom grew to its present size, I surely have my own biases, reflected below, about the institution (positive) and its actors (negative). This is the irony that is not.
--------------
Awry Aristocracies and Other Tales
by Paschim.
As soon as a degree of normalcy was restored after the surreal royal incident in June, I headed for Nepal for six weeks with the overt intention of doing nothing. After two painful years at graduate school spent under excruciating academic discipline, I was ready to break free of routine. This trip thus had a strong personal agenda, but it would have been presumptuous to divorce it from the context of turmoil in Nepal – the pink terror unleashed by Maoists, as well as the clumsy engineering of royal replacement, but regal void, in Narayanhiti. I spent time traveling both within Nepal and in the Indian hill stations of Shimla and Mussorrie, famous for the colonial patronage they received after the Anglo-Nepal war in 1816. I will write more about these travels later, but I dwell here on three fragmented royal themes that occupied me during this trip.
1. An Institution Cordoned
History is no science, and judgments based on facts change over time. And facts change over time, forcing judgments on which they rest to fumble reminding one of a Keynesian quip to a detractor who alleged him of being inconsistent, “I change my mind when facts change. What do you do, Sir?” With an analogous caveat, I concluded early on that an ugly Dipendra who had a year before scuffled his pregnant sister did actually plan, coordinate, and execute the massacre. Alone. Pitying the managerial incompetence of the palace as well as the wanting institution of the army, I remain unconvinced of alternative accounts, which on a scale of incredibility range from imaginative to farcical. But I was surprised to find how lonely I was in my unflinching subscription to the probe committee’s findings, however sloppily presented. Of course, ours is a country of hearsay, and people probably relish a bit too much the perverse joys of concocting stories that stand out for total absence of facts and reason. But even this cultural knowledge didn’t prepare me for the stunning disbelief in which the people held the official version of the massacre. The credibility of the institution of the monarchy has perhaps never been this low, and there is a serious crisis of legitimacy for the new king on whom has been thrust so very unkindly the historic obligation of salvaging a reputation. The barrage that the palace erected to restrict sentimental reach of the common people to its occupants during the Panchayat, probably to keep the institution adequately mystical to preserve the dishonesty of a non-existing divine mandate, now haunts the palace as it fails to rally the public. Perhaps consequently, republicanism as an idea in Nepal, though untenable, has gained more respectability. If there ever was a time when the monarchy could do with some genuine blessings of long life from the cheering crowds it is now.
2. Lust and Pride in the Kingdom
Locating the massacre in an historical perspective, some of the biggest episodes in Nepal have all had ignobly romantic inspirations. First, interning in 1741 at the Court of Bhaktapur as a young prince from the impoverished principality of Gorkha, Prithivi Narayan Shah saw first hand the prosperity of the valley – a rich Newar nation that combined mercantilist instincts with the lush productivity of the valley’s soil to live well, pay taxes, and indulge in a continuum of sophisticated cultural practices, from display of fine crafts and architecture to hedonistic pursuits of maddening jaatras where ayla flowed like the Gandaki. Prithvi also saw that these achievements were being jeopardized by the frivolities of its spoilt Malla rulers. He knew he would return to take over the valley one day, but his sojourn in Bhaktapur was only a tactical continuation of his earlier resolve. In 1738, Prithvi had a humiliating experience over the arrangement of his first marriage to the princess of Makwanpur. The angry boy had returned without the bride, Indrakumari, because of ego clashes with the bride’s brother, Digbandhan Sen. En route to Gorkha, he had secretly come to take a look at the Nepal valley via Chandragiri. According to his confessions in Dibyo Upadesh, it was then that he had made up his mind to rule the valley. He was 15. I posit that Prithvi would perhaps have been less effective if his military moves were not complicated by a personal motive to avenge over failed marriage. Sitting on the southern border with an unclaimed territory that the Company Sarkaar was annexing, Makwanpur had to be won at any cost if Prithvi’s expansionist desires were to take shape. Lust and pride intensified the fervor with which he would do it. His campaign led to the birth of modern-day Nepal, the biggest event in Nepal’s history.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 15-Mar-02 02:36 AM
Continued.
Second, King Rajendra Shah’s junior queen had an adulterous relationship with one Gagan Singh. Jung Bahadur Kunwar murdered the royal lover to force the queen to convene a kangaroo court in 1846 to have the killer confess. Jung, 29, then bloodied the event by massacring the august assembly; he declared himself the premier, created a spurious lineage to a Rajasthani clan, established marital links with sub-continental royalties, and created a pseudo-aristocracy that legitimized itself through plunder within a generation. Under the Ranas, Nepal escaped colonialism, but stagnated under isolation. I think this is the second most significant episode in Nepal’s history.
Third, the long-term consequences of the royal massacre of 2001are yet to be seen, but an immediate implication is on the likelihood of a protracted sustenance of reign of the Shah dynasty that founded the very kingdom. This could be the third most important episode in our history, but the jury is still out. There are other events competing for notice, of course, which include the Sugauli Sandhi of 1816, Nepali Congress revolution of 1950, inauguration of the Panchayat in 1961, Jana Andolan 1990, and Maoist insurgency since 1996. But my list of the big three all have nuanced links to loftier desires of ambitious men tainted and inspired by lust. This is scary because lust is not studied in public policy classrooms.
3. The Gwalior Tie
Bir Shumsher had banished his anglophile brother Khadga to Palpa two years after jointly killing their uncle Ranodip in 1885. Khadga took his loot soon after, to Madhya Pradesh, and built the Nepal Palace near Sagar. His daughter was the first Nepali woman to matriculate from high school, but had shown primitive judgment when it came to marital choice. She chose an Indian man after seeing his photograph, not to budge even after it became known that the gentleman was already married to somebody else. She mothered Lekha Devi, who later became the famous BJP figure, Vijayaraje Scindia, after marrying King Jivajirao from Gwalior. Their second daughter, Usharaje, later tied knots with the Sindhupalchowk MP, Pashupati Rana, while Vijayaraje’s famously estranged son, the late Madhavrao, went on to marry a Nepali. I don’t know if these intricate linkages were crafted at Oxford in the early Sixties when both Madhav and Pashupati attended New College (founded 1379 AD). In any case, Devyani is the second of Pashupati and Usharaje’s daughters who was to be wooed by Dipendra. These ties wouldn’t have mattered much if it didn’t mean that all these people are so related to each other. Most of Nepal’s aristocracy, especially those who pointlessly insist that they are of the right pedigree because their grandaunt’s distant nieces were senior wives, or because they spell Shumsher with the right alphabet, descended from Dhir, not Jung. More recently, while Pashupati’s family belong to a lineage procreated by Chandra Shumsher, late queen Aishwarya’s ancestry is linked to Juddha. Chandra and Juddha were siblings.
Pardon this conjugal calculus, but the moral of the story is whether the late queen should, I wonder, have come up with a more compelling set of reasons to obstruct Dipendra’s choice because her arguments about original purity seem inaccurate, ridiculous, and irrelevant. Jung Bahadur, for example, had set an immodest standard for his brothers by breeding 22 wives and maintaining a harem of over 200 concubines. Accidents in assigning allegiances to new births were very likely to have happened, for it must have been hard to keep track of where the drunken maharaja was sleeping any one night.
Further, women are biologically programmed to live longer than men. If men married women who were older than them, there is a theoretical proposition that they can improve the longevity of their togetherness at old age, as they will both die at around the same time. Did Dipendra have this in mind in courting a woman two years his senior? No. He was just single and bored when he started seeing Devyani, but it would have been nice to hear how the former queen would have received this scientific argument that their prolonged marital bliss was, after all, in the national interest. This is important because subjects now know what can happen when petty royals get upset, and flawed aristocracies shatter.
|
| Nepe |
Posted
on 16-Mar-02 02:41 PM
Paschim,
Hadn’t read this article wherever was it published before (not that I am a well-read person). This is indeed a refreshing read. Felt like revisiting those historical events too briefly but with a company of an informed and honest guide. After the visit, I gotta believe everything you said in the preface. My only discontent, if it must be, to find nothing to disagree much.
Looking forward to read more from you.
Nepe
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 23-Mar-02 09:40 PM
Episode Ten: Life on the Fast Lane
Unedited Interview with Dilli Bhurtel
The Gorkha Chronicler
7 Kartik, 2061 BS.
Dilli Bhurtel’s growing influence belies his modest position as the Ward Secretary of a little known regional party. He just returned from Vietnam where he was the sole non-governmental delegate from South Asia invited to mourn Ho Chi Minh’s death. “I flew business class to Hanoi, and first class back, do you know what that means?” said Mr. Bhurtel, 37, as he chatted with our associate editor, Udaya Bairagi, while waiting to claim his baggage, get through customs, and catch a cab to Samakhusi to take the next bus out to Khaireni. What follows is a transcript of the hurried, but pre-arranged, 20-minute encounter with Mr. Bhurtel:
Bairagi: Dilli-ji, how does it feel to be a regional celebrity?
Bhurtel: When I agreed to do this quickie-interview, your editor assured me that a young lady reporter would be sent. You look like a 38-year-old man with a bored wife at home, and three rowdy kids at school. Sorry, didn’t mean to be rude, but I thought I’d make my disappointment clear. To answer you, of course, it feels good to be famous for being famous. As good as you feel when you go from Mugling to Narayanghat on a truck, and the driver plays that song ‘Kuch Kuch Hota Hai’ exactly 17 times. Ever had that kind of pleasure? Yes, people do say I am a Shahrukh look-alike, and yes, I do carry a comb in my back pocket.
Bairagi: You’re not drunk, are you? All that free drinks on the plane. Anyhow, there’s been some speculation that you’re going to form a new party. Can you confirm this?
Bhurtel: I can, but I won’t. Look, I’ve just returned. And I flew first class. My priority is to reconcile with my wife, and only after talking to her will we decide on how to proceed. All preparations at this stage are preliminary - ideology, leadership, manifesto. But do you know that my brother Jhalak already thinks he is the next Girija? Don’t worry, I’ll tame him.
Bairagi: Do you have any national role models?
Bhurtel: Yes, we will draw on virtues of some of our better leaders in modern times: charisma, intellect, and authority as potent as that of BP Koirala, resolve and courage as solid as that of Ganeshman Singh, power of persuasion and private decency as formidable as that of Madan Bhandari, and drive as blatant as that of Raja Mahendra. One should also know when to quit in politics, and Tulsi Giri’s sense of repentance is inspiring. Did you know that King Abdullah of Jordan was the Best Man in Giri’s daughter’s wedding at Dartmouth College in Amrika five years ago? And we haven’t yet decided whether to go for a sense of humor as naked as that of Krishna Prasad. You know, even by my liberal standards, it will take a lot of censoring, but we will, I suppose, keep him wait-listed. There is no Nepali after all who can simultaneously chew paan, scratch his groin, recite the Gita, and laugh by saying “I am a sakkali abibahit, nakkali kumar”.
Bairagi: What are some of the issues you will be championing?
Bhurtel: We’ll consolidate the existing democratic apparatus. Make it cleaner, more effective, and prove there’s no alternative to an open society. Build an environment for the private sector to create wealth. I used to be a loony who grew up on Bengali propaganda on communism. But I’m becoming wiser. We’ll declare Nepal secular, and radically restructure all institutions - from the army to the civil service to make them representative of all our ethnic groups. Did you know my wife Sanu is a Tharu? I want the monarchy to keep living off our tax money for some years, but eventually, its existence is incongruent with the idea of a true democratic state. The education sector will be overhauled, and relations with India based on practical national interests, not jingoism. I can go on and on, my friend. Talking about politics is like bullshitting a dumb girlfriend - exciting, only if the result is in sight. So, wait for our manifesto.
Bairagi: Read any books lately?
Bhurtel: Yes, I just finished the Hindi translation of Sijie’s, “Balzac et la Petite Tailleuse Chinoise”. Pardon my French. It’s on political humor and growth of adolescent desire. Set during one of China’s bleakest periods, in the heydays of the cultural havoc wrought by Chairman Mao in the 70s. You’re not interested in the story, are you? Anyway, two young boys find themselves posted to a remote village in Western China for ‘re-education’. As they assimilate into the country milieu and amuse its folks, they witness their own evolution into manhood, and lust for a woman’s affection. Under the absurd cruelty of Maoist suppression of free thought and reason, this novel explores the perpetual tension between what can be subdued and what can’t through politics.
Bairagi: Wow, Dilli-ji, that was profound. You’re so cool.
Bhurtel: I know. I can be impolite sometimes, but that’s when you guys breach the contract. I really was expecting a mini-skirted reporter in her twenties to talk to me now. But I got you instead. Man, don’t you look like a cross between Lech Walesa of Poland and Donald Rumsfeld of the US? Isn’t the world unfair? Anyhow, the book’s conclusion is, humane longings for free will and compassion ultimately triumph over authoritarian engineering of human conduct.
Bairagi: So, what’s next Dilli-ji? When can we hear about your grand plans?
[Mr. Bhurtel gets into a taxi outside Tribhuwan Airport, and tells the driver: “La, bus park samma. Meter chalaunus ta bhai.”]
Bhurtel: We’ll be inviting your editor, Uma Chand, to my place in Chitwan to discuss all these matters. Politicians and journalists - we’re an incestuous bunch. We shouldn’t be living off each other, but we sleep together. So, you’ll definitely hear it first when we figure it all out. In the interim, I’d like you to say hello to your wife on my behalf. You’ll do that without feeling threatened won’t you?
--------
Comments invited publicly and at: kautilya100@yahoo.com
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 23-Mar-02 11:06 PM
"Yadav Found Dead" ... = KOL says.
I am not sure whether it is a relevant thread. But, being
Yadav, an advisor to Prachanda Path Wallas, I want to know
whether he is same Yadav that Maoists were demanding to
release before CEASEFIRE and one of the person in their list.
I had seen a Yadav's photograph in Jail, but, not sure whether
he is same one who was killed recently by Royal Nepal Army.
Can anyone confirm it?
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 23-Mar-02 11:51 PM
GP-ji, a Mr. Yadav that you're referring to is Matrika, not Ajablal. And it's the Gajab Ajab who's reported to have died.
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 24-Mar-02 08:41 PM
Paschimji
This thread is so long that it takes a lot of time to open this.(I don't know if it is
same for others too.) Once I tried to post a reply here, and after trying to post
my comment for a few seconds, it said connection lost or something like that. I
will appreciate it if you start a fresh Prachand Found Dead II(or sth like that) next
time.
Enjoyed reading this last piece too. Really, a feather on the hat in the original
and spellbinding saga of Gauthali and Bhurtel!
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 24-Mar-02 10:38 PM
Thanks, Biswo, for your suggestion. I once had problems accessing this myself, but these days I use the “light” link that San has displayed at the top: http://light.sajha.com – makes it much easier. The reason I’d prefer to continue the existing title is that it is a thread – smooth and natural flow of thoughts. A separate thread will ruin the flow and make the story disjointed. Also, I’m curious to see just how far this series will go! Mind you, I started this one bored afternoon in DC when the Maoist nuisance distressed me immensely. I thought it’d end with that one unusual outpouring – Prachanda Found Dead.
But if the technical issue is becoming really irritating, yes, we’ll have to start a new thread. After all, the Gaunthali and Bhurtel saga has only BEGUN!
Thanks as always for your compliment. Nothing is more encouraging than genuine feedback. Found two emails in my inbox this morning most interesting. A good friend from DC wrote: “dharaprabaha atut chha, ani jaangar ra kalpana athaha”. And this is a top-notch management consultant friend who’d be fired if his boss found out that his star employee was drafting verses, not digging up facts and saving companies! But yes, he got married recently – and things romance does to people, oh boy :)
In addition to posting the episodes here, I also mass-circulate it to my private e-list, and in many ways, it’s been fascinating for me to receive very different kinds of emails from different kinds of people who read and perceive the content of the consecutive episodes differently. Economists call this “market segmentation”. The second email that I said I found interesting was from a close civil servant friend at the Cabinet Secretariat in Nepal – you know, a middle-aged Nepali father of 2, etc. He writes, “it was wonderful to have gotten a chance to enjoy the tenth episode. I liked it most of your other episodes, though the rest were also equally biting and amusing! But this one has a distinctly brilliant sense of humour expressed in more subtle, sensible way.”
Did you notice what I noticed? That word MORE in the last sentence? Man, wouldn’t he have killed me for writing that Ninth episode from Nepal! Anyway, thank you all for a warm reception to the tenth arrival – this is just a tiny note of appreciation to all my loyal readers whose support, criticism, and indifference educates me equally.
|
| HahooGuru |
Posted
on 24-Mar-02 11:24 PM
Biswo ji,
Instead of breaking this thread, I would rather request San
to make a new enhancement where only last 20 postings in a
thread appear at a time. So, that it occupies less time to his
Serverside Program to handle the requests each time users
want to view things. It applies all 600uniqe users. I am sure
the unique users will mostly read the long threads instead of
short thread, because there are many short threads and mostly
boring, but, long threads are usually interesting but, only
latest needs to be down loaded. He can put a link to
"GO TO PREVIOUS 20postings within the thread ... in that
way -- forward and backward move" should be possibile.
I don't think San needs much time to enhance this part. This
enhancement will increase the efficiency of Server side Program, too.
I remember once in Nepalnews.com's discussion forum, when
the page was downloading all postings, then, I asked the Nepalnews.com
to make a page break and only down load a part of postings, then, they
listened to me. Well, I told it to another fellow Nepali, who is like
many Nepalis negative at first glance, "Timle bhanera hola". Well,
Bagh karaune ra Bakhro haraune sangai bhako huna sakcha, but, I
remember the person at Nepalnews.com wrote an email to me
thanking me for the advice. I mean its not bad to make request with
system adminstrator, when they are kind peoples like San.
Thanks.
HG
|
| Biswo |
Posted
on 25-Mar-02 09:59 AM
Hahooji and Paschimji:
Believe me it taks a lot of time even with light one. I guess Hahooji's
suggestion is a good one. It is definitely good (to print, to read kramasha..)
the Gauthali and Bhurtel series in one thread. But it is increasingly becoming
needlessly time consuming.
What scares me now (after the last experience) is the loss of comment after
trying to post it. Now, I copy before posting though.
|
| Paschim |
Posted
on 28-Mar-02 10:59 PM
In response to some email queries about that connection between Tulsi Giri, his daughter, Dartmouth, and the Jordanian King, that Bhurtel mentioned to Bairagi in the 10th episode, here's the full account of the fascinating story.
-----------
Tulsi Giri and The Wedding
By Paschim.
Tulsi Giri was one of BP Koirala's most favorite young leaders in the Nepali Congress, circa 1959, who he hoped to groom personally for future leadership. At the Foreign Affairs ministry that PM Koirala himself headed, Dr. Giri was made his assistant as the State Minister in the 1960 Cabinet. After 17 months, King Mahendra, in a blood-less royal coup, got rid of the democratic system, and locked up virtually all elected leaders. Many Congress cadres defected to the Panchayat within the next three years as Mahendra's grip on power became unassailable, but the most prominent Congress leaders remained in prison, with the exception of Subarna Shumsher, who, self-exiled in Calcutta, launched a failed armed struggle in 2018 BS, but returned to Nepal in 2024 BS to "bhakti-purbak sahayog takryauna" to the king. As an aside, I personally think this is the most memorable phrase in Nepali politics ever coined. The Military Detention Camp in Sundarijal held 6 illustrious prisoners - BP Koirala, Ganeshman Singh, Diwan Singh Rai, Yogendraman Sherchan, Krishna Prasad Bhattarai, and Ram Narayan Mishra. BP and Ganeshman were the last to be released after 8 years, who then went on self-imposed exile to India. Krishna Prasad was moved to Nakkhu Jail for another 3 years for refusing to sign a note of acquiescence. Ram Narayan died a natural death, while Diwan Singh Rai, Yogendraman Sherchan and Saroj Koirala were subsequently murdered by the Panchayat.
While all this tragedy was unfolding in the dissenting camp, the two most famous defectors from BP's Congress Party - Biswo Bandhu Thapa and Tulsi Giri - who Mahendra had attracted prior to the coup on Poush 1, 2017, were busy establishing themselves in the Panchayat. Giri went on to become the Prime Minister at different occasions, and was a solid intellectual pillar in the system's early days. Suddenly in the late seventies under King Birendra, reportedly disgusted with the Panchayat that he himself helped nurture, Dr. Giri left Nepal permanently for Sri Lanka with his wife, Ms. Sara Yonzan. It is said that Giri not only went on to regret painfully his betrayal of the Congress, and most notably BP Koirala, in 2017 BS, but also his subsequent failure to make the Panchayat work. Going on exile was his way of repenting his career in politics which he strongly believed he had squandered despite earlier promise. After leaving Nepal, he has not only not interfered in politics, but has also rarely spoken to outsiders.
Despite being one of Nepal's smartest politicians ever, Giri had a personal weakness. It is said that he was excessively fond of women, and even other men's wives. "More so than healthily prescribed", as a source put to this author. Through one of his wives, Giri had fathered a stunningly beautiful daughter, a Nepali national, who by 1999 had become one of the most eligible women in the Island of Singapore where she worked as a fashion designer. She dated there an American gentleman, George Faux.
Almost around the same time, circa 1979, Tulsi Giri was preparing to become a recluse and vanish into the Island of Ceylon, two boys made a pact at Deerfield Academy, Massachusetts. No matter who they became eventually and wherever they were located in the world, the two boys told each other that they would return to New England to not only get married, but also become each other's Best Man in the true Christian tradition. Of the two friends, one was an American citizen, George Faux, who went on to date and later propose for marriage the Nepali Ms. Giri in Singapore, and the other had just become the Muslim monarch in the Hasemite Kingdom of Jordan following the death of his famous father, King Hussein.
In the fall of 1999, the wedding was arranged at Dartmouth for the American Mr. Faux who had graduated from the odd, but fiercely independent, Ivy college in 1984. The King of Jordan was to be his Best Man, as promised when a boy. The American guests were all expected to turn up at this famous wedding involving a king who turned up with an entourage of 50 people. But who would be arriving from the girls' side? There was a dozen or two Nepali relatives of the bride who applied for visa at the US Embassy in Kathmandu, who for not demonstrating compelling reasons for return to the Kingdom were swiftly denied permission to enter the US en-masse. It is said that the US State Department in Washington, DC, had to be pressured later by the Jordanian Royal Palace itself to look into the matter and issue visas to all Nepalis who had applied to attend the wedding at Dartmouth. The Kingdom of Jordan, as is well-known, is a crucial US ally in the Middle East, and only one of two Arab nations to have normal ties with the State of Israel. US, as the vocal patron of the Jewish state, thus is known to go to any length to appease Jordan and Egypt.
In the fall of 1999, in a hurried stopover, King Abdullah dropped by Harvard University to deliver a most articulate speech on the Middle East Peace Process, and answer some strongly worded questions at the Kennedy School of Government. Without staying overnight, he then rushed north to New Hampshire to attend a wedding in which he had promised, almost 20 years ago, to be the Best Man, "whatever he became, wherever he was". A Nepali contingent was in full force to witness this unusual, but most notable wedding at the cold, obscure little New Hampshire town called Hanover. The King, whose country only a handful of Nepalis have ever visited, but know all too well through the memorable Radio Nepal news broadcasts mentioning "Jordan ka Raja Hussein...", merrily blessed his high-school buddy, George, and his winsome Nepali wife.
Dr. Tulsi Giri, the father of the bride, did not attend the wedding. The Giris were said to have been busy relocating to Pune, Maharashtra, from Colombo.
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[Please note that some inconsequential details have not yet been double-checked and verified by the author.]
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 08-Apr-02 05:13 AM
I received the following comments on the G and B saga, episodes 1 to 10, from a woman friend based in Kathmandu recently. These are one of the most interesting sets of comments I have read on the series so far, and so brutally honest that I had to post them here so that all fans of Gaunthali and Bhurtel can take a bite and relish. In seeking permission from the lady correspondent to post her email here, I promised her anonymity. She requested a new baptised name, so I'll affectionately call her "Sancharika".
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Strictly Between Us
Your creation is simply intoxicating! Good sleeping pills for singles. Dumb
it may sound, but I was dumbfounded on several occasions. Anyway, your
so-called "restrained" series helped me get out of a bout of depression I
was going through. Depression? Ya, on and off. It stays with me for 15 days,
and then goes off like Aaunsi and Poorne. Sorry, I just ended up
envying your "innate", not acquired, sense of humour, expression power for
the naughtiest of the things imaginable and the ease with you handled them.
Mind nagarnu, I proceed to spell out my dui sabda (a phrase borrowed from
Gauthali).
Take 1: Prachanda found dead. I keep my fingers crossed. A must item for
all Kathmandu Post reporters who mess up newsreports, and are painfully dependent on Neplish. I too suffer from this syndrome. Good gracious, you can cook news even from across Saat Samundar Paar.
Take 2: The follow-up story. Bhurtel entered the scene with a bang, your
creation. But a bad prelude. For I was caught unawares!!
Take 3: “Gauthali says women are like bicycles.” How well (?) have you
penetrated into women's psychology! Seems the writer is pissed off with Left
romanticism. Not all Leftists are left-handed! at one point of life, I
think, every self-proclaimed Sudharbadi is infatuated with it. A good
illusion though. Experience speaks.
Take 4: "I want my man back". Flamboyant and outrageous. Nonetheless, an
inspiring statement, and so was her rejoinder to the editor.
Take ? : The editor's confidential letter is an insult to die-hard vigilante
of private parts.
Take 5: Your analogies - sex and power. So crude that it sounds convincing.
Can't quote lines. But at times, it smacks of B-grade chauvinism. Your eye
for details embarrasses even the boldest of the feminist lot. Dish out this
stuff to die-hard feminists, and wait for the hackles it will raise in Kathmandu,
the breeding ground for Naribadis of all shapes and sizes.
Take 6: Gauthali's love poem is a let down. Women don't write such poems. I
am not a poetess, but that's what I feel. We tend to comment on anything
that comes across. that's human nature. Read like a piece from a high school
flirt, and his total failure in producing A-grade amorous poems.
Take 7: Gosh, you didn't even spare Gandhi. "He took a vow of abstinence
without consulting his wife..."caught my attention. Thank God, the writer
is thoughtful enough to drive home the point that wives, mind you, not
bicycles, should be "consulted".
Take 8: “Bhurtel is invited” is interspersed with subtle humour. Gauthali's
signature is catchy.
Take 9: "The Commandments" smack of D-grade chauvinism. His list of do's
and don'ts. A desperate appeal from a pampered husband, trying desperately
to be a Macho-man. All men (90%) are animals when it comes to carnal
pleasures. A sweeping remark, pigs may say, but I am not writing a
newspaper report. Bhurtel's craze for sounds is mindboggling. But he is
exposed. He is yet to explore all avenues of carnal pleasures. I am eagerly
waiting for his reunion with his former wife. The writer is also an amateur.
I can make out. Bhurtel's signature is quintessentially Nepali.
Take 10: Kudos to Gauthali's refusal!!
Take 11: "Letter from Hanoi" sucks. His choice of gift for his former wife is
demeaning. "Conical bras". Have mercy on her. How can she wear that stuff?
Poor Gauthali, she can't help it. She can't defy nature. What Bhurtel
doesn't seem to know is that carrying a bag of flesh is useless, if you
don't know how to serve it. His theory of "Latitudes, breast size, sex
appeal"? A product of filthy mind. He knows how to kick where it hurts
the most. Surprisingly, the writer does not go into "surgical details" of
men's anatomy. What are women supposed to look at if the pigs happen to turn
up fully clothed from "top to bottom"?
Take 11: The animal in the writer cools down. Kisunjee's ability is aptly
described.
Bottomline: The West meets the East. This is Paschim. Bhurtel is an
amateur. Gauthali? No Comment.
Lastline: Truly a bombshell
Gain: All hues of laughter-giggles, grin, ha-ha, thunder, etc.
Loss: Loss of sleep, hang over. Exhausted. For I had to mobilise all my
senses to grasp an economist's, a bachelor's "restrained" socio-political
humour.
Regret: I dare make comments on it. Lousy? I don't care. I wrote what I
felt. I am not a Khappis, professional like Gauthali.
Request: Pardon my English and "intelligence level".
My eyelids are getting heavier. About to leave office. Bye.
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| :) :) :) |
Posted
on 22-May-02 04:19 AM
:) :) :)
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| The Grocer's Wife |
Posted
on 13-Jul-02 10:29 AM
San, I was trying to read some very old postings of this thread. Some previous 117 postings of this thread are missing. Can it be archived back in full? Would appreciate it very much. Thanks.
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