Girls in nepal: short video

While Nepal is one of the (the?) most diverse countries in the world (in terms of languages, culture, ethnicity, geography) the Hindu religion is imbedded in the every day of almost all parts of Nepal. And as it is religion that helps create our world view, Hinduism creates some strong ties between people and places in Nepal.

This means that even though a girl growing up in the Everest region of Nepal is hundreds of kilometers (distance) and meters (height) away from a girl living in the district where I am working (Makwanpur), their experience is - at least in some ways - extremely similar.

These days I am now working one day a week at the VSO office on gender related work. I love, love, love it. It complements the work I do "in the field" with COSAN. This week, for instance, I am continuing some research about gender and education in Nepal, meeting with the Muslim Women's Organization (the only organization in Nepal run by Muslim Women), and exploring some ideas with fellow volunteers about how VSO can play a stronger role in bringing about increased awareness of gender issues into our partner organizations and schools.

I want to share this video with you. While not an organization that I have any personal experience with, it does a decent job of showing a window into the life of girls in Nepal. It's about 4 and a half minutes long.

I am hopelessly impatient with technology (hence my very short career as a documentary maker) and can't figure out how to hyperlink this (that sounds cool, right?) so you'll have to cut and paste this link.

http://vimeo.com/21243728


Picture above: My 4 year-old neighbor from Hetauda, Smarika. Candid shot - not posed. She would come and "clean" my apartment, sometimes for up to an hours as play. And to be able to hang out with me.