I started work at BDS this week after a surprise long weekend courtesy of Monday’s bandh. For those who don’t know, a bandh is essentially a strike called by a political party (in this case the Maoists) in protest of anything and, given Nepal’s recent experiences with bandh’s, everything. During a bandh, no vehicles are allowed on the streets and all shops must remain closed. People still go to their offices but generally the day is slow since many people cannot walk to their places of work. Unfortunately I fell into this latter category, and so spent the day trying to make the time pass (this mostly means watching Star Trek).
I finally began interviews this morning with Manisha, who is the President of the Federation of Sexual and Gender Minorities in Nepal. She was very informative and discussed BDS’ work over the last 7 years in detail- both at the community level and at the policy-making level. BDS’ Program Director, Pradeep, has become my key contact at the organization, introducing me to everyone and taking me along to meetings with other NGOs, as well as with the media. We have discussed site visits to Pokhara, where BDS has a regional office, as well as the smaller offices in Patan and Bhaktapur here in the KTM Valley. There is an intern named Anthony from New York working here for the summer, so it looks like we’ll be traveling together on these site visits, which should help mitigate the difficulties I still seem to have with the transportation system in Nepal.
Everyone I have met both at BDS and through my host family has been very welcoming and generous with my many questions. I am learning more about both BDS’ work and the political history of Nepal, to which BDS’ work is integrally tied. What I find most interesting about this organization is the bridge that it forms between community-based outreach and national level policy-making. Much of what BDS does is conducting national programs aimed at HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment, as well as awareness campaigns about LGBTI rights in Nepal. In addition to this, however, BDS is involved in high-intensity lobbying for the inclusion of LGBTI rights in the new draft Constitution of Nepal, which involves contact with a wide network of NGOs, political parties, foreign actors, media agents, and activists. All of its hard work is certainly paying off. In December 2007, the Supreme Court of Nepal passed a decision that established the rights of LGBTI individuals as equals before the law. More recently, BDS’ founding director Mr. Sunil Babu Pant (picture above) became the first openly gay man to be elected to an Asian legislator outside New Zealand and Australia. Currently Mr. Pant’s work is focusing on the inclusion of LGBTI rights in the new Constitution that is due to be passed next year. Everyone seems hopeful that full rights will be accorded in the Constitution, in large part thanks to the tireless efforts of Mr. Pant.
For now my agenda consists mainly of interviewing staff members here and getting to know how BDS works and connects with the community. Eventually I will be going on site visits, and hopefully conducting focus groups with BDS beneficiaries in this area. I am looking at places to move to so that I can be closer to the office and so save money on transportation (I still take taxis since I’m not brave enough to take the tempos on my own). This would also mean not getting stuck at home every time there’s a bandh!
That’s it for now- KTM is still hot, but hopefully the monsoon starts soon so that the temperature cools a bit. Everyone here is as miserable as me, so I know for sure that this is unusual weather. I’ll have plenty more to report once I start doing more site visits and meetings. For now, however, so far so good!
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