@Dr Kanchho:  Hah ha ha! Good one, dal bhat tarkari. Wow, that is so a daily part of my life, I don't even think of that as being Nepali.

@DevilWithin999, I don't why, but one of the things that you said stirred something in me....

One of the ways that I have changed coming to America is that I have a lot more empathy towards the non-Kathmanduites who come from other villages and towns to Kathmandu from all parts of Nepal.

In many ways, I feel that taking the journey that I have from Kathmandu to the States, I have taken the kind of journey that many Nepalis must have taken when they moved from the villages to Kathmandu. I realize that some of these people were my fore-fathers.

Living in Kathmandu, I thought I was the sh*t. I didn't go out of my way to be the sh*t. I didn't need to. All the feedback from around me told me that I was the sh*t. I lived in a decent house. My father had a decent job. We had a decent lifestyle. In comparison to the people around me our lives were better than most of the people that I saw around me. I knew that other people aspired to have many of the things that my family had. I didn't necessarily feel snobbish. But it did make me feel good. Certainly, I didn't feel the need to look down on myself in comparison to the people around me.

All that changed once I came to the States. Suddenly, I was the Nepali villager who moved to the city called America. Other people were the sh*t. And I was the one who needed to figure out how they were what they were. I aspired to be confident like them. I looked up to the jobs that they had and the lifestyles that they afforded and the circles they ran in. Looking around the wealth of America, now it was I, who had come from the village of Nepal that was realizing how much more there was to life than I thought there was. It was I who was now looking in awe at the lives of others and feeling somewhat small in comparison. It was intimidating.

Now, today, looking back at the villagers that came to Kathmandu, I have a lot more empathy towards those who came leaving their families, culture, environment to the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu that was my hometown. Now I realize why their faces got elated when talked about 'gaun jane.' Now I understand the understated excitement in their tone when someone in their village came to visit them.

I am a lot more sensitive to the difficulties they must have had to adapt in a strange town, in a strange geography. Kathmandu culture is a lot faster, a lot slicker than the villages. Here, if you can't carry yourself at a certain level of fashion and not be able to toss a few status symbols, people don't give you the time of day. For an outsider to Kathmandu culture, there is a steep learning curve of social taboos, social connections, slickery, and knowing how to wheel and deal without getting caught, that you have to master. It is all part of the game that is called Kathmandu, that those who have grown up in Kathmandu take for granted.

Coming to America, in many ways, has made me more of a Nepali than when I was in Kathmandu because today, I am no longer just a Kathmanduite from my limited economic, social class. Today, I am a lot more accepting and understanding of Nepalese who come from completely different upbringing and socio-economic status. So in that way, though I left Nepal many years ago, I feel that I have become more Nepali than when I was in Nepal.