A Pardesi in Paradise

Australia:

Mr. Hari Pokhrel,

Namaste Supermarket

34 Diment Road,

Salisbury North 5108, 

South Australia;

Mob: 0435739424;

Email: pokhrelharijee@gmail.com; namastenepali44@gmail.com                   

…………………………………………………………….…………

Canada:

Mr. Madan Kumar Giri,

33 Gerald Street,

Charlottetown,

Prince Edward Island,

 Canada,

 C1A 2m4,

Email:  girimadankumar@gmail.com; madankgiri@gmail.com;

Phone:1-902-367-2258

…………………………………………………………….…………

Nepal:  

1.    Mr. Yam Thulung, 

Damak, Jhapa, 

Mob: 9842622318; Email: thulung33@yahoo.com                                                

…………………………………………………………….…………

2.    Mandala Book Point,

Kantirajpath Road,

Kathmandu, Nepal

Tel: 01-4255444.                                                                           

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Netherland:

Mr. Ram Karki,

Himalayan Restaurant,

Gortstraat 16a,

2511 AP,

The Hague;

Mobile: 0031686173745;

Email:  info@restauranthimalayan.nl  

…………………………………………………………….…………

New Zealand:

Mr. Sudharshan Adhikari,

35 Knowles Street

Terrrace End,

Palmerston North 4410,

Manawatu Region,

Mob: 0064-210645500;

Tel: 0064-6-3566786;

Email: sudarshanadhikari09@yahoo.com

…………………………………………………………….…………

Norway/ Denmark:

Mr. Ramesh Gautam,

Sundeporsen 43

4039 Hafrsfjord,

Norway.

Ph: +4791003665;  

Email: rashu.re96@gmail.com                     

…………………………………………………………….…………

Philippines:

 Ms. Mary Grace Rizal,

118 Sitio Taguete Cupang,

Antipolo City 1870, 

Mob: 0063-9958369217;

Email: marygracepv@gmail.com 

…………………………………………………………….…………

UK:

Mr. Prem Giri,

21 Coronation Road

Ashton Under Lyne OL6

8RH Greater Manchester,

UK,

Mob: 0044-7403380338;

Email: premgiri28@gmail.com                                                                        

…………………………………………………………….…………

USA:

Mr. Bhim Bastola,

3551 Blendon

Bend Way

Columbus

OH 43231;

Mob: +1-5134296425;

Email: bhimbastola@gmail.com                     

…………………………………………………………….…………

Please give your inspiring comments.

Book 3: Third Book Read in 2013

The Gurkha’s Daughter – PRAJWAL PARAJULI

Recently this book was much talked in news and social media. I eagerly appreciated the success of a new Gurkha writer trying his luck with English literature. 

The physical appearance of the book is perfect and touchy. As I pushed through the book, I was amazed with the use of Nepali words across the book indiscriminately.

  ‘The Cleft’- the first story of the book made me think “what is story telling?”. It’s a collection of unique characters who ride a taxi from Kathmandu to Birtamod. That is the story. The subsequent stories leverage the readers’ expectation back to original and even improve them. Each story has its own center and a diverse plot. ‘A Father’s Journey’ and ‘Missed Blessing’ are great stories, psychology based, which are to be read and realized. Other stories are for entertainment. ‘No Land is Her Land’- a story of a girl with multiple unsuccessful marriages of a Bhutanese Gurkha Girl in Nepal, could force the readers to generalize a gloomy image of the Gurkhas spilled from Bhutan. ‘The Immigration’, a story centered in Manhattan, USA puts reader in restaurants and feeds them with the type of good or bad Nepali dialect. The story “The Gurkha’s Daughter” inside the book with same title is not as simple as Kathmandu’s nine year olds’ bhara-kuti collections.

This is a great book in the market. To me it looks like a big experiment to study if a book, full of Nepali jargons with no explanation or glossary to explain, attracts Non-Gurkha English readers.    

Book 2: Second Book Read in 2013

Sakas -  Jagadish Ghimire

Sakas (an Akhyan) tells stories about the famous people associated directly or indirectly with Manthali, Ramechap of Nepal. The pivot of the story is in Ramechhap and connections are everywhere. The story begins from a rehabilitation house where a mother leaves her rape-victim daughter for protection. The girl grows up to become a nurse, falls in love, gets married, gives birth to a daughter and works in a hospital in Janakpur. The husband disappears; a rich man rapes her daughter and attempts to turn on her. She intoxicates him, finishes him, flees with her daughter and leaves her in rehabilitation house. The nurse finds a man who lives with a kind old house owner. When the house owner is old, sick and bedridden, he decides to write the biography of the old man. The old man narrates his experiences.

Sakas covers the history of modern Nepal from the time of Ranas and end with the constituent assembly formed after the civil war. It covers the hardship and difficulties faced by different national personalities and local heroes. It is a sweet piece for historians. I am not the right reader to judge the truth of stories but the events appear real. The way the story is narrated keeps reader tethered to the book from the first to last page. Author has an inspiring way of writing Nepal’s socio-political history.  

Book 1: First Book Read in 2013

Last month I was in Nepal. I had a chance to read a novel by Jhamak Ghimire in Nepali language. The book was Jeevan Kada ki ful, Life: thorn or flower. This novel has an English translation with a different name.

Before I tell you about the author, I like to share an epitaph of the story.  In a remote village in Southern Nepal, lived a farmer.  He was once a post master and later a farmer. The family had a mix up of strict feudalist clans. In 1980, lady gave birth. The man’s mother said to her son, who was becoming a father, “don’t be too excited, it’s a daughter”. Arrival of a daughter as the first child wasn’t a celebrated event. A daughter meant a lot of investment that goes to some one’s else family. The child grew up but abnormally. Neither could she walk, nor talk nor move her hands.  She could laugh at times or cried other times. Later she was diagnosed of cerebral palsy. That means an un-curable paralysis. She was vegetated for rest of her life. He had 2 sisters and a brother below her. When her sister and brother learned alphabets, this girl was not allowed to come around to disturb her. Her grandmother took her care. The day grandma left the earth for good, she  put grains of rice into her mouth using her 2 legs. Then she ate that way for the rest of her life. She would pick up charcoal with legs and rub against the wall. It is a strong belief, writing black letters on wall meant ill omen incurring debt to the family. The only way the parents and relatives communicated with her was by means of sticks. Whatever she did she received sticks, hard enough to teach her lessons.

Dear reader, You all are highly literate by your academic excellence.  If you were to write about the feelings of this paralyzed girl who cannot move her body parts except her legs, cannot speak, cannot use her fingers, how long will your writing be? 5 pages, 10 pages or 50 pages?

This girl could hear very clearly and see with some difficulties. She learnt the alphabets by listening to her father and her sibling’s home classes. With years of self practice with constant beating urging her to stop, she learnt to write alphabets, make words, read sentences, read and make poems and at last became a writer. Today she is one of the finest writers in Nepal. She has been conferred numerous heavy weight literary honors.  Should you like to help her, please buy her books and learn about the world of disabled people and their emotions? I won’t be surprised if in near future she is h0nored with Nobel Prize on literature.

From her struggle I like to share that, any physical disabilities in a person can be corrected and completed with letters, alphabets and education. Should you have any limitations or disabilities complete them with letters. Letters fill all voids.

Sir Francis Bacon is remembered for his quote “Reading makes a full man, conference a ready man and writing an exact man”.