In 2010, Nepal had the title of world’s shortest man as Khagendra Thapa Magar who was 67cm tall . But the title was short-lived when Filipino Junrey Balawing was confirmed to be 59.93 cm. Now in 2012, Nepal has that title back as Chandra Bahadur Dangi who stands just 54.6cm tall. Guinness World Records has officially awarded him the title of the shortest man in the world.
Chandra Bahadur Dangi is 72 years old and weighs 12 kg. He is from Dang district which is 350km from Kathmandu where he survives weaving jute headbands. He has also been declared the shortest human adult ever recorded.
Being shorter than average has so many disadvantage and I can’t imagine being so short. According to Dangi’s interview he was orphaned at age 12 and was looked after by his relatives. His relatives used to display him at freak shows to make money for themselves. He has never experienced romance or found his soul mate. He wants to visit foreign countries and meet people from around the world.
I hope he will find some happiness with this record as Khagendra Thapa Magar did. Khagendra Thapa Magar has visited many countries including Australia and looked happy to be the centre of attention during events and dinners here. He was also the official face of Nepal’s tourism campaign, which featured him as the smallest man in a country that is home to the world’s highest peak, Mount Everest.
Load shedding is a familiar term in Nepal and it means shutting down of power (electricity) in particular areas of the city to reduce electricity usage. In Nepal, load shedding of electricity has a schedule and affects everyone living there.
I came across this short Nepali animation which tells the story of Nepali people living with load shedding schedule in Nepal. I really can’t imagine my life without electricity up to 20 hours a day. But most Nepali people have no choice but go on with their normal life with a candle light or an oil lamp.
It is normal in Nepal to have power outage for a few hours a day but in the summer months it goes up to 20 hours a day so you really have to do everything that requires electricity in 4 hours. If you are lucky, those 4 hours can be morning or evenings but if you are not, it may be in the middle of the night when you are sleeping or the middle of the day when you are at work. It is really a sad situation for a country which has so much hydro power generation capacity and at this stage, it only produce half the amount of electricity that the country needs.
According to a report, Nepal can produce 40,000 MW of electricity from all its rivers but right now is only producing 600 MW (really sad situation). And only 40% of the country has electricity. And these 40% still have to live with load shedding.
Political instability and power struggle has led the country backwards into darkness for a more than a decade now. Instead of using the money to invest in the country’s infrastructure, everyone who comes into power to run the government are busy buying new mansions for themselves, travelling overseas in luxury, with first class flights and hotels and making sure their children are sent to top universities in the world.
Imagine your life without any electrical equipment like vacuum cleaner, refrigerator, microwave, kettle, toaster etc. Yes that is right, you might be scared thinking how you would mange a day without all this but in Nepal they have to go through this everyday.
When I was in Nepal, the situation was not that bad but every time I go for a visit, I find that so many things are going backward instead of forward. There are more people in Kathmandu valley than the infrastructure can handle and it has made the valley chaotic and polluted. I have no idea why the government is not doing anything when they know things are not working. It feels like if you have power and/or money, you can get away with anything there.
In an attempt to make the government aware of the problems people are suffering, at one point they even had one of the television station broadcastings news using lanterns.
Hydropower projects are the future of the country and I really hope there will be at least a few projects built to ease the situation of the people. And I hope politicians will make it easy for these project to be built because I know there were a few projects closed down because of the political situations.
Nepal is describe as ‘Char jat ra chhatis barna ko yo sundar desh’ which translate into Nepali is a beautiful, multilingual and multi-cultural country. If you have met many people from Nepal, you might have noticed how different they look from each other. Please click here for my post ‘Different Look of Nepali people’ for details. Also in Nepal, there are lots of celebrations for different cultural group and ethnic group.
Today is Losar, a festival in Nepal which is celebrated by Mongolian Nepali, mainly by Gurung community as well as Rai, Tamang, Sherpas to welcome their New Year. Losar is celebrated on the first full moon of the first month according to a lunar calendar. On the solar calendar it falls between January and March. Lho means year or age and Sar means new or fresh. The word Lhosar means New Year or beginning of new era.
It is a National Holiday in Nepal so people can celebrate the festival.
Losar is the time when family member gathers and celebrate with cultural processions and feasting. Also on this day, older people give money and blessing to younger ones. I remember when I was young; I used to go to my friend’s place to celebrate Losar as my family doesn’t celebrate Losar (I am from Newar culture so we have our New Year during Tihar. Click here for more info). In her house, I used to get some money as well as lots of delicacies among which I liked sel roti (special Nepali bread) and achar the most.
One of the highlights of this day is that the people who celebrate Losar dress in their traditional outfit and go around Buddist temples. Men wear Bhangra, a white cloth shirt-like apparel tied across the chest and open like a bag at the back (for carrying things), and a Kachhad, like a short sarong or kilt while women wear maroon velvet Ghalek (blouses), enhanced by large gold earrings and semi-precious stone necklaces. Even kids are dressed up in traditional outfits.
To mark the day, all the Buddhist monasteries in the country are decorated with colourful prayer flags and the monks offer prayers for good health and prosperity, If you are in Nepal, the places to visit will be Bouddha and Swayambhu stupas where there will be crowds of people gathered to welcome the New Year.
In Sydney, there is a gathering this weekend to celebrate Losar. There will be many people dressed in traditional dress and there will be entertainment like cultural dance and singing. The best of all, there will be lots of Nepali food including Sel roti and momos
If you know Nepal, you might already know that there are lots of festivals every month. Today, we have one of those festivals and it is called Maha Shivaratri. It is believed that Shivaratri is the night when Lord Shiva was created by his own divine grace so this day is celebrated by Hindus with enthusiasm. Shivaratri literally means ‘ the night consecrated to Shiva’.
Maha Shivaratri is a national holiday in Nepal.
According to a legend, Parvati performed tapas, prayed and meditated on this day to ward off any evil that might befall her husband on the moonless night. Since then, Maha Shivaratri is believed to be an auspicious occasion for women to pray for the well-being of their husbands and sons. An unmarried woman prays for a husband like Shiva, who is considered to be the ideal husband. Another legend is that Shiva and Shakti married each other on this day.
There is one more legend of Shivaratri associated with Samudra Manthan, a battle between devas and asuras during which a pot of poison came out of the ocean and on the request of gods, Lord Shiva drank the poison. The poison was so potent that it changed the colour of His neck to blue. For this reason, Lord Shiva is also called Neelkanth (one whose throat is blue).
So basically this festival is in honour of the Hindu God Shiva. Today all the Shiva temples will be very busy. One of the best places to see the celebration will be Pashupatinath temple in Kathmandu located on the banks of the sacred Bagmati River. There will be thousands of people from all over the world (it is regarded as one of the most sacred temples for Hindus) coming to worship Shiva during the festival.
There will be a mela the days before and after Shivaratri where people fill the roads around the temples of Lord Shiva especially Pashupatinath temple . There will be holy men, beggars, pilgrims, children and tourists.
The night before Shivaratri, all the devotees from all over the country spend the night lightning sacred fires, singing praises of the deity, and keeping a constant vigil to greet his descent to earth, on the grassy hills around the temple to enjoy the warmth of good companionship and chatting around.
At midnight, the celebration begins officially with priests inside the temple making special offerings. Then devotees will take a dip in holy Bagamati river and start their fasting. They offer Bael leaves to Lord Shiva. They will spend the whole day singing sacred songs around the temple. As all the Sadhus are treated as guest , they will be offered free food and accommodation during Shivaratri.
Shivaratri is the only day in the year where marijuana and bhang is legal in Nepal so on this day devotees indulge in smoking them. It is believed that Lord Shiva is fond of these substances and marijuana is taken as a Prasad.
There are lost of tourists around the Pashupatinath temple on this day as there are lots of Sadhus with ash all over the body and devotees with colourful draping chanting hymns of Lord Shiva.
It is believed that if you worship Lord Shiva this day and fast by eating only vegetarian food, all your sins are forgiven. So there will be queues kilometres long in the Pashupathnath temple whole day.
Also this day, kids and youth block the road for vehicles to collect money which they use to buy bhoj in the evening. Mostly vehicles owners are happy to give a rupee or two. When I was a kid I do remember the block in our area made some of the vehicle owners angry with the kids blocking the roads.
Today I worshipped Shiva’s idol at home in the morning and took his blessings. Hope all my sins will be forgiven and we will be blessed with an awesome 2012.
I was watching a film ‘Life in a day’ and the Korean cyclist reminded me of a cyclist from Nepal–Pushkar Shah.
I remember I was still in Nepal when he took his bicycle and went to conquer the world. I haven’t heard about him for a while so when I did my research found his website
Who better than the man himself to describe about him and his mission.
“On November 29, 1998 I set out on an 11 year-long journey to capture my dream, the dream of riding 221,000-kilometres around the world on my bicycle to spread the message of peace and hope for my country and for the world. This mission is not about material gain or international fame. It’s simply about spreading the message of peace. If you see a Nepalese guy panting and puffing on a bicycle with a sticker “I ride therefore I am” please yield and for one second think about how you as an individual can contribute to world peace. This is my tenth year and I have already toured 150 countries and hope to complete the world tour in a total of 11 years. During my tour, I visit schools and clubs in different communities and like to speak about peace, respect for other religions and cultures, living in harmony, respect for human rights and democratic values.
I like to meet civic leaders and exchange views. After graduation from college, I worked as a school teacher and participated in the Democracy Movement in Nepal in 1990. I was arrested and imprisoned many times for my political activism. It had a deep impact on me and I decided to embark on a world tour spreading the message of Peace. I began my journey with only 100 Nepalese Rupees (One Euro) given to me by my mother. I have no official sponsor and have thus far been able to pursue my dream through the kindness and generosity of the many strangers who have befriended me along the way.
When I began my journey ten years ago, many people did not believe that such a trip was possible and said that I would get no further than India. As of July 2009 I have visited 150 countries in Asia, Asia Pacific, North America, Central America, South America, Caribbean, African, Middle East and the Europe.
In May 2010, I cycled from Kathmandu to the Everest base camp.”
Here are some of the photos of his trips.
I know that he was a courageous man to even attempt to cycle around the world with very little support and money. I still remember the day he left Kathmandu, there was this big event for his farewell and it made the headlines in the country.
Currently he is back in Nepal and is still cycling for various causes.
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