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from Photographers Blog:
Man versus wild
Kathmandu, Nepal
By Navesh Chitrakar
I was on my way to cover another assignment when I got news of a leopard that had wandered into a town. Without wasting any time, I turned my motorbike around and rushed toward the scene. When I reached the area, I saw a huge crowd of people, most of them with big sticks, pieces of bamboo or farming tools, but I couldn't see a leopard anywhere.
I asked one of the men standing near me and he pointed to the bush and said that was where the leopard was hiding. At that point, a policeman with a gun entered the bush and climbed up a small tree. I heard a big bang as he let off six rounds of gunfire - the sound was really loud. Was the leopard dead? Was it going to come out?
The gun had been fired to scare the animal and make it emerge from its hiding place, but the plan didn’t work. Up until that point, there had been no trace of the beast, only people making fun of it, shouting, looking toward the bush and cracking jokes. The policeman walked out of the undergrowth with his gun.
After a while, all of a sudden I heard a big roar and there it was: a big leopard darting like the wind out into the open.
from Full Focus:
Imaging religion: Navesh Chitrakar
Nepal-based photographer Navesh Chitrakar documents almost all the country's religious festivals. In this interview, Navesh discusses the art of photography and reflects on the state of the nation's festivals.
from Why Nations Fail:
Caste and coercion in Nepal
Slavery in Nepal was abolished only in 1921. Corvée, forced labor, was made illegal in 1952, but survived. It was only in 2000 that various sorts of coerced and bonded labor finally disappeared.
As late as the early 1990s in the Western parts of Terai, the lowland forest area of Nepal which borders India, many rural people were forced to work 30 to 35 days a year in unpaid labor services. The most important institution in this region was that of Kamaiya labor. Kamaiya was a particular type of servile labor relation where superficially workers and landlords freely entered into contractual relations during the festival of Maghesakranti (first day of the Magha month of the Nepali calendar), which starts on January 14. In practice, the majority of the workers were in debt to various masters, and debts are passed between generations with landlords buying and selling Kamaiya, a situation akin to chattel slavery. In 1992 a government report estimated that there were still about 20,000 Kamaiya households, possibly 116,000 adults and children. The report found that on the average, a Kamaiya worked about 13 hours a day and a male adult worker might receive a daily income of only around 11 Rupees, about 14 US cents. Using the legal minimum wage of 60 rupees for eight-hour work per day, such a worker ought to be getting 102 Rupees for the 13-hour work, about US$1.29, not exactly a fortune but better than 14 cents. Other research by the International Labour Organization using data from Banke district suggests much longer work hours, with a working day for men of as much as 17 hours a day during the heyday of the Kamaiya system.
from Why Nations Fail:
Who’s afraid of economic development?
Surely even the most kleptocratic dictator would be in favor of economic development. Economic development means greater income, greater taxes and more stuff to grab, so what’s not to like about it? But actually, it often doesn’t work that way.
In the early 1980s in Takasera, a village in Rukum District in western Nepal, a group of locals decided to begin a development project and bought a Swiss-made water mill which would power machinery such as a press to make oil and a saw mill. The community sent a group of men to Kathmandu who learned how to dismantle the machinery and then put it back together again. The machinery was brought back and successfully put into operation. In 1984, a government official wrote saying that in autonomously undertaking this project the community had “usurped the role of the king” and the mill would have to be shut down. When the locals refused, the police was sent to destroy the mill. The mill was only saved because the villagers were able to ambush and disarm the police.
from Photographers Blog:
Two sides of a living God
By Navesh Chitrakar
Born and raised in Kathmandu's Newar community I am familiar with Lord Ganesh. His elephant head attached to a human body makes him easy to identify. Ganesh is honored at the beginning of rituals and ceremonies as we celebrate religious festivals.
This month, I had the opportunity to take pictures of Living God Ganesh after I asked one of my friends who was close to the living god's family. I was pleased and surprised that the family was willing to accept me since they don’t normally allow pictures to be taken.
from Photographers Blog:
A window seat to Everest
By Tim Chong
I was covering the Singapore F1 Grand Prix over the weekend.
Sunday was race day and as usual I woke up a bit early to check the news. I saw on my twitter feed that a plane carrying tourists to see the Himalayan range and Mount Everest had crashed in Nepal.
I was on a similar flight a year ago myself and the tragedy felt especially personal because of its proximity.
from Russell Boyce:
Asia – A week in pictures 14 August 2011
This week Pakistan marked its day of independence from British rule with parades, parties, face painting and bombs. Two pictures of faces covered in colour, one paint, the other blood, seems to sum up all there needs to be said about the national pride Pakistan feels while facing so many challenges. Visually the complementary colours of green and red (colours on opposite sides of the colour spectrum) make the pictures jump out of the page especially when put side by side. The angry eye staring out of the face of green in Mohsin Raza's picture engages the viewer full on while in Amir Hussain's picture the man seems oblivious of his wound as blood covers his face, again more opposites, this time not in colour but mood. India too is preparing to celebrate its independence and Dehli-based photographer Parivartan Sharma's picture of festival preparations came to mind after I put together the red-and-green combination picture from Pakistan.
(top left) A man, with his face painted depicting the colours of the Pakistan national flag, attends a ceremony to mark the country's Independence Day at the Wagah border crossing with India on the outskirts of Lahore August 14, 2011. Pakistan gained independence from British rule in 1947. REUTERS/Mohsin Raza
from Russell Boyce:
Asia – A week in Pictures 24 July 2011
China are hosting the 14th FINA World Championships in Shanghai. In my mind's eye, aquatics is a sport of power, grace, balance and beauty but our pictures seem to add the additional factors of concentration, determination or maybe sheer fear. Against my better judgement, I just have to mention that some of the expressions on the athletes' faces remind me of the age old tradition of gurning. What also made an impression are the angles, different points of focus and continually new shapes that compliment a file that could have been very repetitive. 
Qin Kai of China perform during the preliminary round of the men's 3m springboard diving event at the 14th FINA World Championships in Shanghai July 21, 2011. REUTERS/Bobby Yip
from Russell Boyce:
Asia – A week in pictures July 10, 2011
I am not a gamer at all but while looking at the file this week was reminded of a facility on electronic gaming my son showed me that allows you to see a different view point of the action. You can have wide, close and closer still. Two pictures of police beating protesters with batons have been shot as close as you can possibly get to the action but for sure this is no game. Philippines based Romeo (Bobby) Ranoco picture is actually so close that it has been shot over the shoulder of the soldier, who, judging by the blood on the head of the unarmed protester, seems to have scored at least one direct hit . In India and shot just slightly wider is Jayanta Dey's picture. The fact that it is shot slightly wider makes sure we are aware that it is actually three soldiers beating a protester and not one. The line of composition created by the baton and the flexed arm creating a perfect compositional triangle - Although I am not sure the protester would actually care about that.
An anti-riot policeman hits a protester with a baton at a rally against what protesters claim to be U.S. intervention outside the U.S. embassy in Manila July 4, 2011. Filipino and U.S. troops are holding exercises in the Sulu Sea off the western Philippine province of Palawan, which lies near the disputed Spratly Islands. Conflicting territorial claims by several countries over the Spratlys and Paracels are raising tensions in Asia. Besides the Philippines, China, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei are claiming the islands as theirs. REUTERS/Romeo Ranoco
from FaithWorld:
China plans to help Nepal develop Buddha’s birthplace at Lumbini
(A reclining Buddha at Wat Po temple in Bangkok April 8,2008/Sukree Sukplang)
A Chinese-backed foundation and Nepal's government plan to transform Lord Buddha's birthplace in southern Nepal into a magnet for Buddhists in the same way as Mecca is to Muslims and the Vatican for Catholics. The Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation plans to raise $3 billion at home and abroad to build temples, an airport, a highway, hotels, convention centres and a Buddhist university in the town of Lumbini, about 171 km (107 miles) southwest of Nepal's capital Kathmandu.
The foundation, blessed by the Chinese government, signed a memorandum of understanding with the Nepalese government last month to jointly develop and operate Lumbini, where Buddha was born Prince Gautama Siddhartha about 2,600 years ago. The foundation also pledged to bring communications, water and electricity to Lumbini.
