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Posted
on 12-Mar-02 03:29 PM
{Courtsey: Nuru Lama and sebsonline.org}
Hopes, Dreams and Frustrations of a Nepali Youth......by....Nuru Lama
I am a fictional character yet very real. I am your representative Nepali youth, once full of life, today full of 'fist and fury.' Others might have fared better or worse but this is my story. While in primary school, holding placards high above my head, I used to happily join public processions shouting, 'Hamro Raja, Hamro Des, Pran Bhanda Pyaro Cha
Hamro Vasha, Hamro Vesh, Pran Bhanda Pyaro Cha.' Thus the sacred images of desh and naresh were scripted on my empty slate. In secondary school, I was encouraged to appreciate the visionary unification of Nepal by King Prithvi Narayan Shah, to be proud of brave warriors like Amar Singh Thapa and to remember martyrs like Shukraraj Shashtri. Here Buddha was born, here Everest stood high. Like Catholic school children, we sang patriotic songs every morning before class, "Hatti Hoina Datti Ladne Nepali ko Baani Huncha." We smiled gleefully like the picture-perfect children from the Korean (North) propaganda magazines. We knew we were the future karnadhars of Nepal because we were told such.
Everyday we were taught to be proud of Nepal. And, I was one proud Nepali. I understood ours was an important country in the world because foreign dignitaries came for visits and were 'granted audience' by the King. The aerodynamic vibrancy of our national flag looked so impressive compared to the rectangular monotony of other flags. I knew the eternal flame of Buddha was lit at Lumbini, that Shiva presided from the inner sanctums of Pasupatinath, and that Vishnu slept soundly on his serpent bed at Budhanilkantha. Even our geographical scale, 'all' the way from Mechi to Mahakali and from the Himalayas to the Tarai felt Asiatic. This was the land of powerful gods, brave people and beautiful places. But all was not well. The devil lurked in the shadows. I grew up. The symbols of Nepali pride cultivated during my school years clashed with the stark realities of everyday Nepal. On the global scheme of things, I realized Nepal was just another melancholic tale of a poor nation struggling to transition from a feudal, isolated past, chained by the inertias of family-based politics, administrative slack and caste-cultural hegemony. I understood that nationalism was a 20th century phenomenon, pronounced by the histories of colonialism. It was an idea, not a reality. Nepali nationalism was a Panchayati attempt to give meaning to the imperial victories of the Gorkha Kings by exogenously introducing a common Nepali identity. I realized that the Sugauli Sandhi was a charitable giveaway by the British who realized that the sturdy, loyal Gurkha recruits were more valuable than the rugged slopes they occupied.
The 1990 democratic reformation ushered in a new jubilation. We thought a new era had begun. How mistaken we were in our hopes once again. With increased political jockeying at the top, pervasive corruption, bureaucratic negligence, and ominous Maoist rumblings in the Western Hills, the country still remains in what feels like a primordial economic and psychological malaise, depleting life out of the citizenry.
I am a representative Nepali youth. And, I am angry. Without my asking I was given hope and pride, and today the same agents have, without my asking, robbed me of the same. As a child, I too wanted to be a someone, I too thought I could be a someone. As a youth, I see only hopelessness and still waters - my attempts at finding a job, my dreams of providing a better future for my family washed away in the dirty waters of the Bagmati. A degenerative cloud of anger and despair overhangs my generation, punctuated by thunders of bandhs after bandhs. Our Machiavellian netajis prey on our frustration and muscle. We are the walking-talking 'instant' explosives that they can hurl onto their opponents, and when we explode we destroy pavement railings, inflame public buses and assault innocent Indian tourists. I am the 'cute boy' turned karyakarta, hooligan, arsonist par excellence.
The Indian dream is a house, a Maruti and a 'bahadur.' Beside my chaukidar brothers who make dreams come true to Indian families, I have
sisters providing comfort in the "City of Joy", uncles fighting in the Indian Army, cousins laboring in Korean sweatshops and in-laws 'I don't know doing what' in the Middle East. My friends are proud that they fought for the British and not the Indians, are working in America and not in the Middle East. Yes, it has come to that! Instead of fighting against servitude, we argue the trivialities of who the better master is. Is it so difficult for us to accept our destitution that we continue to believe the chauvinistic rhetoric of our netajis, to read history as written in the textbooks?
Everest might stand tall but I certainly have stooped. Once I believed in Nepal. Today, I question it. But even in my lonely desperate moments, I tell myself "all is not lost." I remind myself of King Arthur's lessons from the unrelenting cave spider. I am glad not to be living in the false assurance of a textbook Nepal, gloating in narcissistic self-admiration or regaling in the Emperor's new clothes. I am your representative Nepali youth, wanting to build hope and pride in a new
Nepal. I imagine a new Nepal that celebrates the people, communities and histories that make us a vibrant whole. I imagine a new Nepal that concedes the mistakes of the past, understands our present direness and therein finds the impetus to progress. Let us learn from Buddha who taught us that real happiness comes not from ignoring the truth of our unpleasant reality but in accepting and overcoming that truth.
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