<figure><img width="4000" height="3000" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022120710124/639057119c7e80680e0ce13ejpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Ajit Baral of FinePrint in Kathmandu (left) who published Faatsung, the Nepali language novel from Darjeeling by Chuden Kabimbo (right), and also translated it into English as Song of the Soil which has been shortlisted for the JCB Prize in India. </figcaption></figure>Darjeeling-based writer Chuden Kabimbo’s Nepali language novel Faatsung was translated into English as Song of the Soil and published in Kathmandu by Ajit Baral of FinePrint. Now, Song of the Soil has been shortlisted for the JCB Prize for Literature which honours Indian authors. Kabimbo and Baral sat down for a conversation recently. Excerpts: Ajit Baral: You often stress that literature transcends geographical and linguistic boundaries. You were trying to prove that, literally, when you travelled to Nepal looking for a publisher. What made you look for a publisher in Nepal, even though your debut book, 1986, a collection of short stories, was published in Darjeeling? Did you have any inkling it might cross borders and be translated into other languages? Chuden Kabimo: I believe love and literature don't have any boundaries. I was born in a small village from where it took hours to reach Darjeeling. I had thought I would tell the story of this smaller Darjeeling to the bigger Darjeeling, and if possible, to people beyond Darjeeling. But I didn't know that this story would go as far as it has.  When I finished the novel, I thought it would be good if I could get some copies to Nepal. This brought me to Kathmandu, the city of my dreams, whose landmarks I grew up hearing about on the radio. Why would Kathmandu believe in an ordinary writer from a remote corner of Darjeeling? I had no reason to be hopeful. But fate had something else in store for the novel.  I had travelled to Nepal hoping to find a publisher, but returned with the happy news of simultaneous publication in Nepal and India. My story had, as you said, already crossed one boundary. Every book makes a different journey. The writer guides the story forward, but after the book is published, it is the other way around. Perhaps Faatsung made me aim for the wider world. Nothing is more important for a writer than the trust of their readers. This trust gave me the courage to go to Kathmandu for the first time in my life. Readers in Nepal loved the book, which must be why the translators were interested. The year it was published in Nepal, Samik Chakrawarti translated it into Bangla in Kolkata, enabling me to cross yet another geographical boundary. It was then translated into English, taking me as far away as the UK. And then the JCB shortlist happened. The Hindi translation is now complete. Soon it will make another journey into yet another geography, and I don’t know where it will go next. Ajit, you yourself have been a part of this beautiful journey, first as a publisher and then as a translator. Did you ever think that this novel would come this far? <img width="640" height="982" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022120710124/639057169c7e80680e0ce13fjpeg.jpg" alt="">Ajit Baral: No. Not in my wildest dreams. I knew that the book was beautiful and that it would do well. Remember, I had asked you how many copies you would have printed had you printed it in India, and you had said 1,000 copies. To that, I told you we would print 10,000 copies. That is how confident I was about your book. But I never imagined that I would translate it into English as well, and it would go on to be translated into several other languages and published in the UK and India.The idea of translating came to me much later while editing the Nepali book, when I got to appreciate it better. Chuden Kabimbo: I still remember the days when you started work on the manuscript. Whenever you would come across a sentence or a paragraph that struck a chord with you, you would write to me saying, ‘What a beautiful line!’ or ‘What a beautiful paragraph!’ And I would feel that you were my true reader. But when you found something wrong with my writing, you would say, ‘This doesn't make sense. Please rewrite this bit.’ At that time, I must say you came across as a mean teacher. After dozens of changes, I even started to get irritated. Did you feel annoyed about all the work you had to put into it?  Ajit Baral: No, never. On the contrary, it was a sheer pleasure working on your manuscript. It is always fun when a draft is so good it requires little editing. And yours was just that. I may have made you rewrite a few sentences, but these were just for clarity, to make them read better, striking out repetitions, or asking questions about a character here or an incident there. I was careful not to make substantive changes to your writing which is so lyrical.  Chuden Kabimbo: And that continued when you started translating the book …Ajit Baral: Yes, it did. As Jhumpa Lahiri says, translating a novel ‘is the most intense form of reading and rereading there is’. It became apparent that I had overlooked a few weaknesses in the text, which I flagged and you tried to fix them. A translator should fix problems, if any, in the original text. More so in texts that  haven't gone through rigorous editing. But Anurag Basnet, who vetted and edited the translation, a champion of fidelity to the text, suggested that I remain faithful to the original. Now that we are at it, how did you feel when you read the novel in English translation? Chuden Kabimbo: When you first sent me a draft of the translation to read, I found that my own story had a different taste. The story was the same, but the tone was different. Maybe this is where the power of translation lies. I cannot read Bangla, so I don’t know how that is. But when I read the Hindi translation, I found its tone was also different. It had its own rhythm as well. And I realised that Nepali idioms sound pleasant in Hindi only after reading the translation.   Translation is a bridge through which not only our language and literature but also our society and culture cross over to different places and milieu. With Faatsung being translated into three languages, I feel our geographical imagination is also transported to a new society. You can feel the snow falling when reading a Russian novel. Faatsung's Hindi translator Namrata Chauturvedi keeps saying that every language is endowed with the power of its geographical imagination and that geography plays a vital role in forming memories and experiences, which we tap on to write literature. When translating Faatsung, local references often threw her off. Having grown up in Uttar Pradesh, she hadn't seen a landslide or terrace farming in the hills, which is very different from the plains. It was therefore important for her to describe the geography in the novel. A translator has to imagine it precisely, she says, otherwise, the writing risks losing its poetic strength. You are also from the mountains, Ajit, but the story of the Gorkhaland movement is not your story, and you had to translate it for an audience that was culturally and geographically removed. How challenging was that? Ajit Baral: I cannot recall the translation being challenging on account of this. I didn't worry about certain references getting lost on readers, as I had no idea at the time that it would get published outside Nepal. In any case, our UK publishers didn't ask us to make any changes to help readers, either. In hindsight, however, we could have expanded the context of the Gorkhaland movement a little for the benefit of those unfamiliar with it. This leads me to post you a counter question: Would you have written Faatsung a little differently if you had known that it would be translated into many languages?Chuden Kabimbo: I don’t know if I would have written it a little differently. In any case, I had written a novel, and I don’t think one has to describe everything to make the reader understand an event in a novel. My concern was only the story, and I was more interested in how much of that time of the Gorkhaland movement I can bring into the story and how I can tell the pain it unleashed without boring readers.Yes, people in other languages may not have heard of the Gorkhaland movement. They may be unfamiliar with the grim times that Darjeeling experienced. They may also be unaware of the story of that movement in which thousands of people lost their lives. But a work of fiction is to provide a glimpse of how the events affected the characters. It is to sketch out how terrible that conflict was, or how much was burnt when that fire raged.And I believe tears don’t have any language. When you see someone weeping, you feel their pain even though they may speak another language. I wanted to write about Darjeeling’s pain, and tell the story of that sorrow. Read more: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/taking-nepali-literature-to-the-world/">Taking Nepali literature to the world</a>, Ashish Dhakal

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A novelist talks to his translator

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114101124/637209f39c7e80680e0b5572jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="507" height="600"/><figcaption>Author Buddhisagar. Photo: BUDDHISAGAR/FACEBOOK</figcaption></figure>Buddhisagar’s novel Karnali Blues starts with a father, who says after seeing his newborn son for the first time, “He has a mole on the sole of his foot, so he will have to walk a lot but he won’t go off anywhere and leave us.”His mother then asks the baby, “Will you go off and leave us when you’re big?”A statement from one parent, a question from the other.In a Thamel restaurant on a sunny winter afternoon, Buddhisagar walks in wearing a brick-orange jumper and black pants, looking as if he just returned from a track meet-and-greet. He apologises for being late. “I walk everywhere,” he offers as an explanation.He does not look like any of the pictures on the Internet, those that make him out to be larger-than-life celebrated Nepali author. Maybe it is because he is not expecting to be photographed.Read more: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/review/former-gurkha-soldier-turns-author/">Former Gurkha soldier turns authors</a>, Chun Bahadur GurungThis is the real Buddhisagar, in his most natural state. Perhaps this is how he looks writing in his own company, while sipping tea from a local vendor and building stories out of childhood nostalgia.Like Brisha Bahadur in Karnali Blues, Buddhisagar was also born in Matera, and brought up in Katasé and Kalikot. Like the main character of his novel, he was not academically gifted. But unlike his fictional counterpart, he was rather shy, Buddhisagar  confesses. So the prolific author most likely did not go around looking for mischief or drawing moustaches on pictures he found around the house.Many call Karnali Blues an autobiographical fiction. “Some parts of the beginning of the novel are real,” the author admits.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114101124/637209f59c7e80680e0b5573jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="725" height="960"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>The inspiration for the novel came in a hospital, a place of both birth and death. “My father was sick and like in the novel, he was in Kohalpur. He died later, from brain hemorrhage as well,” he says.But Buddhisagar does not think he is our protagonist. He explains, “A writer is never one character. They are inside the minds of young and old, of men and women - they are everywhere in fragments. There are some parts of me in Brisha Bahadur. There are some parts of my mother and father in him as well. He is not all me.”After a pause, he adds, “Just look at the poems he writes. If he was me, he perhaps could have written them better.”There is also the juxtaposition in the book between the two Harsha Bahadurs — one is the breadwinner of the family and the other lies paralysed in a hospital bed.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/nepali-literatures-thulnani-toya-gurung/">Toya Gurung: Nepali literature’s Thulnani</a>, Muna GurungThen, there are the two Brisha Bahadur: the child who looks up to his father, and the youth who still does so even as the father lies on his deathbed.Father and son oscillate between having to give and receive care to one another. There is also the pacing of the past and the present in the chapters of the novel. The present moves in a numbingly slow pace as the human mind goes through moments rejecting death, and yet accepting the hopelessness enveloping it whereas the past rushes up to the narrator like a deadly current in a moody river that catches up to those who do not want to be caught.“What matters the most to me is <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/writing-about-nepal-from-afar/">authenticity</a>,” Buddhisagar says,  sipping on a single-shot Americano. “Regardless of whether a story is autobiographical or not, the readers must think that the events happening in the story can actually happen in reality.”<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114101124/637209f89c7e80680e0b5574jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1222" height="900">Karnali Blues tells us about <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/taking-nepali-literature-to-the-world/">people and places that age</a> through immaculately detailed visuals of the great river’s tributaries weaving themselves into the story.Villages and towns also have characters and stories to tell. A tea shop by the river turns into a small market. The river becomes a <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/how-the-bagmati-civilisation-is-becoming-uncivilised/">dumping site to accommodate modernisation</a>. The cattle get sick. A new bridge opens up a nearby town, and its population migrates, hoping for a better future.The village dries up, but the rivers stay polluted. There is death and abandonment, but even if one life ends, the other has to move forward. The title is apt, there is no other place to feel blue and desolate than in the Karnali.“The back-and-forth style of storytelling in Karnali Blues came from those hospital nights with my father,” Buddhisagar says, this time holding a freshly-lit cigarette between his fingers. “You start by reading about an unknown person, sick and on his deathbed,  and slowly, you walk along the story with him. Eventually, the readers get to know him and so when the end comes, it creates an emotional response.”Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/taking-nepali-literature-to-the-world/">Taking Nepali literature to the world</a>, Ashish DhakalBecause we spend 400 pages with Harsha Bahadur, we know that he is a constantly caring patriarch whose love for blue waistcoats is immeasurable. We also know that Brisha Bahadur’s nameless mother is constantly forgiving. Despite being a troublemaker, we still adore Brisha Bahadur’s predilection for an expensive bicycle, or a leather jacket. His love for tea makes him the most relatable Nepali on earth. And thus we come to care for all of them.“Since I spent many years writing the novel, it opened a whole new world for me,” Buddhisagar says, blowing out blue smoke through his nostrils.It has been 12 years since he came out, and readers have come to love the world he created as well. It has now found new visitors with <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/taking-nepali-literature-to-the-world/">Michael Hutt’s English translation</a> (see above).<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114101124/637209fb9c7e80680e0b5575jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1080" height="792"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Language bridges distance, and so when asked whether he wishes to change the way he had written Karnali Blues, especially now that he has become a father himself, he shakes his head.“I don’t have any regrets about my past work. Whatever I had felt while writing the book has dissipated. If I read it now, I will do it as a reader,” says Buddisagar. “We are fathers of a different era. I don’t feel the need to change the way I have written about fatherhood in this novel.”Perhaps it is not Buddhisagar we should be looking for in our narrator, rather it is us readers that find ourselves in his characters. The way we were as children, the kind of parents we want to become.Maybe Buddhisagar has expertly hidden himself somewhere within lines like these in Hutt’s translation: “Once Father set out, he never looked back. He used to say, ‘If you turn to look back, your attachments will trap you and you won’t be able to go.’”Buddhisagar is working on his third novel. The English translation of Karnali Blues translated Michael Hutt is available in Kathmandu bookshops. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-story-of-books-in-nepal/">The story of books in Nepal</a>, Ashish Dhakal

The Man from Karnali

<img width="640" height="640" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114091156/637202dd9c7e80680e0b27d8jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>With 1,084,170 words, 198 chapters, seven books, one play and <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=13770#.Yc-5xi2B3-Y" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">a billion-dollar franchise</a>, the Harry Potter series revived the reading habit of millennials everywhere. Twenty-five years after the first book came out, it is still the bestselling book series in history, translated into 80 languages – including Nepali.  Few know that in 2008 Sunbird Publishing House in Kathmandu secured the copyright from J K Rowling to officially translate Philosopher’s Stone into Nepali. This was part of Sunbird’s aim to publish more books in Nepali for rural children at a time when the Maoist insurgency had destroyed schools, disrupting education. The book was released as ह्यारी पोटर र पारसमणि  (Harry Potter ra Parasmani) translated by Shlesha Thapaliya and Bijaya Adhikari, and edited by <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/exploring-nepals-culinary-diversity/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Kedar Sharma</a>. Having grown up reading Harry Potter books, Thapaliya remembers being thrilled when Helen Sherpa of Sunbird reached out to ask if she would be interested in translating it. “Helen asked if I could translate the first chapter as a sample, and they were happy with my work,” she recalls. It took Thapaliya a year to complete the draft, during which time Bijaya Adhikari also joined. Adhikari first read the books in 1998 when Chamber of Secrets had just come out, and only the <a href="https://www.britishcouncil.org.np/digital-library-nepal" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">British Council Library</a> had copies. He was also familiar with Nepali Unicode, which came in handy during the translation process. It was also the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/how-they-kept-nepal-in-the-dark-ages/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">time of loadshedding in Nepal</a>. “I used to sit with the book and translate by the candlelight,” Adhikari remembers. Power cuts were only part of the challenge. The real Forbidden Forest, so to speak, was to correctly translate many specific terminologies, such as muggles or quidditch. “We weren’t sure at first how Nepali children reading it, especially in the rural areas, without exposure to the British context would relate to the story,” says Thapaliya. Spells, Adhikari adds, posed a particular challenge. Rowling uses a modified version of Latin to create incantations in the original series, often a play on their desired effect: levicorpus, for example, to hoist the victim by their ankles, has roots in levare ‘to lift’ and corpus ‘body’. The same reasoning and effects were difficult to contextualise for Nepali audience. Even the words ‘witch’ and ‘wizard’ had to be reconsidered, as बोक्सी (boksi) and बोक्सा (boksa), which carry a negative connotation in Nepali society. So, the translators used जादूगर्नी (jadugarni) and जादूगर (jadugar) which more closely mean 'magician'. Proper names had diphthongs with no Nepali equivalent (for instance the vowel sound in ‘Harry’ – not quite the strong ह्या, nor the long हा. Food items were uniquely European, as were the festivals and holidays. “We decided that we couldn’t obviously change the context of the book by Nepalifying everything,” Thapaliya says, “as reading is supposed to strike one’s imagination and teach new things.” So, instead of a literal, direct translation, Adhikari came up with the formula to rather try and translate the meaning and the feelings. The editing process was equally rigorous, as he sat with his cousin, Aditi Adhikari, and her father Kedar Sharma to go through the text from cover to cover. “As the cultures of Nepal and the UK do not align exactly, we would often end up adding two or three words to explain the terms that were confusing or unfamiliar,” he says, “We were constantly asking ourselves if the translation was making sense to the children in Ilam or <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/first-drought-then-downpour/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Rukum</a> who are not familiar with western folklore.” The translation did not get much hype upon release, even as Helen Sherpa wanted to take the book to different parts of the country and share with children there, and its distribution was limited among a handful of Potterheads. Adhikari adds, “The cultural relevance of Harry Potter is significant to people who have been exposed to Western media and literature.” Consequently, the planned translation of the second book did not pan out. Even ह्यारी पोटर र पारसमणि is now difficult to find. <figure><img width="1320" height="951" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114091156/637202e09c7e80680e0b27d9jpeg.jpg" alt=""><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Its rarity is comparable to the first edition of Philosopher’s Stone of which only 500 copies were printed. One was <a href="https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/harry-potter-first-edition-sells-smashing-471000-2021-12-09/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">sold for a smashing $471,000</a> in the United States on 9 December, setting the record price for a 2Oth century work of fiction. The global cultural impact of Harry Potter is a result of its universal themes of love, friendship and discovering oneself, while combatting the dangers of authoritarianism and propaganda. And J K Rowling managed to make school fun and thrilling, where one can expect adventure and room for growth in every corridor, instead of only homework and punishment. But will the series sustain its relevance as attitudes change owing to Rowling’s controversial politics? Many fans, organisations, and even the cast of the film adaptations have distanced themselves from Rowling because of her trans-exclusionary feminism. “We should have seen it coming,” adds Soph Levinas, a 22-year-old non binary Nepali: “Growing up, we never saw the problematic aspects of the books because we didn't have the context for it. Now, it is difficult for me to gloss over the stereotypical portrayals of many characters.” <a href="https://www.amazon.in/Harry-Potter-Philosophers-Stone-Rowling/dp/1408855658" target="_blank" style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone</a> first came out in 1997 at a time when Nepali children would be playing cricket, tag or hide-and-seek in the streets. The internet and mobile phones were a novelty. Whatever time remained, children did homework or read the Nagraj comics. Harry Potter took his sweet time aboard the Hogwarts Express to find his way to Nepal. It was not until the mid-2000s that Pottermania finally caught on, and even then it was a such a different world and culture that it did not have much of a readership. English folklore, tales of vampires, werewolves and dragons were not so familiar to Nepali youngsters. But at a time when there were not enough books either in Nepali or English targeted especially for young adults, Harry Potter appealed to a niche readership. Anjan Shrestha of Educational Book House in Jamal, one of the first bookstores in Kathmandu to introduce the series, recalls that Harry Potter was slow to pick up momentum here. “We brought the books in 2001, but it took another two years before there was a decent fanbase,” he says. But by the time <a href="https://www.amazon.in/Harry-Potter-Half-Blood-Prince/dp/1408855704/ref=sr_1_1?crid=11OS11VIUYFPG&amp;keywords=half+blood+prince&amp;qid=1641003890&amp;s=books&amp;sprefix=half+blood+princ%2Cstripbooks%2C204&amp;sr=1-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Half-Blood Prince</a>, the sixth in the seven-book series, was published in 2005, self-proclaimed Potterheads were sharing the bulky hardbacks among friends, discussing plot lines and theories, turning twigs into wands, and re-reading while they waited for the next book. In subsequent years, the appetite for the wizarding world only grew. It is a different world today, of course, and whether Harry Potter remains popular among children born today is a question to ask in another 25 years – half a century after Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone was published.

Ashish Dhakal

The lost Nepali translation of Harry Potter

Fenerbahçe Beko won the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague finals in Abu Dhabi, held 23-25 May, defeating Monaco 81-70 in the final. Olympiacos, who defeated Panathinaikos 97-93, finished the series in third place. The Most Valuable Player (MVP) of the final match, Nigel Hayes-Davis from Fenerbahçe Beko, received a prize of 1,000,000 Miles&amp;Smiles from Turkish Airlines’ Chief Commercial Officer Ahmet Olmuştur. The carrier has been the title sponsor of the Turkish Airlines EuroLeague, a top tier tournament, since 2010.

Turkish Basketball

Thousands of Nepali students dreaming of an American education have been forced to look elsewhere as the Trump administration’s visa restrictions make their future uncertain.
The US was long considered a top destination for higher studies, making Nepal the 10th biggest country of origin for international students in America.&nbsp;
However, that number has seen a significant decline with the total for Nepali students now at 16,482. Some 8,000 Nepali students obtained no-objection certificates to study in the US from the Ministry of Education in the past year.&nbsp;
India, Australia, Canada, South Korea, United Kingdom and Japan are the other popular destinations for Nepali students. There are no clear numbers for Nepalis going to India, but a slight decline was noted this year after the deaths of two female students.
The US State Department has issued a circular to its embassies not to issue new visas to applicants until further notice. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the directive stated that the department planned to expand the screening of applicants' social media.&nbsp;
While new applicants are barred including those applying for visitor visas, students with scheduled interviews are allowed to proceed.
“Many of our students are affected by the new restrictions, but those who had applied for student visas earlier have got interview dates,” one Kathmandu-based college counsellor told us.
Meanwhile, even foreign students with spotless records already in the US have not been spared, as visa scrutiny intensifies under the new policy. In a move that underscores the growing sense of insecurity, many US colleges advised international students to carry their passports and documents at all times, even when traveling locally.
“Me and my friends did not go home this summer because we were not sure we would be allowed back, so we just went to Niagara Falls,” said a Nepali undergrad in Ohio, who like many interviewed for this report did not want her name used for fear of repercussion.
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Nepali students have adopted a cautious stance, with many choosing not to return home during summer vacation due to fear of visa revocations as well as travel bans. Meanwhile, over 7,000 Nepalis with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) will have to come back to Nepal by 5 August or face deportation. Thirty-seven were flown back to Kathmandu on Omni Air last week.
“The US is one of the most sought-after destinations for higher education, and the ban will definitely impact bright students,” says Narottam Aryal of the King’s College in Kathmandu.
Indeed, Nepali undergraduates admitted into Ivy League colleges for the 2025 academic year have been asked to look for alternatives. The entire Fulbright Foreign Scholarships Board resigned on Wednesday citing interference from the Trump administration on the selection of this year’s cohort. Some Nepali students already on Fulbright scholarships have noted disruptions, delays and even cancellation of stipends.&nbsp;
The student visa restrictions were initially just for foreign students admitted to Harvard University, but it was later extended to all Chinese students and now to all students. Universities like Columbia which actively recruit foreign students, face sharp enrolment declines, threatening their financial stability and diversity.
An Indian female PhD candidate at Columbia University had her visa revoked by the US State Department, and said she was targeted on the basis of her social media posts on Israeli military attacks in Gaza. Social media vetting of political activism has raised concerns about privacy and freedom of expression in a country where such rights were a given.
Many students have been informed via email that their visas have been revoked for getting speeding or parking tickets, but even others with no criminal record have been affected. The fear of deportation looms large amongst international students, including those from Nepal.&nbsp;
For most Nepalis who migrate to the US for education, the journey is a high-stakes investment. They come largely from middle-class families, often rely on a patchwork of scholarships, work-study programs, loans, or even the sale of family assets to afford fees.
Most Nepali students pursue STEM subjects which offer extended Optional Practical Training (OPT) periods that help fund their education. But with the US backsliding on education and humanitarian matters, countries like the UK and Canada are becoming more attractive despite their own recent stricter controls on student visas.&nbsp;
The UK universities saw a 63% rise in Nepali students’ admissions in 2024. Japan is another popular destination with 64,816 Nepali students enrolled as of 2024.
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Already, China, Hong Kong and Malaysia are poised to benefit from the increased scrutiny of US student visas. Several Hong Kong universities are offering unconditional admission to affected students, while Malaysian institutions are targeting previously US-bound Asian students. China and India have 330,000 and 280,000 students respectively in America, but the numbers for China have seen a sharp drop in the past year.
Elsewhere, branch campuses of American institutions such as NYU in Abu Dhabi, Georgetown in Dubai and Northwestern in Doha are getting more admission applications, and universities in the Gulf region are expanding infrastructure to accommodate those who would otherwise have gone to the US.&nbsp;
Even educational institutions in Nepal are hopeful that the US visa restrictions can be an opportunity to at least keep Nepali undergrads in Nepal, and also attract foreign students from the region.&nbsp;
“Many students might choose to complete their undergraduate degree here in Nepal and then move abroad for their Master’s degree later,” says Aryal of King’s College. “There was a need for quality higher education in Nepal anyway in terms of innovation and opportunities, so this could be the time to reduce our dependence on other countries.”
Nepal’s strategic position between India and China makes it sensitive to US policy shifts. India, a key ally, is also under US scrutiny for potential student travel restrictions. Chinese universities are already offering more scholarships to Nepali talent to capitalise on the US retreat.
American universities have challenged student visa restrictions in the courts. A federal court in Boston revoked the blanket ban on Harvard, and the State Department has ordered the resumption of processing student and exchange visitor visas.&nbsp;
Some are still hoping that President Trump will backtrack on the student visa restrictions, just like he has done with many of his more drastic executive orders.
Even so, the visa see-saw and longer-term uncertainties about living in the United States and its education system means students across the world are making alternative plans.
Says Aryal: “Policies of foreign countries change according to their needs, so excessive dependence was never a good idea. We should work to create different opportunities and choices of higher education within Nepal, so students are retained.” &nbsp;

America no longer prime destination for Nepali students

That winter day in January 1664 marked an exceptional event in the reign of King Pratap Malla of Kathmandu. It was 15 Paush 784 of the Nepal Sambat and for the first time, a historical event was being immortalised on canvas for generations to come.&nbsp; The occasion was the grand Tuladaan ceremony of the King’s youngest son Chakrabartendra Malla from his wife Anantapriya, an Indian princess from Cooch Behar in present-day Assam.&nbsp; During the ritual, the prince was weighed against gold, silver, pearls, and other precious stones, which were then offered to Goddess Taleju Bhavani, the guardian deity of the Malla dynasty.&nbsp; The 170 x120cm painting captures the time of King Pratap Malla in all its splendour and is more than a personal tribute to his son: it is a significant visual historical document. It was evidently completed five years later in 1669, and could be considered a photographic record, with retrospective recreation of the event by the unknown artist. A Tuladaan ceremony is performed to purify one’s karma, quell impending bad luck, or as an act of charity and devotion. Chakrabartendra Malla was not well, and the ritual was performed in hopes of restoring his health. King Pratap Malla had arranged for each of his sons to take turns ruling Kathmandu so they got administrative experience. But Chakrabartendra died just two days after assuming power in 1670 (790 NS). This painting is considered the earliest known example in which the composition is dominated by an architectural landscape: the Taleju Temple. Given the stylistic features such as side-profile facial depictions and the rendering of human forms, it is believed that the Nepali artist was trained by a Rajput master.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250615040624_ddad3bc27a327e3f9926c8473287e4f14b53081296c295049009f327a4d97051.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20250615040624_ddad3bc27a327e3f9926c8473287e4f14b53081296c295049009f327a4d97051" data-rendition-name="original" width="3248" height="4395" loading="lazy" alt="Tuladaan NT"> </figure>  During that era, there were regular exchanges of artists between Northern India and Kathmandu Valley. The painting is also a melding of Nepali, Tibetan, Mughal, and Rajput art styles of the time. Pratap Malla could have been inspired by a painting of Mughal Emperor Jahangir’s Tuladaan ceremony for his son Khurram in 1607. The Mallas and Mughals shared cordial relations, which is reflected in the cultural influences seen in the art and attire of the period.&nbsp; The clothing of the Malla ruling class, in particular, features colourful tunics, turbans, and jewelry that display strong Rajput and Mughal stylistic elements. The musicians in the upper tier are also dressed in Indian-style clothing, while the ensemble on the lower steps wear local attire, notably without turbans. Their hairstyles also differ, with the lower group wearing their hair tied in a bun at the front. This national treasure is currently in storage at the Collège de France in Paris, and has never been publicly displayed. Nepal’s art scholars like Gautam Vajracharya, Pratap Aditya Pal and Anne Vergati have written about this iconic paubha in the past, but the only detailed study is from the perspective of music history by researcher Richard Widdess who had access to high resolution copies of the original.&nbsp; Widdess from the Department of Music at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London describes the paubha as the most significant and richly detailed documentation of music in Nepali art. He identifies distinct musical ensembles on the terraces of the temple, and remarkably most of them are actively used today. One of them reflects the Mughal naqqārakhāna model — a loud outdoor ensemble typically composed of kettledrums, trumpets, and cymbals, traditionally performed from the gateway of the emperor’s palace to announce his entrances and exits. The depiction of such an ensemble in the tulādāna painting is likely the earliest known representation of a complete naqqārakhāna in Nepal — considered the forerunner of the panche baja, the traditional Nepali ensemble. On the stepped pyramid base of the temple are two groups of musicians playing local instruments: dhimey, bhushya, and dha. They are unmistakably Newar musicians, wearing short skirts and short-sleeved tops, with bare heads and legs—clearly distinguished as local performers.&nbsp; Higher still on the temple pyramid are musicians of apparently higher status, positioned close to the king, and his courtiers, possibly professional court musicians from India, well-versed in rāga and tāla. A dāphā group is also clearly depicted, identifiable by their characteristic instruments.&nbsp; Dāphā bhajan is likely the oldest surviving tradition of Newar devotional singing, and this paubha is the oldest visual record of it. Pratap Malla himself is believed to have composed songs that continue to be performed by dāphā groups throughout Kathmandu till today.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025061211064_d67636730cdc0ec778c02494817aca0b99654f2950d0fae4b95499a61faf7ef3.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2025061211064_d67636730cdc0ec778c02494817aca0b99654f2950d0fae4b95499a61faf7ef3" data-rendition-name="original" width="596" height="768" loading="lazy" alt="Priceless paubha in Paris NT"> </figure>  The artist’s thorough attention to musical detail may be attributed to King Pratap Malla’s own deep interest in music. His inscriptions on this painting and elsewhere proclaim his mastery of all branches of knowledge, including music. He is also known as the author of dance dramas and poems, penning his name as Kavindra (king of poets). Some noteworthy elements of new art techniques stand out: for example, the roof of the temple is filled with realistically rendered white doves, pigeons, and crows. This is a rare feature in paubha, where animals and birds are stylised, mythological forms. This remarkably talented unknown artist has managed to also render an orthographic projection: the front and side view of Nepal’s first architectural paubha. The Taleju Temple, with its staggering multi-tiered structure and numerous steps and platforms, is masterfully translated into layers within the painting. This represents a significant artistic achievement of the time, especially considering that dimensional perspectives had not started in deity-based paubha.&nbsp; The artist has also made a meticulous effort to capture architectural details such as the toran (ornamental arch) and temple struts with impressive precision. There are flickering lamps along the steps and some people carrying what appear to be oil pots.&nbsp; It is a full moon night and the dark sky is adorned with all the gods and goddesses, who are depicted as blessing the ceremony while seated on stylised thangka clouds. There is a lot happening in this painting, with people engaged in various activities. The artist has also rendered a forest backdrop behind the temple, complete with deer, trees, and flowers. Could there have once been a royal garden behind the Taleju Temple?&nbsp; More details and clarity can only be achieved if we are able to view the original or a high-resolution scanned version of the artwork. Many countries proudly display art depicting historical events in their national museums with great reverence. France, for example, has The Coronation of Emperor Napoleon and Empress Joséphine by Jacques-Louis David (1808–1822), along with numerous paintings of the Napoleonic Wars. Many were commissioned by Napoleon himself for future generations to remember.&nbsp; For Nepal, the equivalent is the Tuladaan paubha which is a visual record capturing a historic moment involving one of Kathmandu’s greatest kings, on the very day the event took place. Sadly, we await the day when this masterpiece is displayed, shared in high resolution for detailed study, or more rightfully — repatriated to its homeland, where it truly belongs. &nbsp; Shaguni Singh Sakya is the Director of the Museum of Nepali Arts (MoNA) at Kathmandu Guest House in Thamel. <h2>Gods homeward bound</h2> The Nepal Heritage Recovery Campaign and Nepal’s Department of Archaeology are convening the first international conference on the Recovery of Cultural Heritage from 16-18 June in Patan. The conference will address urgent issues of theft, illicit trafficking, the campaign to repatriate looted cultural artifacts, and explore how the return of sacred antiquities contributes to justice, healing, and reconciliation for communities and nations affected by cultural loss. American art crime professor Erin L Thompson and Saubhagya Pradhananga of the Department of Archaeology will deliver the keynote. Meanwhile, author and Nepali Times publisher Kunda Dixit will lead a conversation on Illicit Trafficking: Public Opinion and Role of Media with Erin Thompson, Amr Al Azm, associate professor of Middle East History and Anthropology at Shawnee State University in Ohio, as well as Bradley J Gordon, a lawyer based in Phnom Penh. There will be sessions looking at repatriation perspectives from Cambodia, India, Vietnam, China and Poland, international frameworks for repatriation, emerging digital technologies in the repatriation of cultural heritage, cultural property agreements, museums as well as trends in the art market, and heritage diplomacy and the role of media.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025061211068_59cfccfa8f5d73bfe8b4c5811a7f53abc09ea04e8cb7c638933d62e5283efdf6.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="2025061211068_59cfccfa8f5d73bfe8b4c5811a7f53abc09ea04e8cb7c638933d62e5283efdf6" data-rendition-name="original" width="1080" height="1350" loading="lazy" alt="Heritage recovery NT"> </figure>  <h2> </h2> Some of the other highlights include James K. Reap, a professor in the Master of Historic Preservation Program at the University of Georgia who has a session on the US response to illicit trafficking. Art historian Lea Saint-Raymond is taking on “Gods at Auction: The Market for Himalayan Artefacts”, while lecturer of criminology at the University of Glasgow Emiline Smith is delving into transformative approaches to heritage ownership and repatriation. Helena Arose of Antiquities Coalition and Melina Antoniadis of NOSTOS Strategies that specialise on the return home of cultural heritage as well as Hao Liu of International Cultural Heritage Law at the School of Law at Shandong University are some of the others attending. The Nepal Heritage Recovery Campaign was set up in 2020 to develop a coordinated movement to reclaim Nepal’s stolen gods and goddesses, with an aim to ensure that recovered items are returned to their original shrines, niches or sanctums. Ahead of the conference opening organisers have arranged for a film screening of Loot &amp; Return: 4 Documentaries at YalaMaya Kendra in Patan Dhoka between 14-15 June. Following the conference is a multimedia exhibition titled Absent Gods: Nepal’s Lost Heritage from 31 July to 4 August at Patan Museum.

Priceless paubha in Paris

While Nepal was hosting the Sagarmatha Sambaad international climate conference in Kathmandu this month, on Mt Everest it was pretty much business as usual.&nbsp; The signs of climate breakdown are all there: a river now runs through Base Camp in summer, the Khumbu Icefall is more unstable, and there are more &nbsp;frequent avalanches. When expeditions arrived in March, the mountains were bare: it had not snowed since September, but then blizzards dumped unseasonal snow in May. And despite climate worries, such is the pull of Himalayan mountaineering that the Everest Industry showed no signs of slowdown. More than 600 international climbers and their Nepali guides had made it to the summit of the world’s highest mountain. At one point there were an estimated 2,000 people in the tent city on the Khumbu Glacier. All the ropes and ladders on the Icefall came down on Thursday, marking the official end of the spring climbing season, and just in time to avoid a monsoon cyclone approaching from the Bay of Bengal. It has been an action-packed season. One factor could be that Everest fees will go up from September: each foreign climber needs to pay a $15,000 royalty, up from the present $11,000. The cost for a Nepali climber on the South Col route will also go up: from Rs75,000 to Rs150,000.&nbsp; The fee to climb Everest in autumn is $7,500 (up from $5,500), but most climbers still prefer spring. Winter permit fee (December-February) is only $3,750 per person and the mountain is now also open for monsoon (June-August) climbs, when the fee is ever lower at $2,750. The revised rule also makes it mandatory for every two climbers on an 8,000m peak to hire one Nepali mountain guide.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025053004050_67f856fe52714e4bdcf21ae7d45c6f18c82117b9d0a5f73ed1efa04c96de1046.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2025053004050_67f856fe52714e4bdcf21ae7d45c6f18c82117b9d0a5f73ed1efa04c96de1046" data-rendition-name="original" width="931" height="732" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest Industry graph 1"> </figure>  In addition, climbers also have to pay for porters and guides, equipment, Base Camp costs, Ice Fall and fixed rope team fees, so climbing Everest does not come cheap. But such is the draw of climbing the world’s highest peak that some say the increased fees will not diminish the crowds next year. The government has tried to spread expeditions out to other seasons and other 8,000ers, but with not much success. Earlier this year, Nepal unilaterally increased the number of 8,000m peaks to 14 by adding six more sub-summits to broaden the choice for climbers. Added were: Yalung Kang (8,505m), Yalung Kang West (8,077m) &nbsp;Kangchenjunga Central (8,473m), Kangchenjunga South (8,476m), Lhotse Middle (8,410m) and Lhotse Shar (8,400m).&nbsp; The announcement could go against the accepted topographic criteria that a stand alone peak has to be at least 300m higher than an adjoining prominence, and at more than 3km isolation from it. The UIAA (Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme) still recognises only 14 mountains as eight-thousanders, and only eight of those are in Nepal, or on the border with China. Nepal’s revised mountaineering regulations also increased the insurance coverage of high-altitude workers to protect porters and high altitude guides who usually take more risks on the mountains. Rescue teams and clean-up campaigners to collect trash and remove bodies of dead climbers up to Camp IV of Mt Everest do not need permits.&nbsp; The Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee is now using drones to fly down trash in 20kg sacks. Each climber is also required to bring down at least 6kg of waste and not just their own, but this rule is erratically enforced. With five fatalities on Everest and Lhotse, Spring 2025 had a historically low death toll. Another five climbers died on Annapurna, Kangchenjunga and Makalu.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2025053004050_38681de22f0fefb6faa12b01755566d09c5064d0ff84e12ccc7b5d68ea9ba38a.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2025053004050_38681de22f0fefb6faa12b01755566d09c5064d0ff84e12ccc7b5d68ea9ba38a" data-rendition-name="original" width="665" height="740" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest industry graph 2"> </figure>  Journalist Ben Ayers who ran the Everest Live social media channel from Everest Base Camp with daily updates credited the low death rate to dramatic rescues of climbers from the ‘Death Zone’ by their Nepali guides and longline helievacs — the visuals all uploaded on YouTube.&nbsp; “Ironically, this perception of safety is bringing more and more inexperienced climbers to the mountain, and they need more rescues,” Ayers said in one of his dispatches.&nbsp; American expedition chronicler and summiteer Alan Arnette suspects there is a lot of under-reporting given that the jet stream and storms were lashing Everest even till late in the season. He told us: “I heard a lot about frostbite and rescues that were not made public. It’s become practically impossible to cover the details on Everest. All the teams report nice news, and they don’t talk about bad stuff to avoid hurting businesses.” Although trash on Nepal’s mountains makes headlines, what does not receive as much attention is the climate impact of so many expeditions. The Sagarmatha Sambaad conference sidestepped this issue, which is ironic given that the impact of climate breakdown is most evident on Himalayan peaks and their glaciers.&nbsp; <h2>Need for Speed</h2> The big stories this year have been about speed-running from their home cities to the top of Everest. Ukrainian entrepreneur Andrew Ushakov flew out of JFK on 15 May at 10:15AM Nepal time, and was on the summit 3 days, 23 hours, and 7 minutes later on 19 May at 9:22AM.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250601080640_1c5cc6fc991307861768f07037ed9d30930fb20f35dbb57dc31c9a92a9e1a885.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20250601080640_1c5cc6fc991307861768f07037ed9d30930fb20f35dbb57dc31c9a92a9e1a885" data-rendition-name="original" width="1440" height="1800" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest Industry"> <figcaption>Andrew Ushakov at the summt. Photo: ELITE EXPED</figcaption> </figure>  “I could never find the time for the traditional 40-50 days of acclimatisation,” Ushakov explained matter-of-factly. His ‘Everest Sea-to-Summit’ climb was possible because he spent 400 hours in hypoxic sleep tents over the past four years in New York. However, Ushakov did use ropes already fixed, hired four Nepali guides, helicoptered to Base Camp, and used much more oxygen than an average climber. And after the climb, Ushakov was arrested at Kathmandu airport for being in possession of $20,000 of undeclared cash and spent a night in jail and fined $60,000.&nbsp; The other speedsters were Garth Miller, Alastair Cairns, Anthony Stazicker, and Kev Godlington, all former British Army commandos. They left London and summited five days later on 21 May, and flew right back. They also used hypoxic tents to simulate the thin air high on Everest.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250601080644_90c8dd5cc07b4b43f2989b1dc0c0650ab80f10ebb06680c25a6909c519957bd8.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20250601080644_90c8dd5cc07b4b43f2989b1dc0c0650ab80f10ebb06680c25a6909c519957bd8" data-rendition-name="original" width="810" height="668" loading="lazy" alt="The Everest Industry "> <figcaption>All four members of the Furtenbach team at the summit. Photo: Sandro Gromen-Hayes</figcaption> </figure>  But more controversial was their use of xenon gas therapy in a German hospital to ramp up the production of oxygen-carrying haemoglobins in their blood. Xenon is banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency for being performance enhancing in sports. Expedition leader Lukas Furtenbach said this rule does not apply to mountaineering, as it is not a regulated sport like swimming. Nepal has no rules about xenon, but the Department of Tourism said it was launching an ‘investigation’ to decide on future policy since it is difficult to ban xenon, but allow oxygen. The controversy has also divided the mountaineering community, with some climbers saying they just want to maximise their chances of survival. Spending less time on the mountain could make climbing safer by reducing avalanche risk. It would also mean less trash on the mountains, but it would reduce the income of Nepal’s expedition industry. It is also unclear how much of the success was due to xenon therapy and whether the ex-special forces were already in good physical shape.&nbsp; The need for speed hides the fact that climbing in the Himalaya is dangerous business, and climbers cannot sprint to the top just by huffing xenon. But ultra-fast climbs could be charged more, and the revenue generated can be used to establish state-of-the-art rescue operations, and increase pay and insurance for guides. Two other speed chasers this season were Swiss-Ecuadorian Karl Egloff and American Tyler Andrews, both on Everest without oxygen. Andrews choppered to Base Camp to catch a weather window, but turned back from 8,500m due to high winds. Heavy snow and wind also forced Egloff to descend from 7,000m. Slow and steady climbers like Anja Blacha from Germany did make it to the summit without oxygen, while Kami Rita Sherpa broke his own record with his 31st Everest summit as he led a 26-strong Indian Army group. There were 468 permits issued for foreign climbers from 48 expeditions to Everest this spring. Nepal’s other eight-thousanders together had only 17 expeditions. Nepal has more than 1,000 peaks above 6,000m, and has opened only 476 of them for climbing.&nbsp;