<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110151112/636d06f99c7e80680e0a5f93jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1023" height="574"/><figcaption></figcaption></figure>What do rapper Snoop Dogg, actor Alec Baldwin, comedian Bill Burr, health guru Jillian Michaels, entrepreneur and influencer Gary Vee, startup investor Tim Ferris, relationship therapist Esther Perel, talk show host Oprah and the Obamas have in common? Podcasts.Podcasts are perfect for those who like to listen to experts talk about topics they are interested in, or passionate about. They are a terrific way to entertain yourself without staring at the screen, while doing household chores. In fact, podcasts are a hit with multitaskers who love to listen to something stimulating while they are driving, cooking or folding laundry.Some people even listen to podcasts while they are on the treadmill. Step aside, Justin Bieber. Joe Rogan is the new joggers’ jam. Additionally, bedtime reading has been swiftly replaced by bedtime listening, especially with adults who prefer to close their eyes and fall asleep to a pleasant, confident voice that they have grown rather fond of.Information, entertainment, or education: the purpose of a podcast does not matter, as much as the quality of content. Podcasts tend to be of all kinds: in-depth conversations on fascinating subject matters, comedy and silly banter to destress and smile with, business and financial advice from industry experts, insights and experience exchanges on parenting and child care, marketing tips and tricks, guided meditations, post-match sports talk, movie breakdowns, TV series discussions, literary interviews and reviews, or cultural commentary. Podcasts are popular because they are easily accessible, just a few taps away, either on the browser or inside an app, and usually free.What makes podcasting different is its ability to establish intimacy between strangers. Much like radio, it helps the listener form a relationship or connection with the voice they listen to, which is why podcasters enjoy impressive levels of loyalty. After a few hours of relevant and valuable content, audiences keep returning to the same creators for more episodes.Another unique selling point of podcasts is that they are highly engaging, with astonishingly low drop-off rates, which means that they are ripe territory for advertisers to disrupt and catch ears at. Host-read advertisements also mean that listeners trust the product more, so radio ad-like commercials do not need to interrupt an episode mid-conversation.There is something real and human about listening to other people talk on a podcast that is radically different from TV, film and YouTube entertainment. We could say that podcasts are a regular staple in digital media culture and consumption, and not just a passing trend. Podcast culture is interesting and diverse, like human society itself, because there are podcast newbies, podcast junkies and everybody else in between – there is no such thing as sameness when it comes to understanding listeners, and the only way to get to know anything is to test and learn.We are not talking about cutting edge technology or a recent discovery of this type of audio media, and yet, podcasts reached peak popularity in 2020, especially since the pandemic. People had time, and needed free entertainment. TV show hosts and actors needed an outlet that did not require entering a set or using complicated equipment.What is more, Zoom fatigue and excess screen time has meant people need to give their eyes a break, and keep hands free. Timing wise, podcasts are perfect for today’s app-savvy audiences, but the funny thing is, they got published before the Internet age.Back in the eighties, podcasts were called ‘audio blogging’ -- a way of recording thoughts and feelings, like written blogs, but did not quite take off because they lacked ease of distribution. In 2003, when the iPod was a prevalent personal device through which audio blogs could be downloaded, the term ‘podcasting’ (‘pod’ from ‘iPod’) came into being.By 2005, it went mainstream once Apple added podcasting as a feature on iTunes. By 2018, with most carrying smartphones with mobile data on them, podcasts saw another huge spike, and in 2020, when celebrities turned to podcasting as a means of making content, and subsequently, earning big bucks, podcasts were finally seen as a simple, friendly and convenient medium for people everywhere to make entire careers out of.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110151112/636d06fb9c7e80680e0a5f94jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1974" height="322"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Those new to the world of podcasts can start by exploring a few apps that help find the channels that resonate with them, and even inspire them to start their own podcast. <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/apple-podcasts/id525463029" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Apple Podcasts</a>, an early leader that offers millions of unique podcasts that are well curated, and is available to iPhone users.iPhone users can check out quality podcasts on the app from all over the world. However, the next best podcast platform, <a href="https://podcasts.google.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Google Podcasts</a>, is both Apple and Android-friendly. Google Podcasts has some cool content, and can get personal recommendations and manage listening activity.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.spotify.com/us/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Spotify</a>, known for its music collection, offers 2.2 million podcasts. Audible, an Amazon product, is known for audiobooks but also hosts 100,000 podcasts. <a href="https://tunein.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">TuneIn Radio</a>  which streams more than 100,000 radio stations, boasts a rather large collection of 5.7 million podcasts.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://castbox.fm/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Castbox</a>, a popular player, scrubs podcasts from all over the web, including iTunes. It is totally free, comes without ads, and is especially great for those interested in language learning through listening.Those who want to launch their own unique podcast can try <a href="https://www.podbean.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Podbean</a>, an Android podcast app where they can not just stream and download content, but also create their own podcast, straight from the phone. Podbean offers a few handy features like adding sound effects like applause, drum rolls or laughs, and placing music clips in your episode to give it a personality as well as create smooth transitions.And saving the best for last, there is <a href="https://anchor.fm" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Anchor</a>, a professional yet beginner-friendly app that helps users record their own podcast and publish them online across listening platforms. Anchor is the right choice if you want to regularly publish episodes and grow your audience organically. It offers unlimited hosting, and makes money off your content, but also serves up ways to monetise your podcast. How about it? Now we are talking.

Saniaa Shah

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Now we are talking

<img width="1000" height="563" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107171132/636933399c7e80680e03df83jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>Young and confident faces smile into the camera, eager to enlist in a war that has just broken out after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914. It is hard to believe that they will soon be cannon fodder on the trenches of Flanders Field.Director <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001392/?ref_=nmbio_bio_nm" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Peter Jackson</a> has put together a documentary of rare clips from the I<a href="https://www.iwm.org.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">mperial War Museum</a> and the BBC archives to mark the centennial of the Armistice on 11 November 1918. The movie camera had just been developed, and even carrying the equipment to the front to shoot these frames must have been an act of heroism. And 100 years later, with the propaganda value of the films peeled off, the grainy footage in They Shall Not Grow Old bear witness to the hardships, valour, carnage and the utter senselessness of the bloodshed.Jackson whittled down 600 hours of testimonies, over 100 hours of clips, and many contemporary posters to this 99 minute documentary, parts of which are digitally enhanced and coloured. For those who are fans of Jackson’s epic battle scenes in <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120737/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Lord of the Rings</a>, this film offers something different -- war’s grim reality.We see the moments just before soldiers go ‘over the top’, leaping into deadly fire from German machine gun positions. Time loses its meaning. “It was the longest and shortest moments of my life,” says one warrior. We see the moments of anxiety in the faces of men conscripted from normal civilian lives: “I learnt how to use a gun, but would I be able to kill a man if I had to?”Jackson has chosen to be nuanced, even as he retains his penchant for the visually grotesque. The wounded develop gangrene when rain turns trenches into mud pools. Their bodies are infested with lice. There is the anxiety of killing and dying as smiling faces fade into images of fresh corpses and decomposing bodies. This is unsanitised war, a film not for the fainthearted.Read also: <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/100-years-of-platitudes-First-World-War,1025" target="_blank" rel="noopener">100 years of platitude</a>, Sunir Pandey<a style="background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/Nepalis-waited-200-years-for-country-to-be-proud-of,2939" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Looking back to the future</a>, Editorial <img width="1998" height="1080" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107171132/6369333b9c7e80680e03df84jpeg.jpg" alt="">The storytelling is immersive, we are taken back a century right into the frontlines. Jackson combines hundreds of voices which give a constant commentary. A soldier talks of how impossible it is to have even a moment of respite from the constant gunfire and explosions. Viewers don’t get much respite either.Jackson even manages to find some humour and humanity amidst the carnage, we see not only the terror but also friendship as soldiers bond over tea, cigarettes, and gambling. The open toilet rows where men did not cover up because “there were no women”. We get glimpses of wagons and war horses, the novelty of mechanised tanks.Soldiers start to sympathise with the German boys like them on the other side who are also missing their families. United by common misery, towards the end they “got on very well together”. The soldiers on both sides were past caring who won as long as they got to go home alive. When a soldier says that the Armistice was “the flattest moment in my life”, we realise that real warfare is very different from whipped up patriotism. It is just about men who want to finish their job.But the war is not over even after it is over. The men are unemployed and unwanted back home. No one wants to talk about the Great War, no one understands what they went through. Like veterans before and after, they find they do not fit in anymore. ‘Never again’, many said after World War I, and it is to remember not to forget the brutal reality of war, and not make glorified assumptions about it, that documentaries like this are important. Jackson’s work is dedicated to his grandfather who served in the war.Read also: <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/Double-war-centennial-for-Nepal,1011" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Double Centennial</a>, Editorial<a style="background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/Gurkhas-dying-for-others,2938" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dying for others</a>, Om Astha Rai  <img width="1998" height="1080" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107171132/6369333e9c7e80680e03df85jpeg.jpg" alt="">Some 200,000 Gurkhas fought in World War I in Gallipoli, Mesopotamia and the Western Front. One in ten did not return home, and 2,000 were decorated for bravery in battle. But there is no trace of Gurkhas in this film, although we catch a brief glimpse of some Sikhs. The sacrifice of the Gurkhas and of the colonial armies is once more air-brushed, just as it is in the Imperial War Museum in London. This is about what white men went through while fighting other white men, not about the brown boys from Nepal who helped them. It has taken 100 years to produce a film that at least begins to look at the folly of war, and to wipe away the distinction between victors and the vanquished. How much longer will it take for western film makers to shed their Euro-centrism and document the sacrifices of tens of thousands of brave young men from Nepal and India who laid down their lives for a king and country not their own?   Popular culture has a great impact in shaping collective memory. Jackson’s documentary could have been a cultural milestone and set history right, but it is an opportunity missed, and the exclusion  rankles.  They Shall Not Grow OldScreening: British Council, Lainchaur5:00 PM Sunday, 11 November Read also: <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/gurkhas-versus-turks-gallipoli-campaign,2192" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gurks vs Turks</a>, David Seddon<a style="background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/More-warlike,1023" target="_blank" rel="noopener">More warlike</a>, Deepak Aryalhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHYRfukHToc

They shall not grow old

Violations of Nepal’s airspace during WWII

One of the few Newa towns situated outside Kathmandu Valley, Panauti still evokes the feeling of a place frozen in time.&nbsp; Largely untouched by haphazard urbanisation, this town 32km east of Kathmandu used to be a kingdom revered for the sacred confluence of the Punyamati and Rosi rivers.&nbsp; The Bramhayani temple is the site of a 12 yearly Makar Mela which is attended by devotees from as far away as India.&nbsp; Panauti’s crumbling monuments were restored in the 1990s by the French government. Temples, resting places, traditional homes were rebuilt and locals trained to revive their craft. Panauti and France marked 50 years of cooperation in September.&nbsp; However, the priceless murals on the temple walls are fading and need urgent restitution. Now, these crumbling wall paintings are meticulously documented in the Wall Paintings of Panauti and Their Context.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260106090116_31f6acf06ef879037fec8274b85153eab4468566abf71616490679bf8468b85d.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20260106090116_31f6acf06ef879037fec8274b85153eab4468566abf71616490679bf8468b85d" data-rendition-name="original" width="1596" height="1074" loading="lazy" alt="Panauti murals"> </figure>  In his foreword, French researcher Gérard Toffin writes about some of the earliest wall paintings from the Malla period in Kathmandu, including a 17th century mural depicting the procession of Rato Machhindranath which has since been restored.&nbsp; Several other pieces still exist but in a pitiful state, defaced by scratches. ‘They were painted on a plaster coating made of soil, husks, or limestone, which were applied to the bricks making up the walls,’ Toffin notes.&nbsp; The book delves into the cult of Asta Matrika among Newa of all castes and classes, the first of which is Bramhayani. These all-pervading deities are linked to Shaktism which focuses on the importance of the female principle and together, combine the forces of life, sex and fertility with that of death and eros. The deities are painted on the wall, carved on the stone or moulded into metallic statues.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260106090120_836efd2b0a569d8ec0fb2c6651a29b8f2dd8f8f75b72e27bb86b0bfc0ad8461f.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="20260106090120_836efd2b0a569d8ec0fb2c6651a29b8f2dd8f8f75b72e27bb86b0bfc0ad8461f" data-rendition-name="original" width="1074" height="1434" loading="lazy" alt="Panauti murals"> </figure>  Riddhi Baba Pradhan, former director general of the Department of Archaeology who oversaw the restoration of Panauti 30 years ago, writes that a colourful wall painting depicting Buddha's past life at the Chabahil Chaitya built or restored during the reign of Lichhavi king Vrisdev in the 3rd century might be the earliest mural in Nepal. As for Panauti, a fragment from a 400-year-old scroll which illustrates a scene of Triveni Ghat with Dalinchok Hill in the background is likely the oldest. But that relic is currently at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in the United States.&nbsp; Pradhan recalls first encountering wall paintings inside Bramhayani temple which were deteriorated by smoke, leaky roof, dust, vermilion, sprinkles of animal blood and lack of maintenance. The team led by chemist Bhimvar Singh Thapa treated the wall paintings and some of the details were recovered including the paintings of Astamatrika and Asta Bhairav on the east, west and southern walls.&nbsp; PAINTINGS ARE NOT VISIBLE The murals were painted during the reign of the last Malla King of Bhaktapur Ranjit Malla and Queen Viswalaxmi Devi 300 years ago. But 40 years after the restoration, Pradhan notes that the murals are again in poor condition: ‘The paintings are not visible, the plaster is severely damaged and the surface has peeled off … electrical wires hang haphazardly inside the temple.’ The second lot of murals at Ghat Sattal are thought to have been commissioned during the late Malla period or the beginning of the Shah dynasty. Exterior walls depict incarnations of Lord Vishnu as well as Sesh Narayan, Ganesh, a scene of Samundra Manthan, of angels Maya, Moha, Ganga. Their attributes, dresses, ornaments, facial expressions, body postures are all skilfully represented but in a deteriorated condition.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260106090116_88d06703ae23a271905d81f35056d41df92cbbc4b9966fac3f34821659e585a8.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20260106090116_88d06703ae23a271905d81f35056d41df92cbbc4b9966fac3f34821659e585a8" data-rendition-name="original" width="588" height="862" loading="lazy" alt="Panauti murals "> </figure>  The wall paintings of Bramhayani Dyochhen are 90% degraded even though they were restored and repaired 40 years ago by the Panauti Integrated Project. Compared to other artefacts, wall paintings are more delicate to external factors, and if not preserved an important part of Nepal’s heritage will be lost.&nbsp; Furthermore, most of the wall paintings in Nepal are temperas, and not frescos. Tempera is painted with water-soluble mineral or vegetable pigments fixed with glue on the cow dung clay plaster on the brick walls. While Nepal’s focus has been on the repatriation of stolen artefacts from abroad, religious and cultural objects within the country like the Panauti murals need urgent attention.&nbsp; This slim publication by Panauti Municipality is an important call to begin the work before it is too late.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260101120124_d0efa1e57b2710a206beb37c7e934ac34e694afc278985934eac2fc52124a92c.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20260101120124_d0efa1e57b2710a206beb37c7e934ac34e694afc278985934eac2fc52124a92c" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="Wall Paintings of Panauti"> </figure>

Saving Panauti's murals

In 2025, Nepal’s Ministry of Tourism <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-everest-industry" target="_blank">added six new 8,000m peaks </a>to those listed on its website. These are subsidiary summits of <a href="https://explorersweb.com/kangchenjungas-challenging-confusing-subpeaks/" target="_blank">Kangchenjunga</a> and <a href="https://explorersweb.com/through-the-unknown-to-the-impossible-lhotse-middle/" target="_blank">Lhotse</a>, which some view as insufficiently independent to be called separate peaks. In 2024, the international mountaineering federation (UIAA) responded to a request by the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA) and the government to officially recognise these peaks. While recognising that ‘there is no one definition of a “mountain” or a “peak” or a “top” or “point” in topographic terms’, and encouraging further debate the UIAA’s opinion was that the 8,000m peaks should continue to the ‘Classic 14’, first completed by Reinhold Messner in 1986. The degree of prominence and isolation of <a href="https://www.climbing.com/news/new-8000-meter-mountains-nepal/?scope=initial" target="_blank">the six new peaks </a>varies, with Yalung Kang having the strongest claim to being a separate peak with a prominence of 135m, but they are all separate enough to be included on some peak-bagging lists. The UIAA’s own list of 4,000m summits in the European Alps includes Punta Giordani with a prominence of only 6m. Whatever the case for the six peaks being geographically separate mountains, they represent significant climbing challenges. They are not minor tops that can simply be ‘bagged’ on route to a main summit. In the case of <a href="https://explorersweb.com/through-the-unknown-to-the-impossible-lhotse-middle/" target="_blank">Lhotse Middle and Lhotse Shar</a>, no one has ever managed to traverse between them and Lhotse itself.  <figure><img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260107080144_881321a6e46818beb7bbd4fe6f21589d89d19bf77ae8218474d373ef7ab0c431.png" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="20260107080144_881321a6e46818beb7bbd4fe6f21589d89d19bf77ae8218474d373ef7ab0c431" data-rendition-name="original" width="2888" height="1590" loading="lazy" alt="New 8,000ers"><figcaption>Nepal’s 8 existing 8,000ers: Chomolungma 8,848.86, Kangchenjunga 8,586, Lhotse 8,516, Makalu 8,485, Manaslu 8,163, Dhaulagiri 8,167, Annapurna 8,091, Cho Oyu 8,201. Photo: GOOGLE EARTH PRO</figcaption></figure>   <figure><img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260107080144_27bf905c1a559c46819dc96ca33d22c27fc301d415fc034f26b8acd105c12da7.png" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20260107080144_27bf905c1a559c46819dc96ca33d22c27fc301d415fc034f26b8acd105c12da7" data-rendition-name="original" width="1750" height="976" loading="lazy" alt="New 8,000ers"><figcaption>Nepal has listed six additional 8,000ers: Yalung Kang (8,505, Yalung Kang West 8,077, Kanchenjunga Central (8,473, Kanchenjunga South 8,476, Lhotse Middle 8,410, and Lhotse Shar 8,400. Photo: KUNDA DIXIT</figcaption></figure>  Several fine routes have already been climbed on these mountains, such as Slovenians Andrej Štremfelj and Marko Prezelj’s alpine style ascent of the South-West Ridge of Kangchenjunga South. The six peaks have not yet achieved universal acceptance, but it is possible that climbing an expanded list of 20 eight-thousanders could become a new mountaineering challenge, just as the 14 classic peaks are today. It is therefore interesting to analyse who is currently closest to achieving this goal, using data from The Himalayan Database and other Internet research. The first conclusion of my analysis is that these six additional peaks have received far less attention than the classic 14 eight-thousanders. One of them, Yalung Kang West, has never been climbed or even attempted: probably because it is a subsidiary peak of <a href="https://explorersweb.com/kangchenjungas-challenging-confusing-subpeaks/" target="_blank">Yalung Kang</a> which is itself a subsidiary peak. The other five peaks have seen a total of 138 ascents. Just 101 people have ever climbed one or more of the additional peaks, which compares with 354 people who climbed Everest on a single day: 23 May 2019. Russian Evgeni Vinogradski is unique in having climbed five of the six new peaks. He has also climbed six of the classic 8,000ers, giving him a total of 11 out of the 20 peaks on the expanded list. Vinogradski is now 80 and is unlikely to increase this total. Several other former Soviet climbers have climbed three of the new peaks, having participated in the 1989 traverse of the four main summits of Kangchenjunga. This includes two legends of Soviet climbing: Kazakh Anatoli Boukreev and Ukrainian Sergey Bershov, each of whom has climbed 13 out of the 20 peaks on the extended list. Boukreev died attempting Annapurna in 1997. Bershov, one of the only men to have ever climbed Lhotse South Face, is now 78 and, although he was in good form when I met him in Chamonix last summer, he is unlikely to further extend his tally. The addition of the new peaks does not take any of these climbers beyond the total of 14 peaks achieved by the 76 climbers who have completed the classic ‘Himalayan Crown’. Of those who have climbed all 14 classic eight-thousanders, only one, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/um-hong-gil-s-project-impossible" target="_blank">Korean Um Hong-Gil</a>, has climbed any of the six additional peaks.  <figure><img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260107080144_5651fc6445f5e5fd838f28e1eac1da45da136b309a4a00db1e4aafa7d4836251.png" data-media-id="editor_9" data-image-id="20260107080144_5651fc6445f5e5fd838f28e1eac1da45da136b309a4a00db1e4aafa7d4836251" data-rendition-name="original" width="2142" height="1310" loading="lazy" alt="New 8,000ers"><figcaption>Only one mountaineer, Korean Um Hong-Gil, has climbed any of the six additional peaks.</figcaption></figure>  Um climbed both Lhotse Shar and Yalung Kang, giving him a total of 16 summits. He required four attempts to climb Lhotse Shar, including one attempt in which he turned back just 100m from the summit following the deaths of two teammates. He finally succeeded in 2007 via a route up the Lhotse South Face. If a race to climb all 20 eight-thousanders were to begin, Um is currently in the lead. <a href="https://www.himalayandatabase.com/" target="_blank">The Himalayan Database</a> also lists two additional mountains in Nepal not included among the peaks announced by the Ministry of Tourism: Annapurna Central and Annapurna East. If these are included, bringing the total to 22 peaks, a few additional climbers deserve mention. Poles Piotr Pustelnik and the great Jerzy Kukuczka have both climbed all 14 classic eight-thousanders as well as Annapurna East, giving them 15 out of 22. Swiss climber Erhard Loretan climbed all 14 as well, and both Annapurna subsidiary summits, giving him a total of 16 out of 22 peaks. Annapurna East has a greater prominence than some of the 6 new peaks proposed by Nepal, but Broad Peak Central in the Karakoram has the greatest prominence of any subsidiary 8000m summit. Kukuczka has also climbed Broad Peak Central, so if the list is extended to 23 peaks, he has 16, equal with Loretan and Um. Then, there is a case for Shishapangma Central in China, which further complicates the task of coming up with a definite extended list. At the moment, these subsidiary summits are not attracting a lot of attention: of the 138 summit climbs on them, only 12 occurred in the last 25 years and none since 2011. Most climbers like to have some wide recognition of a target before investing time and money in trying to achieve it, and this may make it hard to build interest. But as completing the classic 8,000m peaks starts to become a rather frequent occurrence, some may be attracted to the longer list. If this new challenge catches on, as the Ministry of Tourism presumably hopes, how long will it be before someone passes Um Hong-Gil’s total and how long before someone climbs all 20 or 22 or 23 summits? <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/dispelling-myths-about-climbing" target="_blank">Edward Morgan</a> is a British author and climber based in Switzerland. His first book, Lhotse South Face - The Wall of Legends, has been published in several languages and his second book, Chasing Mallory's Dream is due out in the UK this year.

New 8,000ers may restart peak-grabbing race

The American military action in Venezuela and the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro Moros may redefine Nepal’s geopolitics as it juggles between three world powers, India, China and the United States.&nbsp;
Nepal’s interim government is busy preparing for elections on 5 March, and it was late issuing a statement on the American intervention in Venezuela, but the country may have to re-evaluate how it deals with its immediate neighbours and the global power.
“How does Nepal avoid being the next Ukraine or Venezuela? Small countries shouldn’t go around irritating big neighbours. And when big neighbours really get upset, they usually put up a moral fig leaf justifying their miltary action,” says energy economist Dipak Gyawali. “What we see with Venezuela today is bereft of such moral content, essentially banditry which in today’s day and age is unacceptable. Neither the rising new powers nor much of the Global South will take this lying down.”
International relations experts have said that there is now a new world order in which rules-based diplomacy has been thrown out of the window, and the world has been carved into America leading the western hemisphere, Russia is allowed to do what it wants in Ukraine and Europe, and China’s sphere of influence is now the Indo-Pacific.
Foreign affairs expert Nischal Pandey says there is a lesson for smaller nations like Nepal: “We have to be aware of the sensitivities of the major powers in the vicinity.”
There is also a lesson for smaller resource-rich countries not to give an excuse for intervention with poor governance and political instability due to inequity. In Venezuela’s case it was throttling democracy and not using its immense oil-wealth to uplift its people.
Nevertheless, the Trump administration’s abduction of a sitting president of a foreign government regardless of the dictatorial nature of his regime and Venezuela’s volatile internal politics, is illegal and breaches the international order that has been in place since after World War II and its devastation on humanity.
While Trump’s intervention in Venezuela, and threats against Colombia, Cuba and Greenland have brought international condemnation, here in Nepal it has not been taken as seriously as it should.
Says Amish Mulmi, author of the book All Roads Lead North: Nepal's Turn to China: “Some of the reaction on social media has been that of glee over the fall of a dictatorial Communist government on the other side of the world. However, the government statement about fully respecting the principles of sovereignty and the Charter of the United Nations is a strong statement that makes clear Nepal's position on the matter.”
“The abduction of Maduro is a clear sign of Trump's America ensuring its sphere of influence through might and a warning to toe the line,” Mulmi adds. “It also infringes on the sanctity of borders and the preservation of sovereignty. Trump's actions reek strongly of a bygone era of imperialistic control and resource capture.”
Venezuela has 17% of the world’s reserves of crude oil, even though refining this heavy tar-like oil will be costly, and is possible in only a few places including Texas.
“This has to do with a larger political economy of oil, the unravelling of pax Americana and the post-World war II order. This is USA’s heavy-handed response to remain on the top as well as to partly solve its debt of $39 trillion,” explains Gyawali. “But this is not going to help: China is far ahead, Russia has recovered from its 1990s low point, and manufacturing capital has moved away from America. So controlling only financial capital - and using military power so brazenly - is not going to work.”
The might also be specific lessons for Nepal as a smaller country with vast water resources. While water, unlike oil, is renewable, India’s interest in Nepal’s hydro resources cannot be ignored. Ironically, America’s capture of Venezuelan oil reserves could exacerbate climate breakdown and the melting of Himalayan glaciers, which will put Nepal’s water resources in jeopardy in the coming decades.
The only way to deal with this for Nepal and downstream India will be to build reservoirs on rivers to store monsoon precipitation, and that makes water a strategic commodity for the future.&nbsp;
“If we continue in the current mode of hydropower-biased water resources development ignoring irrigation, flood control, navigation, fisheries, tourism and other benefits, India will get the free benefit of regulated water while we pay the upstream environmental and social costs. History will blame our elected leaders for having undersold our resources,” adds Gyawali, who served as water resource minister in the early 2000s.
As for a larger geopolitical lesson: “We in Nepal are fortunate in having not one threatening hegemon but two superpowers India and China: they don’t agree with each other, but do agree on a peaceful Nepal for their own security. However, our current political leaders are irritating both the neighbours, unlike since the centuries past when our rulers looked solely after Nepal’s core interests and our neighbours knew that.”
American intervention in Venezuela also calls for strengthening of our institutions and diplomatic outreach. Nepal has been a non-aligned state, and for all its history has tried to follow a policy of equidistance between India and China. The difference with Venezuela is that Nepal has to deal with two giant neighbours, and not just one.
Says Mulmi: “It is no more only about balancing great power relations but also about benefiting from them. But that will be increasingly difficult as international law and the principles of sovereignty are encroached upon.”

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