Collegiate Times

It never occurred to me that life could be much better than this.

I never had a chance to think about the way I lived. Sure, I went to the rural sides of my country a few times each year. My uncle actually lived in a small town, right off the Kathmandu valley, in a joint family with another uncle.

Every time I went to visit, I used to go visit the paddy fields and village areas with my cousin and his friends. I was always amused by how many logs a little girl could carry on her head from the forest to her house for fuel. I was mesmerized by how women walked miles to get gallons of drinking water.

While we dreaded going to school, boys in this countryside walked to a different village and back each day joyfully to attend school.

So new to my lifestyle, I just stood there like a tourist and actually enjoyed their day-to-day struggle. Even to them it had become a part of life.

So this is it.

I had encountered the day-to-day life of both sides, rich and poor, but it never occurred to me how bad the situation was until I learned of the Holocaust. Finally, I realized the true meaning of a Third World country.

After thinking about these occurrences throughout my life, it really came down to one thing. While the first and second world countries are competing in global markets or the space race, Third World countries are still struggling within themselves.

While the affluent populations, as well as people who can barely survive, are sending their children abroad for further education, the less fortunate populations are working so hard, day and night, to fulfill basic necessities, that they cannot afford to send their children to school.

As younger generations further their studies, the country is left in the hands of old-fashioned, uneducated and self-oriented populations.

The Holocaust is just another example of significant information that Nepal and countries similar to it are still unaware of because of the state of the nation. In my opinion, until this ongoing social trend has changed, the world will continue to have a distinct division of the nations, and Third World countries will always be listed on the bottom.

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A version of this article appeared in the Sep 2 issue of the Collegiate Times.