Karuna Gauchan Kathmandu
“I met an old man in Langtang. The earthquake had taken his house. He had no family, no money and no immediate support. To make things worse, he had cataract and was slowly going blind. He had somehow managed to make a rag-tag shelter under a rock. I doubt he received any relief. I briefly spoke with him. To see him like that broke me but I had to return home to my ‘life’. Back home, I buried theinteraction with the man. Thoughts of him were uncomfortable. It would make me feel guilty. You know It is difficult to live with what you have when you know there are many people who are worse off than you. It is also difficult to change and abandon the lifestyle you have grown up with. I like many of my friends come from well-to-do families. But there are many things that make me question the lifestyle we lead. It is all internal though. To voice it out in public is not always easy. These are situations whereby despite knowing it is wrong, I chose to stay quiet. For example, I absolutely hate when my relatives tell me to help out in the kitchen or serve food to other family members during a get-together. It angers me that they assume that as I am a girl, I should work in the kitchen. It would not be a big deal to me if they treated my brothers or my male cousins in the same way. However, it is always the girls who have to help out. It is not only with family and relatives. I see the hypocrisy in school too. Despite studying in a comparatively liberal school, I have heard many teachers comment about how the girls are not dressed ‘appropriately’, how we are showing too much skin or how we are distracting the boys and male teachers by wearing ‘provocative clothes’. They talk about the shorts we wear which my parents have no problem with. And these are teachers who teach us about what rights are and what morals are. Even though people say certain things are wrong, they are conditioned by the society that they continue with the same old ‘thought pattern’. I think one thought pattern I wish to change is telling myself that ‘They are family. I should not say anything’. I have no problem voicing my thoughts when it comes to my friends, teachers, or strangers but when it comes to family I always keep it in. I aspire to not be afraid to call out family members regardless of the repercussions. I also want to feel less guilty about the life I lead and help out people in need. People like the old man I met in Langtang.”
