Leaving Nepal, and Its Danger, in the Past

The men with swords had been there before. In the calm Nepali night, they huddled outside Suman Rai’s home, their faces lighted only by the molten glow of their cigarettes, and shouted “Long Live Mao!”

Then a knock — two knocks — and a dozen of them burst through the door.

The face of the young political radical before them was familiar, but it was Mr. Rai’s voice — the one that ricocheted through the town square, the one that threatened to spread anti-communist calls to the mountains — they knew best.

The men circled Mr. Rai. Forget the past, they said. Join our cause. When he refused, they threw him down and punched him into an unconscious haze.

Shortly after that harrowing summer night in 2007, Mr. Rai, 27, who worked as a guide near Mount Everest, decided to end his days as a pro-democracy organizer in Nepal. He stuffed his bag with photos of his wife and daughter and fled to America.

Mr. Rai went to Atlanta, where he worked on an assembly line at a telecommunications company before moving to Los Angeles to take a restaurant job.

But even in the middle of a multicultural city, he felt lonely. He often thought of his family: his wife, Saraswati, a nurse, and their daughter, Fortune, now 4; his father’s permanently panicked face; the day he came home with wounds after a political rally and his mother resolved to fast until he left for Katmandu.

Sensing his isolation, the owner of the restaurant gave Mr. Rai the phone number of a Nepali friend living in New York. The two talked for hours, debating the rift between communists and democrats in Nepal and thinking of ways to help from afar.

“There is still not peace in my country,” he said. “This must change.”

A year and a half ago, Mr. Rai made the journey to New York. Finding a steady job proved difficult. He approachedCatholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New York, one of the seven beneficiary agencies of The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund. The agency gave him money for aMetroCard and access to English and cultural classes.

Mr. Rai this year started working as a cashier at a hardware store, where he earns $1,200 a month. He tries to send $200 to his family each month, but he is paying off a $4,000 fee to a lawyer who helped him get asylum in the United States.

He lives with three roommates in a cramped home in Elmhurst, Queens. There is a television, a Nepali flag, a subway map, a bottle of soda and not much else.

At night, Mr. Rai sits in the glow of his laptop, chatting online with his wife and daughter, who plan to join him here sometime next year. He has also returned to community organizing, helping form an association of Nepali immigrants in New York. “Do, do, do until die,” he said. “That is my philosophy.”

In September, as Mr. Rai struggled to keep up with his bills, the Neediest Cases Fund provided $500 for one month’s rent.

“Everybody has different kinds of problems, different kinds of troubles,” he said. “I’m happy to not have to worry about the present, to be able to think about a future.”

Not so long ago, it was difficult for him to imagine his future.

Shortly after that summer night in Nepal, the thugs returned — this time in Katmandu.

They posed as reporters from the daily newspaper, he said, and asked to hear his life story. At the end of the conversation, one of the men held a pistol to his head. “Do not talk to anyone about your history!” the man shouted.

Another slapped his wife to the ground and lifted his daughter above her crib, Mr. Rai said, threatening to drop her. That night, he decided to leave Nepal.

“When I saw my infant daughter’s life in danger I wanted to run away,” he wrote in his application for asylum. “My boldness evaporated and I felt my legs shaking uncontrollably. Somehow I wanted to offer them peace and security and hope of good life ahead.”

New York Times

Nepal’s Maoists declare 4 autonomous states as dispute deepens

Dec. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Nepal’s Maoists declared four autonomous states in the Himalayan nation and planned more general strikes as a political dispute delaying the writing of a new constitution intensified.

The coalition government condemned the move by the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) and said such protests were obstructing the nation’s peace process, Nepalnews.com reported.

The Maoists pledged to boycott parliament and disrupt daily life in Nepal after the president in May overturned a decision to fire the army chief, who refused to accept former rebel fighters into the military.

Strikes are choking the Himalayan nation’s $9 billion economy and growth may slow to 3.8 percent this year from 5.3 percent in 2008, according to theAsian Development Bank. A general strike is planned Dec. 20-22, Nepalnews.com reported.

The Maoists yesterday declared two areas in the country’s west as autonomous states, following two similar declarations in the east last week, Nepalnews.com reported. Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal said the move would “invite political confrontation” and urged the Maoists to withdraw the decision, according to the Web site.

The former rebel party plans to declare 13 autonomous states based on ethnicity and region by Dec. 18 as a “symbolic” gesture, the Kathmandu Post reported last week.

The Maoists fought a 10-year insurgency to overthrow the monarchy in the landlocked nation sandwiched between India and China before disarming under a United Nations-backed peace accord in 2006.

Dahal Resigns

Maoist leader Puspa Kamal Dahal became prime minister in August 2008 after his party won most seats in parliamentary elections. He resigned in May after President Ram Baran Yadav overturned his decision to dismiss Army Chief of Staff Rookmand Katawal. The army has resisted integrating former rebels, a condition of the peace accord, saying they’ve been politically indoctrinated.

The Maoists are demanding that the president, who oversees the military, accepts the dismissal of the army chief, who has since retired, the Associated Press reported last month. They say the president acted unconstitutionally and want the present government to be disbanded, followed by the formation of a new coalition government led by them, AP said.

Nepal Cabinet Holds Everest Meeting to Highlight Climate Change

Dec. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Nepal’s Cabinet meets at the Mount Everest base camp today to highlight how climate change is shrinking Himalayan glaciers and threatening rivers essential to agriculture and development in China, India and Pakistan.

Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal and more than 20 ministers, officials, journalists, and technicians reached Lukla in eastern Nepal yesterday and will travel by helicopter to Kalapatthar in the Everest foothills for the meeting, according to Nepalnews.com. The Cabinet intends to make a formal decision at the meeting on Nepal’s climate change policy and to endorse steps to protect the Himalayan environment.

The team will have its clothes, oxygen masks and medicines inspected before flying to the Kalapatthar plateau, 5,240 meters (17,192 feet) above sea level, Nepalnews.com reported. The meeting will last for about 20 minutes, it said.

Global warming, worsened by greenhouse-gas emissions, is melting glaciers from Switzerland to the Himalayas, threatening water and food security for 1.6 billion people in South Asia, according to an Asian Development Bank study. Half of the Alps’ glacial terrain has vanished since the 1850s, according to the World Glacier Monitoring Service in Zurich.

The Himalayas are the source of India’s Ganges River; the Yangtze, China’s longest; Nepal’s main river, the Karnali; and Pakistan’s longest, the Indus. India and China possess more than 40 percent of Earth’s population and rely on rivers for drinking water and irrigation.

Nepal, lying between China and India, is home to Everest, the world’s tallest mountain, and eight of the world’s 14 peaks higher than 8,000 meters.

Maldives Threatened

The Maldives has also used its endangered geography ahead of United Nations-sponsored climate talks that begin Dec. 7 in Copenhagen to publicize the threat that heat-trapping pollution causes developing countries.

Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed and 11 ministers donned scuba gear to hold a meeting 4 meters under water last month in a lagoon, the British Broadcasting Corp. said.

The Maldives may be uninhabitable by the century’s end, scientists have said, based on forecasts of rising sea levels. Glaciers and ice sheets are melting in Antarctica and Greenland and ocean water occupies more volume the warmer it is.

Nepal’s prime minister is scheduled to speak at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen, Nepalnews.com said. The 11-day meeting, involving about 190 nations, aims to replace the Kyoto Protocol emissions targets that expire in 2012.

Talks have been at an impasse over the extent of curbs on carbon emissions from coal plants and factories and how much wealthier countries would provide in financial assistance to developing nations to cope with the impact of global warming.

China, the biggest greenhouse-gas emitter, offered last week to lower its CO2 output relative to the size of its economy while the U.S., the second-worst polluter, pledged to cut its carbon emissions by 2020.

Trekking Nepal? Don't be a wimp, snowboard the Himalayas

Richard Ragan shares his near-death experience riding down the world's highest mountains. Where's the best places to snowboard in Asia? Nepal, Japan and New Zealand according to Ragan.

Snowboarding the Himalayas, not so much. Carving Himalayan slopes is a rare opportunity, but so is living in North Korea, and World Food Programme Representative, Richard Ragan, boasts about doing both. For Sports Week, CNNGo asked Ragan about surviving close calls with avalanches, favorite tricks, and how much it costs to ride the Himalayas.

CNNGo: What's the closest call with death you've had on the slopes?

Richard Ragan: We were out shooting a short film called "sweetspots" which was for Nike ACG and I got swept up in an avalanche on Annapurna South. I thought for sure I was a goner and my life flashed. I thought about my wife, kids and luckily got spit out just short of being pitched into couloir (a passage or corridor.)

Because the entire slope was unstable, we had to call in the helicopter to pick up the team (6 of us.) The rescue was difficult because the weather was bad and the pilot had to fly in and do a one-wheel touch-landing on a ridge. As he hovered the helicopter, we all dove in through the side door. Once the last of us was safely inside he peeled off down the mountain.

Coincidentally, the same helicopter crashed about 4 days ago (late November) killing the flight engineer and critically injuring the pilot and co-pilot, demonstrating how dangerous flying is in Nepal. Honestly, only a handful of pilots in the world have the skill to fly here. The air is thinner, the weather changes fast, and the terrain is as hard as it gets anywhere in the world.

CNNGo: Anything you can do on the Himalayas that you can't do elsewhere?

Ragan: The Himalayas offers the highest altitude riding in the world. One is surrounded by the largest and steepest mountains on earth and the views are unparalleled. Because the mountains are so high, the runs are long.

I was just trekking Manaslu with several Swiss guides who were climbing up and skiing down everyday. What took me hours to descend took them only 20 to 40 minutes. In Nepal, because the mountains are some of the wildest on earth, you can pretty much try just about anything. When I first visited Nepal in 1989 I ran into a French team that was trying to parachute onto the top of Everest and snowboard down -- they failed.

CNNGo: Where are the best places to snowboard in Asia in your opinion?

Ragan: Nepal for sure, followed by Japan and New Zealand. The most interesting place I've ridden was in North Korea and aside from being part of the only American family to ever live there (with my wife and daughter,) I'm sure I'm the only person to ever snowboard there. China is also embracing skiing and snowboarding. Although most of the Chinese skiiers remind me of those funny clips from Warren Miller's films -- total chaos.

CNNGo: How much does it cost to do a weekend trip in the Himalayas? Is it necessary to hire a guide? If so, which company is best to go with?

Ragan: There is only 1 commercial company in the world that offers the opportunity and the costs vary if the trip is private or group, but it's roughly US$10,000 for 5 days. The company is Himalayan Heliski Guides and is run by Craig Calonica. He has lots of experience in the Himalayas (climbing and skiing) -- among other things having twice tried to do a ski descent of Everest. The other option is to climb up, which requires mountaineering skills, and to ride down. More and more ski/snowboard mountaineers are coming to the Himalayas these days.

CNNGo: What are some dangerous slopes you dream of boarding down?

Ragan: Cho Oyu -- the sixth highest mountain in the world -- and to ride in Valdez, Alaska.

CNNGo: Favorite snowboarding tricks?

Ragan: On big mountains, or in the back country, my favorite snowboarding trick is getting down alive.

CNNGo: Other advice for people who want to follow in your footsteps?

Ragan: Riding big mountains is not a place for beginners or intermediate skiers/snowboarders. You should have some mountaineering experience and be trained in avalanche safety. While it isn't a place for everyone, for those that do have the experience, this is the greatest place on earth to carve some turns.

http://www.cnngo.com/explorations/play/snowboarding-himalayas-832369