It's possible that I am flat-out wrong about this, but the lesson I have quietly absorbed from Vijay Kumar's professional life (so far) in Nepal is this. If you 'peak' early in life in Nepal (i.e. get famous for doing something . . . anything... at a relatively young age in Nepal), and then you continue to stay and work in Nepal with the same old clapping-for-you-all-the-time people (i.e. your friends, relatives and hangars-on who have a direct interest in keeping your ego stroked), then, the chances are high that: 1) you would grow up to be someone who's highly impressed with himself, and 2) are stuck forever to remain singing your own bhajan all the time, while believing that you have an inalienable right to diss others for no reason. My limited observation: Too many really good, promising people have been 'damaged' in Nepal precisely because fame came early in their life, and then, drunk on that easy success that came their way without much of a challenge, competition and setbacks, they eventually started believing their own press releases, and started thinking how 'mahaan' they were/are. Of course, once that happened, they were (at least, to me) no longer interesting people, but egomaniacs who could only survive in Nepal, not anywhere else where brutal competition and changing market scenarios would force them out. [I find it breath-takingly puzzling that even after 20 years, Vijay Kumar, even with his jhoor and khattam questions, has little competition on TV. Chalk that up as a victory to our collective mediocrity! What's the broader remedy then? One has to work hard and sincerely at anything one does in Nepal, while reminding oneself that all the fame in Nepal actually means NOTHING, NOTHING and NOTHING for -- let's face it -- such fame comes so damn easily in this postage-stamp size of a country such as ours. Is it any wonder that, to cite one provocative example, many 'mahaan' and famous-ONLY-in Nepal sahityakars have an emotionally hard time digesting Samrat Upadhyay's literary success in the US and beyond? Ah, one lives and learns! oohi ashu