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 Watching this one-and-a-half-hour play about love, drugs and lust in the dimly-lit Kunja Theatre in Thapagaun will make you repeatedly question your fast-paced life. You may also start rethinking your early adulthood.The four actors in ‘Basu-dev’ are nearly flawless. They show you the dark underbelly of Kathmandu, where young adults feel lost in their life, distant from their families, and unaware of the consequences of their actions. They make wrong decisions all the time while follow­ing their “cool” friends.

Although advertised as “kid-friendly” on social media, it is packed with lip-locks, sexual innu­endos, sexually intimate moments and a lot of swearing. All this does not come across as weird and awk­ward as the story calls for it. The actors being cool about it all makes the play even more interesting.

The background music and light complement the set well. Though there is some awkward dancing, and towards the end, you might be look­ing at your watch, this play is still a very good package. There is tension, comedy, love and drama.

Sijal Bajracharya, 23, who had never seen a theatrical play before, says, “I really enjoyed it. It made me realize that the youth of Nepal are very talented and have a lot of potential. I had not expected much to be honest, so this play exceeded my expectations.”

Produced by Four Cube Enter­tainment Pvt. Ltd., Basu-dev is directed by Sandeep Shrestha and Nabin Bhatt. The play is at 5:30 pm every day, till September 16 (except on Wednesdays). On Saturday, there is a matinee show at 1:30 pm.

Photos by Pritam Chhetri

 SADAN ‘the five petals’ group art exhibition at the Classic Art Gallery, Imukhel offers a vibrant art experience, featuring the work of five young female artists: Sabita Dangol, Anamika Gautam, Deepma­la Maharjan, Anisha Maharjan and Namrata Singh. Madan Chitrakar, an artist and art critic, says the paintings are unique because all the artists are young and come from diverse cultural backgrounds.

“The art gallery has always aimed to empower women artists and this is an event that highlights our will­ingness to do so,” says Sarita Dan­gol, the organizer of the exhibition. According to Dangol, some paintings are available for sale as well.

The exhibition provides a fresh and diverse art experience as well as an opportunity to explore some paintings that may adorn your walls.

You can visit any day of the week between 10:00 am to 6:00 pm. The exhibit ends on September 25.

The two Eminent Persons Groups (EPGs) set up to review past India-Nepal treaties had come up with a final draft of their joint report on July 4. After this, the report was to be presented first to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and then to his Nepali counterpart KP Sharma Oli. But Modi is apparently too busy and he has thus far not given the joint EPG team the time to meet.

When Nepal had raised the prospect of submitting the report during the Indian prime minister’s recent visit to Kathmandu for the BIMSTEC summit, India had reportedly declined as it would not discuss ‘bilateral issues at the side­lines of the multilateral forum’. But then India and Nepal did discuss a host of bilateral issues at the sidelines, including cross-border railways. But, according to Bhekh Bahadur Thapa, the coordinator of the Nepali EPG, there is an alter­native explanation behind Modi’s reluctance.

“When we talk of revis­ing past Indo-Nepal trea­ties we are talking about extremely sensitive issues,” he told APEX. “Since the joint report will be made public immediately after it is presented to the respective prime ministers, perhaps the political leaderships in the two countries are taking their time to closely study the recommendations away from the prying eyes.”

He also cautions against “wild speculations on such a deli­cate issue”. His remark comes in the wake of some comments in the media that the EPG process has been a failure as India is supposedly not interested in heeding its recommenda­tions. Along with revisions in the 1950 Treaty of Peace and Friendship, for instance in the clause providing for ‘recip­rocal treatment’ of citizens of one country in the other, the EPG report also recommends a level of border management. Some analysts suspect India is not ready for these changes.

Thapa says both the Indian and Nepali political leaderships have invested a lot in the EPG process and it would be pre­mature to suggest that the process has been a failure. Also, he clarifies, the EPG members decided against submitting the report at the sidelines of BIMSTEC summit as that would have “undermined the importance of the EPG process.”

Whatever the EPG members may say, the longer the submission of the report is delayed the stronger will be the perception that the whole process has somehow been futile as India is simply not interested.

 It might not be a book you would be comfortable carrying around because of the quite blatant title, but ‘Erotic Stories for Punjabi Wid­ows’ is an important work that you will want to recommend to every­one you meet.

The novel is audacious in its effort to defy conventions and give voice to older Punjabi women since their voices are rarely, if ever, heard. Also, there are multiple storylines with elements of rom-com, mys­tery, and family saga interwoven into the mix of erotic stories and all that make for good reading for people with different types of book preferences.

Here, the protagonist Nikki is a sin­gle 22-year-old university dropout who lives in London above the pub where she works while she searches for her true calling. Then she kind of finds what she is looking for when she lands up a job as a creative writ­ing instructor at the Sikh temple in Southall, a predominantly Punjabi area of London. Unfortunately, the creative writing class turns out to be an adult literacy class instead and the students—Punjabi widows—don’t even know how to read and write basic English.

Then the women decide that since they have lived in London for so long without speaking a word of English, they would much rather use the class for something construc­tive and begin sharing their stories instead. These stories stem from their dreams and fantasies and are deliciously romantic, erotic, and sometimes even downright scan­dalous, given the community they belong to.

The women know that if the self-appointed ‘guardians’ of South­all find out their secret they will have to face unspeakable wrath but they don’t care. Having been denied the simple pleasures that come with making their own decisions as their lives have always been about what their parents or husbands deemed fit for them, the class is the only place where each woman becomes an individual in her own right and is able to truly express herself. It’s also the thrill of the absence of shame they have carried with them for so long that keeps them going.

Then there is the parallel narrative that’s about Nikki, her relationship with her traditional family as she struggles to fit in as well as escape their ways, and her romance with a boy named Jason who has his own thing going on. You will find yourself cheering for Nikki as well while you pump your fists for the women who seem to be breaking barriers and rewriting their desti­nies. This sexy and heartwarming novel will definitely find a recep­tive audience among women who will want the men in their lives to read it too.

“The continued drive for excellence is our philosophy here at Sampurna,” said Rajan Nepal, the editor of Annapurna Sam­purna, at a program at the Annapurna Media Network corporate tower on August 30. The occasion was the first anniversary of Anna­purna Sampurna, the AMN’s weekly Nepali entertainment tabloid. “We continuously seek public feedback so that our content is tailored to the taste of our valued readers,” Nepal added.

Captain Rameshwar Thapa, the AMN chairman, said prod­ucts like Sampurna that con­tinue to do really well in print suggest that “the demise of print media is greatly exagger­ated. Rest assured, the print in Nepal will be going strong even after a decade.”

Annapurna Sampurna has been able to establish itself as a market leader in the segment right from the start of its publication a year ago. The 51 issues published in this time has offered people of all age groups something to read about: it does social issues, crimes and celebrity news as much as it covers glamor and sex. “It’s a complete package and I assure everyone that we will get better and better,” Nepal said. APEX BUREAU

Teach For Nepal (TFN), a move­ment to address education inequality in Nepal, hosted a dinner event this week to acknowl­edge the banks and corporations supporting the cause. Anil Keshary Shah, TFN's Leadership council member and Nabil Bank's CEO, host­ed the event. In attendance were over 100 CEOs and executives. Also present were TFN leadership council members Rameshwor Khanal, Jagdish Bhatta­rai, Rajan Shrestha and Chairperson Reshu Aryal Dhungana. Chairing the event was Education Minister Giriraj Mani Pokharel.

TFN fellows are outstanding uni­versity graduates and young profes­sionals chosen through a highly com­petitive process. They go through an intensive residential training fol­lowed by two years of teaching fel­lowship in rural public schools. “The support of various banks and cor­porations is not only helping Teach For Nepal support students in rural Nepal. It is also helping create great citizens who will take a human-cen­tered approach to the challenges we face as a country,” said Shah.

 Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, Gail Honeyman’s debut novel, is a joy because, even though she’s an oddball, there’s something about 30-year-old Eleanor that makes you relate to her and instantly like her. Honey­man’s writing style is witty and it’s a delight to get to know Eleanor through her narration as she comes alive in the pages. No wonder while Honeyman was writing Eleanor Oli­phant is Completely Fine, it was shortlisted for the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize as a work in progress. It later won the 2018 Costa Debut Novel Award.

In the book, you will meet Elea­nor, a clerk at a graphic design office, whose existence is orderly even though completely devoid of good relationships. She works all week long and on Friday nights buys herself two bottles of cheap vodka to last her the weekend and eats pizza for dinner and doesn’t speak to anybody till Monday comes around. All this is fine with her. Her job doesn’t remotely interest her but that doesn’t matter so long it pays the bills. Her existence is unre­markable. But Eleanor also feels there’s nothing remarkable about her either, especially not when you factor in the scars that make up more than half her face.

Then Eleanor develops an obsessive teenage-style crush on a handsome and arrogant singer of a band, and she finally buys herself a mobile phone and laptop, and even opens an account on Twitter to follow and keep track of his where­abouts. She also feels the need to kind of reinvent herself if she is to grab his attention.

Also, one day, she and her col­league, Raymond, witness an old man collapse in the street. They help him and in the process Elea­nor, unwittingly, ends up forging ties with him and his entire fam­ily. There’s also the matter of her disturbing relationship with her mother whose only contact with Eleanor seems to be through once-a-week phone calls. It is all these interconnected events, and seem­ingly harmless situations, that force Eleanor to reexamine her life.

Eleanor’s experiences as a woman not used to the world yet attempting to navigate it are poignant. They teach you a thing or two about the need to understand yourself bet­ter and come to terms with your faults and cracks, and to move on. Eleanor’s voice is sharp and it cuts through the hogwash that we, as human beings, are capable of tell­ing ourselves in order to overlook our weaknesses. She will, at times, feel like a much-needed inner voice reminding you that you can turn your life around by making the right choices, no matter how difficult those choices might be.

To see what Pokhara was like before moder­nity hit the tourist town, you must turn north of Mahendra Pul and head to the old Pokhara Bazaar. Past Mahendra Pul and a number of reli­gious shops, you enter the old city of Pokhara, the old abode of Newars. There, you can get a glimpse of the authentic Pokhara. The place has plenty of old houses with carved wooden win­dows and shops that sell religious curios