Two sad stories - Bus travel in Nepal and Ismit’s story

The bus is full - well almost, for us was still some space on the roof.

Well the good message is that in the chance to be killed in a road accident in Nepal is with 1,900 fatalities for 30 Million people (1:15,800) per year significant smaller than in Bangladesh with 12,000 for 160 Million people (1:13,500). In Bangladesh it is also called the "Rushing Roulette"  however Bangladesh has no mountains and just imagine how the statistic would like if they had any? The local paper published the numbers for 2011 this week:  1,900 fatalities in traffic accidents of which 39% are bus traveler. Looking at the road and vehicle conditions and the amounts of ups and downs, the number seems almost too low. There would be no survivor if a bus rolls down the rice paddies and comes to a halt 2000m below road level.  Anyway, I would think the local buses are in much worse shape than the tourist buses and night travel should be avoided anyway so I should be fine.

Note: While the above numbers seem to be very high, I was more than surprised to see the statistics e.g. for Germany with 4000 for 82 Million (1:20,500) or Australia with 1300 for 22 Million (1:16,900) – so even staying home is not much safer – another reason to travel. Mom, you can sit down and stop worrying now!

What do you need a convertible for if you can have it for free?

No chance of survival - once you roll, you roll - all the way.

The above is actually not the story I wanted to tell. Today I sat in the bus from Chitwan to Kathmandu, a 6 hour drive from the Southern plains over the mountain ridge into Kathmandu Valley. A younger woman sat down beside me and surprisingly started talking to me in very good English. In this kind of countries usually only men start talking to me. Well, nothing against a pretty woman talking to me…

She was telling me her story, I guess she needed to unload all the shit of the last weeks to somebody – in this case that was me. She told me that she recently has married the man she loved - nothing wrong about that. However the problem is that her mother in law hates her as she is from a different caste than her husband. Within their own caste they seem to be very high, however the one caste does not respect the other and so on. She was devastated as she came from a good well off house in Kathmandu and received a Master in Management from a good University. She said that she likes to “live simple, but think hard”.  Now that she is married, the tradition – and especially the mother in law – expected her to move to Chitwan into the local village and work on the fields, carry the fire wood, cook the meals and clean the toilet. Not necessary what she was aiming for in her life so she was on the way to Kathmandu for a week of ‘leave’ from her mother in law. She wasn’t able to satisfy her mother in law with anything she did, the cooking wasn’t right, the cleaning not good enough, simply everything was wrong and especially the caste. To my question about what her beloved husband did against the situation she said that he is worried about not getting any land from the families’ property and that he wouldn’t have a job in Kathmandu and so on.  Her pretty eyes couldn’t hide the sadness and devastation. I told her about my female boss at work who has three kids and her husband is looking after them while he works from home and she runs a big corporation.  She could barely believe that it is possible – well at least not in Nepal. I couldn’t wish her more than luck and the felt lost in giving her any proper advice except the typical blabla like looking for other women in the same situation, finding a compromise with her husband, maybe moving overseas (her sister lives in Dubai) and so on. However I think it is time to think about the caste system, it has more than aged. It is time to ‘live simple, but think much harder’. Good luck Ismit.