Nepal Now: On the Move
We're talking with the people migrating from, to, and within this Himalayan country located between China and India. You'll hear from a wide range of Nepali men and women who have chosen to leave the country for better work or education opportunities. Their stories will help you understand what drives people — in Nepal and worldwide — to mortgage their property or borrow huge sums of money to go abroad, often leaving their loved ones behind.
Despite many predictions, migration from Nepal has not slowed in recent years, except briefly during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. About 1 million Nepalis leave every year to work at jobs outside the country. Tens of thousands go abroad to study. Far fewer return to Nepal to settle. The money ('remittances') that workers send home to their families accounts for 25% of the country's GDP, but migration impacts Nepal in many other ways. We'll be learning from migrants, experts and others about the many cultural, social, economic and political impacts of migration.
Your host is Marty Logan, a Canadian journalist who has lived in Nepal's capital Kathmandu off and on since 2005. Marty started the show in 2020 as Nepal Now.
Nepal Now: On the Move
'Migrating from Nepal is a tradition'
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If you’ve been listening to this show since we re-launched in March to focus only on migration, I think, like me, you would have started to see that there is no one type of migration story. Yes, there are two large groups of migrants — people going abroad to work and others going to study. But within those are a vast number of sub-groups, for example, people going to work because they cannot imagine any other way to earn money (and then within that group are the people who walk across the border to India because they can’t afford the cost of flying to work in another foreign country). Among those who can afford an air ticket, are Nepalis who can access enough cash only to make it to a Persian Gulf country, not Europe, and so on. I think you get my point.
Today’s guest, Prakash Gurung, has tried to migrate both to study and to work. And he’s certainly not alone in doing that. But from what I understand after our chat, and re-listening as I was editing it this week, he might belong to another sub-group: people who could earn enough money to get by in the capital Kathmandu if they found a job, but who think they could do better working overseas, even if it means doing the same work.
When we talked a few months ago at the Himal Media studio in Patan Dhoka, Prakash told me that since he finished ‘plus-2’ – what might be called grades 11 and 12 in other countries – he has tried to get a study visa for the US and when that failed, working visas for Croatia and the Netherlands. None of those came through either, and he was working as a driver for the ride-sharing app Pathao when we met. Doing his plus-2, Prakash focused on hospitality so I mentioned the large number of 5-star hotels that are sprouting in Kathmandu. Prakash said he would definitely be willing to work in one of them, but even if he did manage to get a job, he would probably keep seeking an overseas opportunity, because the pay would be better.
But then later in our chat he stated that before going abroad, Nepalis should try first to find an opportunity at home. I remember thinking that sounded contradictory, but on second thought it might simply be a reflection of how complicated a migration journey can be.
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Music by audionautix.com.
Thank you to Himal Media in Patan Dhoka for the use of their studio.
