THE GLOBAL AND THE LOCAL

Sushma Joshi Kathmandu Post Kathmandu's annual theatre festival, started by Aarohan theatre, is awaited eagerly by theatre lovers. This year, I could only make it to one play out of seventeen. But I may have stumbled upon the one that was most different, unusual, and new to Nepal. The Circle Course, by Mira Kingsley, may have been the first time when Nepali audiences saw a female actor on stage who exhibited raw physical strength and jaw-dropping endurance along with feminine grace, emotions, and intelligence--all at the same time. A woman moves across the stage, carrying a man wrapped across her body. Muscles tensed, she carries him across the whole length of the floor, as the audience watches in pindrop silence. The unusual scene is quickly followed by a ripple of unease as the two actors--one male, one female--take off their shirts. The feeling of sexual inappropriateness quickly vanishes as the two bodies move in perfect co-ordination, one supporting, one holding the other one ...

Sushma Joshi Kathmandu Post Education should encourage students to start their own creative and business ventures Have you noticed how there seem to be so many qualified people looking desperately for jobs on the one hand, and businesses complaining about how they can't find the people with the right skills, on the other?” This observation, made by a colleague of mine, made me realise that the Nepali jigsaw puzzle of education and employment don't quite seem to fit together. On the one hand, Nepal produces an stellar cast of graduates each year who are filled with enthusiasm and desperation, trying to get into highly skilled technical professions before realising that these jobs are either non-existent or so competitive its best to migrate abroad. From the rural areas, large numbers of SLC graduates realise that the Lok Seva job they hoped to get is elusive, and start slowly to think about the migrant labour route. On the other hand, businesses in Nepal complain frequently abo...

My article From the Battlefield to the Gulf appeared in sympathiemagazin , a German publication, in 2008. It is a brief overview of the state of women in Nepal in the post conflict moment.  You can find the article I wrote, in English, as well as the table of contents.   --> FROM THE BATTLEFIELD TO THE GULF SUSHMA JOSHI Saraswoti, a young neighbour of mine, was eighteen when she moved to Kathmandu. Her husband, a twenty-year old policeman, was riding to work in his bicycle when a group of schoolboys milled around him. A schoolboy fired a shot from inside the crowd, and Saraswoti's husband died on his way to the hospital. The policeman was targeted by teenaged guerillas for being part of the state. In Kathmandu, Saraswoti lives with her extended family and has raised her son Ujwal as a single mother for the last four years. She has received 7 lakhs as compensation from the government. She says she doesn't want to get remarried. The civil confl...