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We Are Usually Wrong

The police and the media should stop harassing the former prince and stop acting like a pack of hyenas that want to boss a wandering lion that has lost his brothers and is alone in the savannas of Africa. Lions themselves are social animals when among lions and we all know that the hyenas practice nepotism in their social groups. You can prove me wrong if you can present new scientific reports about lions and hyenas.
By Sijan Sharma

The police and the media should stop harassing the former prince and stop acting like a pack of hyenas that want to boss a wandering lion that has lost his brothers and is alone in the savannas of Africa. Lions themselves are social animals when among lions and we all know that the hyenas practice nepotism in their social groups. You can prove me wrong if you can present new scientific reports about lions and hyenas.


They say, Change is a constant phenomenon. They also say that those who do not adapt to the circumstances die out. So, change and the direction of change are very important for our long-term survival. Also, if we want our future generations to remember us, or to at least carry our essence, we should provide them the conditions and the environment whereby they’ll have the freedom to choose what they want. And at the same time there must be a path back to the start if they felt they have made a mistake by taking a certain path. So, in a language that everybody can understand, I will try to explain what has gone wrong. To accommodate as many people’s views as possible, I will make use of popular sentiments, political references and utilize historical evidence to support my ideas.


“Please open your eyes, try to realize, I found out today, we’re going wrong.” Clapton is my favorite guitar player and I enjoy him best with Cream, just like you enjoy your coffee. And there was the singer in the band singing about something that went wrong during a time of the greatest liberties in the western world in the past century. It tells us that even in the best of times, one can do great wrongs and that it can affect the future in a bad way if it is left unchecked. From a political standpoint, we are seeing some of the most lucid times in the history of our country. But if we fail to use our lessons from the past, we could end up miserable, lose ourselves and end up being consumed by the forces and influences of the wider world.


Look at what has happened to the country in recent decades, and if you believe that the relief that you are currently feeling will last forever without any of us having to do any real work on ourselves, you’d be failing to prepare for the future. Our country has essentially disappeared over the past few decades. Global powers and cultures that dominate our psyche, also govern how others in the world view us. Our culture and values, the only thing unique to us, which is the only medium that can help us retain our identity and still earn respect from others, have significantly diminished domestically as we had to integrate other values into our system so that we could live harmoniously with others as a nation. There is nothing wrong in adopting the values that others have developed, because other nations have had experiences and learned things in their own ways, and we’d have developed the same values if we were in their position.


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But we should also be offering something in return.


You know, while I was still a schoolboy, I once asked my teacher of Economics - “Why is it that leaders fail to develop the country despite the fact that underneath the surface of the politics and everything, they too are people like you and I who would be happy to see the country develop?” He said, maybe not everyone thinks like you. But the fact is, everybody does think a little like me. We all want our country to develop and are eager to help as much as we can. We all want equality and equal opportunities for all. We all want the rule of law and peace of mind. We all grew up learning and retaining these values. But good intention alone isn’t going to be sufficient. Maybe we need to take a better look at ourselves and dive into our history to find out where it went wrong or what we can do to not let that thing repeat itself again.


When I decided that I should dive into our history and see if I can come up with some insight, I found that the Lichchhavi period in Nepal might have been one of the more glorious periods, since it is referred to as the golden period in Nepal’s history. So, I decided to dig in deeper to see if I could identify anything that could unlock the key to economic, social, cultural, and political achievements. There wasn’t much written anywhere about the kind of sentiment that people held back then, which might have helped them. But I wasn’t ready to give up and decided to shovel up the dirt that has gathered from digging history out of its grave. I had to find the gold that was buried with history. But I found no evidence of the glittering metal in the dirt. However, as I felt that I was done with the madness and picked up a Buddhist pendant necklace I had found among the dirt. I decided to cover the evidence of my madness and put history’s bones back into the hole I had dug and covered it up with the dirt before I left.


Maybe we should all take the time to think and reflect. And maybe we will find some answers. You are not going to be happy if our dreams fail, just like those of the previous generation have. And you probably won’t make any money if you sang about having to watch history repeating itself time after time, since Ozzy already has the singing rights. And it's better to drink coffee in a café where you can chat with men. And when you do, they better have something interesting to tell you rather than them being bugged about the lawlessness and how it affects prospects for the future.


I usually go to a café to eat something, and coffee is okay but not something I personally love. Anyway, as I sat in Black Forest, a café in town, and I sat outside where I could smoke, I reached for the pendant necklace that I had dug up earlier. I was getting a bit anxious and decided to try self-hypnosis by making just my eyeballs follow its movements as I swing the locket from side to side. Self-hypnosis doesn’t work because you must remain conscious to keep the locket swinging before it loses the momentum and comes to a half. The only way self-hypnosis works is if you replace the locket in your palm with a glass of alcohol. But I had found the Buddhist pendant locket in the dirt. I had not found some fancy old bottle of rum. I did not find a Jar of whisky in the dirt when I dug into what evidence was left of Nepal’s antiquity. Instead, I found out that Lichchhavi rulers were quite busy spreading Siddhartha’s message. I learned that piety was a norm that the citizens accepted. And perhaps for this very reason, there was always a great level of religious tolerance during the Lichchhavi rule. And that the Nepali people had lived in harmony because of their pious resolve - the tolerance that Siddhartha preached about. This harmony made them capable of co-operating within society to overcome social problems and uproot rudimentary beliefs. But weren’t they much different times? I mean we are modern. And the Buddha himself had said that one should live in the present. So, how can we solve our issues through leading a pious way of life? Is it possible to solve social problems by being more tolerant of people with different views than ours? And our trade relations with other countries, political and diplomatic ties with foreign states, although disreputable, is already spread further and wider than in the Lichchhavi period…isn’t it?


See…I am not a fortune teller or a religious man. I am just someone who smokes a few cigarettes everyday and sits in his room either typing on his laptop or playing his guitar. You better not take my word for it, but I think our leaders should get busy improving foreign relations, preserving culture, helping improve the relationships with our trade partners and making us more respectable among people in other countries. Maybe we should restore monarchy, maybe we shouldn’t - I don’t know and don’t care. But I do believe that the former king himself should get busy protecting our unique culture and interacting with other foreign agencies instead of flexing his political influence on the streets through rallies. And the police and the media should stop harassing the former prince and stop acting like a pack of hyenas that want to boss a wandering lion that has lost his brothers and is alone in the savannas of Africa. Lions themselves are social animals when among lions and we all know that the hyenas practice nepotism in their social groups. You can prove me wrong if you can present new scientific reports about lions and hyenas. But from what scientists have so far reported, I am not wrong. I don’t hate hyenas. I just feel bad for the cubs that are born to mothers that are in the lower order of a hyena’s social groups. I also feel bad for hyenas’ cubs that are either younger or weaker than their siblings. And worst off are those cubs that are the youngest cubs born to a hyena mother of the lowest status in a clan. These mothers disappear, because they must travel great distances in search of means to produce milk and provide meat to feed their cubs. And the cubs eventually die. In our society, these cubs would be preyed upon by criminals to carry out their dangerous work. The female cubs, if it were human, would become a prostitute after being raped quite a few numbers of times and being given drugs or alcohol which they get addicted to.


Anyway, piety should be the norm. We should accept some internationally-held values. Acceptance occurs naturally when we ourselves have a few things of our own to offer. Fair exchange of trade and culture will follow if we improve relations. The former King is smarter than you or I are and can represent us, our sentiments, and values, internationally. And sometimes, even the poorer hyenas could use the powers of a strong lion, which can kill a huge buffalo, and no member of the scavenging hyena clan will have to go hungry. Oh! My food order has arrived. So, if you come to my town, you know where to drink coffee. But they still don’t serve them with Cream. I’m sitting on top of the world, checking out the guitar tones Clapton uses on this song. I think it’s a 59 Gibson Les Paul. Anyway, whether coffee or Clapton, you can never go wrong if you are mixing in the cream. 


 

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