What I think about Talakjung vs Tulke

Talakjung vs Tulke, directed by Nishcal Basnet, the Director of super hit 2012 Nepali movie “Loot”  is dark comedy. The movie is set in a village of the  protagonist, who is a commoner, a sort of  innocent idiot who constantly fools around with the villages and gets in trouble a lot. The movie starts with early funny scene’s and a gradual buildup of the  plot as well the cast.

Talakjung aka Tulke, played by Khagendra Lamichhane, who was previously supposed to be from well to do family having being stripped of his land and wealth by the chieftain he now lives as commoner doing any work he gets his hands on and fighting with almost everyone in the village with few of the friends from his circle. Tulke, who hates being called Tulke has a cursh on Fuli, played by Richa Sharma. For the first half an hour the movie revolves around the life of protagonist, the first half of the movie is pretty funny , the story line starts when one of the Contractors who’s working on brining the roads to the village is kidnapped by rebels.  Slowly the darker side of the comedy is built up when an insurgency starts hitting the village. Talks about a revolutionaries taking over the village is on the rise, when Tulke finds out that one of his close friends in joining the force as well, he gets interested in it as well and starts talking about it with everyone. After hearing about the revolution going around the village the chieftain is scared that he might be over thrown, then he tricks Tulke into telling him about the revolutionaries. Fuli, who works for the Chieftain, tricks him and then sets him up for an attempted rape on her which leads to exile of Tulke from the village. Tulke then runs away from the village and goes to the city, meets a small time criminal and then starts his criminal life by robbing people around the city using a fake political party’s letterhead. His glory days are short lived as his leader is shot dead in police encounter. By chance he escape the encounter and leaves the city with five hundred thousand rupees that he took form a shopkeeper.  When tulke returns to the village, the village has changed.  His friend, Hanuman is dead, all of his friends are missing. Rebels are running around the village in almost full control of it. Tulke learns about the real story behind the death of his friend Hanuman. The story takes a different turn after that.

As for the end of the movie, I better no spoil it for you guys!

The first half is pretty good, with lots of funny scenes and dialogues. The second half of the movie, takes a different turn and most of the small parts shown in the movie is completely out of context or not related to the rest of the movie. The director has tried to incorporate different aspect of a commoners life and the state of insurgency. The movie is good direction wise and with a very good Cinematography, but lacks a clear theme or a story. The part where tulke goes to the city has no effect on the move whatsoever, as supposed by any audience, it was supposed to show over growth of Tulke’s strength or behavior but he returns as the same guy, without any effective change on the movie plot.  Even the name of the movies doesn’t seem appropriate as the per the plot.

A river, a bridge a climb and a flat road

A river, a bridge a climb and a flat road

Almost 5000 meters high, tried and panting like a dog, sweating like a pig, on an endless trail, almost as if the road would never end. I’m used to it, I mean I've done this many times, well not this trail but different other trails. But why is it that this one is testing my endurance, testing my limit. I’m fine, not tired at all and fit and fine, just heavy breathing. That’s why I’m trying to equalize it with slow walking, but the further I go, the farther it looks. The road/trail never seem to end, I never had such low will power to climb anything, it was plain torture, 3 hours of plain torture. May be it was because of careless walking for the 4 days before that and taking a challenge of doing a 2 days walk on a single day but I had its toll. As l lay down a cold stone on a landscape which seems far more a dream than reality, the lack of will stopped me to take my camera out and take a photo of it. I looked down, as down as I could see, almost 2000 meters below us was road that we took, where we were 2 days ago.  I glanced as far as I could see may be in a hope of seeing every road that we had walked which reminded me of how I ended up in one of the remotest part from one of the most Urbanized.

Back in Kathmandu

I was planning a trip for a very long time, specifically Annapurna Circuit Trek. Always been a dream to travel to Tilicho lake and cross the Thorang La. Out of no where a great opportunity hit me and then I had a chance to go there, as a part of my work. Going alone, though not hard would have been tiring as per my work so I took a friend with me, at least I thought there would be two of us. But  2 days before the trip I learned that a friend of mine from Peru had friend who was visiting Nepal. So we met with him and told him that we were doing the ACAP circuit trek and he crazy enough to say that he’d join us. I guess he thought it was an easy trek, which it was, well most of it. We arranged his permit, and parted and decided to meet at the bus park next morning! So we did and learned that he brought another friend, who was France. So it was four of us, taking on the challenge of Tilicho and Thorang La Pass. We took a micro bus to Beshisahar, which was supposed to take 5-6 hours, but it took us around 7-8 hours to reach Besisahar and after that it was a crazy crazy road on a jeep up to a small village called Chyaamche. We met 3 beautiful girls on the jeep one was gorgeous, and they didn't have a guide with them so they decided to join our crew as well, so we ended up at the same hotel that day and decided to start walking at 7, together, the all of us, at least we did that for 2 hours may be? Quoting one of those girls “ You guys are too fast for us”. In fact I asked them to join us up to the Tilicho lake, which they weren't doing, but if I had convinced them to walk up to the Lake, I swear they would have killed me there!

The trail is pretty easy as a whole, but we had to take a different road because of massive landslide, so we took a trekking trail which was better but came with a price, the price being plenty of leeches. Which we realized 2 hours or so after getting bitten.  The trail pretty awesome, as we walk beside the River Marsyangdhi, cross few suspension bridges. The first days walk was pretty awesome, everyone was fresh and fit enough. The highlight of the first day’s trip has to be the Daal Bhaat. I convinced my friend from Peru that Daal Bhaat is the best food ever, and asked him to have a Daal bhaat as well. Little did we know that the daal bhaat we were about to have was the second worst daal bhaat I ever had in my life, the first one has to be the one I had in Kalinchowk. We were crazy hungry as we had walked for almost 5 hours on just light breakfast. And the guy took about one hour and half to cook it and there was nothing other dhan plain rice, daal and few potatoes, yes just few there wasn't even a refill and the potatoes were as salty as anything ever could be. He was pretty mad at me for that! But it was just a bad luck that we had the food at the wrong place!

The thing is, the road to Manang is quite  easy comparatively with other trails, such as Gosaikunda or Langtang. The road is almost flat, but the funny thing is, where ever you stop, I mean the end of the days walk, when you’re about and hour away from the stop there’s a climb. So that means you walk on a flat road for 5 6 hours, which you think is easy and you walk fast and after you're all tired and beaten up you have to climb. I could sense the tiredness in every one so I had to lie to them about how the trail ahead of us is. So I just told them, to motivate them to walk that there’s a river few minutes ahead of us and a bridge and a climb and we meet the road and its done. And the funny thing is, there’s always a river, a bridge and a climb and we meet a road. That was the theme for most of the trip, and its always five minutes to go. But finally we reached out destination after crossing the river, climbing for 5 minutes which took about 45 minutes may be, and then we met road.

The next day’s walk was similar, walking along a flat road for 5-6 hours and then when were near the stop climbing for another 30 minutes which again had a bridge, a river, a climb and we met the road. But then we did what Robert Frost does, we took the road less traveled by, it was a crazy climb but it was fun. The next day’s trek was supposed to be good one because so far, all we saw was hills and rivers, no sighting of the mountains, but at then end of the 3^rd day we were walking in Himalayan territory having crossed trans Himalayan boundary.

Manang- unliked Mustang, Manang is pretty green and awesome, I'm not saying Mustang is not good, Mustang is heaven, but Manang is different!! Both places are equally amazing but unique as well. The landscape are different and so is the culture and everything, though bordering with each other they’re just two different dimensions. The road to Manang , after Pisang is the best one, it’s a flat road for may be 3 4 hours until you reach Manang, it all depends upon how fast you can walk. And if black pitched, the road to Manang would look similar to any roads on Terai highway.

After reaching Manang, we had our lunch and started walking up to the Tilicho lake, well to the place where we would reach before trekking to the lake.  I was working along the trail, watching birds and any other animals that could be seen.  On the way to a place called Khangsaar, I found a new species, to my list that is, and I was taking a photo but it flew away few hundred meters below me. So I looking down hoping to see it again and then get a good photo, I started waking looking below and out of no where I tripped on this huge stone and fell down in the direction of the slope that was way over than 1000 meters drop. I don’t know how but I was able to get back to my feet, somehow, I had blacked out for a second there and thought that I was going to die! I took a photo of that place to remind me that I didn't fall there! The walk after that was pretty crazy, crazy in terms that we had to climb and climb and again there was river, a bridge a climb but sadly there were no road, just a small trail where barely two people can fit.  

We were walking pretty fast for the 3 days before we did the Tilicho lake, had walked for about 7 8 hours every day. We had skipped a day and reached there before a day. Furthermore we decided to go to the Lake and come back down to the place where were resting, that was doable, because we did it, but it was hard, meant walking all day long.  But we took the challenge and did it, which turned out to be a little pain in the back. We started early in the morning, had breakfast, took some Rotis with us and then the journey to Tilicho began. The first few hours of walk was a normal one, till we reached the Landslide area where the fun began!

The road to Tilicho, at least the landslide are, its crazy!! It’s a slope with a landslide, where small stones keep on falling regularly, and may with 1000 meters drop below, not sure about it being a 1000 meters but is pretty high.  We saw some blue sheeps high up in the hills as well. We were having lots of fun, at least till then. After we reached the Tilicho Base Camp, the torture began. For the first climb it was easy just a small climb, but then after that it was just climbing up and up. To be honest its not that hard, but since we did the trek from a stop way before the Base Camp and had walked almost 3 hours before doing that climb it turned out to be a tough one. If you start from the base camp the climb may not be that hard. It will be hard but not that hard! Thus the climb was torture, as for the altitude sickness we didn't feel anything at all, apart from heaving breathing, which happens even if you rest in that altitude.

I took a rest on stone and looked back the place where we came from, which all of you know already. I looked back and remembered all that Ive written above, and as I looked up, my friends were way ahead of me and I had to walk to the top that crazy Jig-Zag trail. I just took all the short cut there was to meet with them. Then finally we reached a place which said, Tilicho Lake 35 minutes! Finally I was motivated enough to walk fast to the lake, and every torture and pain we felt while walking up to the lake was washed away with a single glance of the lake as if the water passed through our bodies and cleansed us from the suffering! The view there was worth every single step and would have been worth it if there more climbing to it. The blue color of the lake shines on a background of white clouds and looks as if there’s no end to it, or as if the sky and the lake meet at that very spot. The lake sits silently below huge mountains . Its seriously beyond me to describe how it exaclty feels to be there!! I was speechless for a moment there, and breathless too as the point from where we can see the lake is at around 5020 meters. 

To be continued !!

Langtang: A brief Wildlife watch

Langtang National Park, one of the most trekked destination in Nepal. Langtang Himalayan range is shortest distance from Kathmandu for any Himalayan trekking destination. The trek starts at Syafrubesi, or you can alternately start from Dhunche to trek up to Thulo Syafru then down to Bamboo.

The easiest way to reach Syafru is to get a bus from Machchhaa Pokhari Balaju. You might want to book the tickets a day ahead as there are few buses and lots of people travelling daily. Syafrubesi is a small town with plenty of hotels, many more under construction and the resting place for the first day's travel. Next day the trek starts from Syafru as you cross Kerung River and then join Langtang river basin on the right side as you walk below the rocky cliff, the trail is awesome!

We started off with Breakfast at small bakery right after crossing the bridge in the old part of Syafrubesi. Good place to have tea and breads at a normal price. After that there's no normal price. The trail is pretty easy for about an hour just plain and slightly up and down with zig-zag terrain.After you reach Domen, then the trail goes up hill gradually gaining height. Up to domen, you the common  birds, Sparrows, Crows, Bulbuls, Mynas. After domen you reach Pairo (Landslide -  Pairo in Nepali). The place is named so because there's a massive landside on the right side blocking the flow of Lantang river on the left side of your trail. Wildlife wise you can see Assamese Macaque's, cliff or rock bees colonizing on the debris of landslide. After passing through landslide the  trail continues in is regular fashion until you reach Bamboo which is a beautiful place. You can see Himalayan Langurs, Assamese Macaque's lots of birds species , Fly catchers, Bulbuls, White tailed Ruby throat, Thrushes, warblers. The most tiresome walk of the whole trek lies few hours after bamboo, the hill of Rimche (I found a beautiful Snake in the hill of Rimche)  it manages to depress lots of people. After climbing Rimche hill then the trail is pretty easy and you drop down few hundred meters and reach the days pit stop, but if you can walk fast then you can reach Langtang in a day but it might be hard but not impossible.

The first days rest is at Lama hotel, with plenty of places to stay. You can see Snow Pigeons apart from above mentioned birds and 5 species that I couldn't identify. The next morning, as we left Lama hotel climbing up the hill for sometime then dropping down right into the Langtang river and then climbing up again, and mostly the first day of trek is right through the forest with just  a view of Langtang river on the left or right which changes after Rimche to left there's nothing much to see but the second day's trek show's you the glimpse of Langtang Lirung which give you energy to walk fast.The next destination is beautiful place called riverside, few small tea houses on the bank of Langtang river, after crossing Riverside, you see lots of Squirrels up to Ghodatabela, we did see Pika  in between as well. There are lots of Squirrels, saw Whistling thrush. Ecologically, as you pass ghodatabela  you see a clear distinction on the two slopes, South facing with small trees and less vegetation and North facing with plenty of Pines. I saw Barking deer around ghodatabela, its a good spot to look for Barking deer. You can see Yellow billed Chough and Red billed chough, saw few yellow billed blue magpie. The trail is beautiful, best trails start from there, and as you climb up a small hill and reach Thyangsyaap you start to see the Langtang valley up ahead in the distance, but its not that close at it looks. Langtang valley has lots of hotels, plenty of places to stay, but a quick suggestion for Nepali travelers, if you're travelling in group then pre booking might help because, they dont give Nepali's room if there are few groups of foreigners living in the hotel, as they say "Nepali halla garchhan bideshi risaauchha - Nepali's make noises and the foreigners get irritated".

In the valley, if you look towards the North, you'll see plenty of himalayan Tahr grazing, flocks and flocks of Snow Pigeons, lots of yellow billed and red billed chough's and if you wake up early in the morning and climb one the small hills you will see the national bird of Nepal - Dhanphe (Lophophorus), I did see the Lammergeier vulture in Langtang valley. As you start the trek to Kyanjin valley early in the morning you might see the Lophophorus, and Pika's. Half way through the trek to Kyanjin I saw a Snipe, and lots of small birds that I couldn't recognize. Kyanjin valley is one of the best places I've ever been to, its almost a cup shaped area with the valley in the middle of the cup and if you're there in post winter season, it looks as though you're surrounded by mountains the whole 360 degrees. Kyanjin has to be one of the best places I've ever been to.  Even at the top of Kyanjin Ri which is almost 4900 meters I saw yellow billed chough. Plus you get to see few glaciers as well. The walk is so worth it. I'd highly recommend you all to do the trek plus stop in the destination I mentioned and look for the signs of Wildlife.

+ If you're lucky you might see Snow Leopards, Red Panda's Musk Deers!! I've added photos of few animals I saw during the trip! Langtang is famous for wildlife experience and it wont disappoint you! You'll see plenty of Birds and Wildlife!! Enjoy!

Take nothing but pictures
Kill nothing but time,
Leave nothing but footprints

                                                              Himalayan Langur

                                                                          Kyanjin

                                                                  Yellow billed blue magpie

                                                                  View from half way to Kyanjin ri

A short Itinerary :

First day : Kathmandu to Syafrubesi : About 7 hours
Second day : Syafrubesi to Lama hotel : About 5-6 hours
Third day : Lama hotel to Langtang : 5 hours , you can reach Kyanjin the same day or you can stay in Langtang but its better to walk 2 more hours to reach Kyanjin and stay there!

If anyone of you are wondering how much will cost then, the maximum rate for Daal Bhaat was 350, but depends upon your bargaining skills and rooms doesn't cost much. Tea cost a lot if you get a single cup so if you're a group then its better to get a whole thermos that way its cheaper.  

Leopard conflict : A question to conversational ethics

I’ve read an article of Conservational practice in Nepal, I don’t remember the exact title but it expressed Nepal as being a frontier in Conservation Management. To some extent it was logical, but with the recent event of Leopard conflict in Kapan, it brought to my mind that every animal apart from Tigers, Rhino’s or Snow Leopards are neglected. I bumped into the video shot by the locals of Kapan, and there was this guy, who, as I’ve read in the news must be from the Ministry of Forest. He has the Leopard completely in control, he’s hurt and there’s blood all over the floor, but the leopard was under control and he was holding it. And there’s another guy holding a dart gun right next to him! But still, instead of Tranquilizing the leopard when he is under control the first thing they do is try to kill it. Why is it so easy to Kill a leopard? Because it doesn’t fall under as exotic species as Tigers and Rhinos? Or because it doesn’t have any role in Ecosytem? The food chain? I would have understood if they’d said that it was out of control and attacking humans and all, but then it wasn’t. The leopard must have made into the city during the night time, if it really wanted to kill humans; I think it would have already killed few people. 

And this happens almost every year! If this was one time incident I would have understood. But almost every year a Leopard is killed inside the valley! We do know that international agencies pump in huge amount of fund for conservational work. Does conservational work involve only lecturing people in five star hotels or branding it? Why can’t that sum of money be used to train student from the same field, to use the dart guns, and circulate their phone numbers among different media’s or even involve the police department? Provide them with necessary training; give them an authority to dart the animal! I read somewhere that the incident with the leopard happened somewhere around 6 into morning and the officials were there around 10:30. Why is there a huge negligence when it comes to Leopards? I don’t think there’s an actual data on the population of Leopards in Kathmandu valley. Just because they are frequent visitors in the valley doesn’t mean they are common! They might be very few, and if we really kill every leopard that comes into the city, and the reason for killing them is, if we don’t they might come again then why not just wipe their population out for good? That way there won’t be any conflict! Leopards are equally important as tigers are! And the most disturbing thing is they actually parade the dead Leopard like they won’t the world cup! You can see photos of people carrying around the Leopard like a prize. They have as equal right in this Earth as every human. And just because we are somewhat superior to them doesn’t mean we have right to kill them at will.

 Is that what intelligence and superiority mean? We marched into their homes, destroyed their habitat and then we blame them for coming in to our “homes?” it’s us who walked into their homes! We; who killed their habitat, the reason they are driven into the city is us! And we feel so superior about killing a Leopard from a long range with a gun, and then prove our worthiness by parading a dead animal? Is that what conservation is? Just because the Leopard doesn’t bring in hundreds and thousands of Tourist’s to our country every mean that it’s not important to the ecosystem? If this was the first case, may be I’d fine because things might have gone out of control if it wasn’t “Shot dead” but this happens every time a Leopard comes into the city. Where’s the conservation then? I don’t think conservation means just talking about the efforts to save the animals when Leopards are getting killed every year! And if the government is not fine about giving the authority of darting to the local people or students why can’t they train the Police officer for those particular situations? Why can’t they train them at the academy and separate a batch for wildlife conservation and wildlife trade related division? Or why can’t the ministry make such effort to join hands with the police department to train them. Should be not think about this? Or should we just kill every Leopard that comes into the city? I don’t really know what’s lacking here, a proper management or trained officials. I do understand the local citizen’s fear of having a Leopard in their house, isn’t there any way to work this out? 

We do have enough forest, mostly trees and still people wonder why do the Leopards come into the city? Well, first thing first they don’t eat trees, and the next thing is, whatever the feed on don’t feed on trees. May be, instead of just planting trees continuously, we must look in to a better alternative and plant those plants which a deer can feed on and then maintain a good habitat for Deer’s, only then will the Leopard stop coming into the city. We’ve all got to eat don’t we? And hunger is what drives the Leopard’s into the city, so should we kill them in our homes or make a sustainable place inside their home to feed them? 

Photo source (Google images) 

Being a Zoologist

The question I get a lot is
"So you're a Zoologist" Is it GEO or ZOO logist?
"Ohh Zoologist, so what does a Zoologist do?"

And I think for a while before telling them what a Zoologist does, basically I act as if I think, but the only thing comes to my mind is this photo:

So, what's it like being a Zoologist then? Do I ever do things as mentioned in the picture above? Or its just playing around with toy's as the girl is doing? 

I'd love to be like Jeff Crowin though! Big fan!! Used to watch him on TV, always thought I wish I could be this guy! I loved the episode where he came to Nepal, he went to Chitwan and rode an Elephant, I remembered his documentary when I was inside the jungle! He was my childhood inspiration on becoming a Zoologist 

Basically to start with, if you have enough grants or personal financial source to fund your trips then Zoology is the best subject in this universe! All you ever do is travel here and there looking for animals! Most of you, well all of you have seen the documentaries in Natgeo or Discovery and wondered I wish I had a life like that. And when were in the field, We, the Zoologist do have that life. Its exciting and frighting at the same time, depending upon where you are!

Its exciting as long as you get to travel do some bird watching, some photography on the side walks, trek to the Himalayas but then you actually start to work on your desired species its pain in the back.

I've got this beautiful butterfly shot, every one compliments me on that photo being good, the shot was just a fraction of seconds short but that butterfly dragged me on its random dancing trails for more than 20 minutes! Same with the dragonfly, both are equally mobile. It not just that, even with less mobile species as the Himalayan Langurs along the Langtang river, you observe one, and one small mistake and the whole group moves and then you're left with nothing.

                                  This guy gave me a hard time
I remember when we reached Langtang, we were taking rest, and far ahead into the largest rock in front of us, a small rock was moving. I thought it was debris falling down, but there were lots of them, it just looked like a small rock falling, we were far from that, almost 20 minutes walking distance, but then one of the friend handed me the Binoculars and once I looked through it I realized it wasn't a rock but it was a Himalayan Tahr. We were so excited, for almost every one it was first time seeing a Tahr in the wild. Few of us, who weren't tired of two days walk decided to get closer, the closer we got the farther they started to move. So we started to hide behind every bush and tried getting closer but those tahr who have been surviving Snow Leopard attack were far to good for us, they knew that we were coming, we chased them away. We crawled towards them and it was like one of those shows on tv where the cameraman and presenter crawling up on their knees, may be they're better because they get a good shot, we weren't, a rookie mistake somewhere may be. But then we had lost all hope of seeing one closer, suddenly we heard something towards our right, there were more than 15 Tahr grazing, and one of them saw us and started to run again, but did see one from a pretty close distance, the best surprise of that was, a Beautiful Male Danphe (Lophophorus). To finally see the National Bird of Nepal was quite a treat.

'

Himalayan Langur 

  Tahr 

                                                 
One time we were on bus, the area looked like a possible Vulture habitat, we were on a high alert that we might see one. But the hope was fading, by the way you guys must remember that in "every tv documentary regarding animals, the presenter looks for the animal and doesn't find one and gets hopeless and suddenly sees one and runs towards it?" That kind of happens in the field too, its pretty hard to find animals in the wild and when you do, you get so damn excited about it that you forget the basic things of tracking an animal. So we had lost hope and suddenly we saw 3 vulture on top of a rock, I asked our driver to stop the bus and got off with my camera on hand and slowly started walking up the rock, most of the others were down on the road trying to take photo. I quickly climbed up the rock and I had realized that there were other vulture behind this big rock that I was hiding against, but as I moved ahead of that rock, I saw this huge vulture flapping its wing right in front of me, it was scary but exciting at the same time. Things like this are pretty interesting.


Had chased two Assamese Macaque in Langtang as well for about 30 minutes may be, the dragged us up and down the hill but it was fun, it always is.

But the thing is, its fine as long as your in a friendly animal habitat, well there's no such things called friendly animal habitat in the wild but my point is you're good as long as there's no big cats or wild Elephant or Rhinos around. Back in Chitwan, which was the best wildlife experience I had, one that would beat mediocre documentary on Animals. Field work at its best, 15 days of field work in one the places with highest Tigers and Rhino density. The work was interesting learned lots of things regarding wildlife interaction as well as field work. One the days, when were going into one of the plots, out ranger was in front of us, we were walking on a line, as school children then ranger shouted Rhino Rhino!! All of us were crazy scared, suddenly the Rhino started chasing us for a while, how long, we have no idea because we ran with all the life's energy, it was scary, deep inside a grassland, typical Rhino territory and getting attacked by a full grown Rhino, so then we ran for a while, and since we were in Grassland there were barely any trees, we had to run the the whole field to reach the forest, and the grass was so tall that we couldn't see if there was another Rhino 10 feet ahead of us, we just ran into the oblivion. When we finally reached the forest we climbed up to the trees and look at the grassland, the Rhino was right there , we stayed in the trees, hoping that the Rhino would go away and we'll go back to the field, put down the traps, collect any animals if found one and then get back, but the Rhino had other things in mind, he was in no mood to walk away and he didn't care if we weren't able to do our work in the field. While we were on the trees, this guide came with two foreigners, we told them that there's a Rhino few meters away, they were actually excited because it was their first time seeing a Rhino in the wild so instead of getting to safety they moved towards the Rhino, the Rhino had moved almost near to the forest with few trees around, then the guide took them in front of one of the trees, it wasnt that big, then male tourist, climbed up the tree right in front of the Rhino and started taking photos, the wife (may be) , the girl went ahead of them and found another small tree as she moved the Rhino moved as well, she then hurriedly climbed that small tree it was so small that the tree couldn't hold her weight and she fell down right in front of the Rhino about 10-15 feet, she fell so violently that the Rhino was scared and charged off in another direction, if the Rhino had charged at her, she had no where to run but she was saved that day, she should have listened to us and stayed where we were, we were the expert there and scared to death of going near the animal and they walked as if they knew that animal forever. No matter how confident you are you should be cautious around the animals. One of the days, the other group were charged by an wild elephant, which destroyed the field, and most of the equipment, one of the guy hurt his legs while running away from the elephant. Its a dangerous business, not just fun, there's fun in it but its something to be serious about. You could get trampled by an Elephant, attacked by a Tiger or Rhino, on a bad day, anything can happen, the forest is crawling with snakes. Its a risky job being a Zoologist.

                       This close to a Rhino

                                       Tiger pug mark

 Its fun that you get to travel a lot and be in nature but it can go bad at the same time, but the risk is worth it!
You get to learn a lot about animals, observe them, you get a different look at life, how life works in wild, how it was for us thousands of years ago. Its Awesome being a Zoologist.

General Identification of Snakes of Nepal

Snakes are the most feared animals in the world. Ophiophobia has to be to the topmost Phobia’s related to animals, followed by Arachnophobia (Fear of Spiders).  There are about 3000 Species of Snakes found in world, of with around 375 Species are venomous. In case of Nepal, we have around 89 Species of Snakes, of which 21 are venomous and little less than 7-8 species which can be very lethal. Snakes are common all over Nepal, even in the lower Himalayas, and there’s a data of Himalayan Pit Viper recorded from around 4200 meters. Personally, I found Collared Black Headed Snake (Sibynophis collaris) on my way to Langtang valley at around 3000 meters. Around 20000 bite victims are reported every year from Nepal, with 1000 fatalities.

Identification of snakes based on Photographs is pretty hard, without handling a snake  proper identification is a tedious job. The Snakes are identified on the basis of the structure and arrangement of Scales. Mostly the scales retain their characters throughout their life, but the color may vary.  To identify snakes, structure, position, number and arrangement of scales are generally considered.
The most used scales are, Scales of head, upper and lower labial (Structure, position, arrangement and number), scales of dorsal side, scales of ventral, both ventral and subcaudals.

How to distinguish Venomous snakes from Non Venomous:
1) The first method for identifying a snake can be by opening its mouth, if there are two fangs on the upper front region of premaxilla, if the fangs are present, the snake is definitely venomous.
2) Sometimes the fangs may be broken, and appear to be absent. In this case, other attributes of the snake must/may be observed.
3) Examine the dorsal and ventral scales on the body
• If the scales are smaller, slightly rounded, imbricate and scales on the dorsal and ventral surface are exactly similar then the snake is no Venomous.
• If the ventral scales are narrow and don’t cover the belly, then the Snakes aren’t venomous.
• If the ventral scales run along the belly and are large, then the snakes can be venomous or non-venomous
4) Examine the head and scales on the head
 • If the head is broad flat and triangular and numerous small scales are irregularly arranged the head then the   Snake is venomous.  (If the head is triangular, it’s the Vipers, and highly venomous)
•If the snake has a similar structure of head as mentioned above along with a pit, called a Loreal pit, between its eyes and the nostril, the snake is a Pit Viper
• If the snake has an elongated or rounded head or blunt, apart from triangular, it might be venomous as well as non-venomous.

5) Examine the overall body of the snake
• If the snake has hood shape mark on its head, dorsal scales rhombiod space in between them, and if the third supra-labial shield touches the eye and the nostrils then the snake is venomous (Cobras). And if the snake with similar structure has an Occipital shield then the snake is King cobra.
• If the central rows of scales are larger than the surrounding scales and vertebral hexagonal scales are present then the snake is definitely venomous (Kraits). They also have a metallic shine on the body.

Rest of the snakes, without above mentioned characteristics are mostly rare fanged and not fatal to humans.  There are 5 families of snakes found in Nepal,  Typhlopoidea,  Pythonidae,  Colubridae,  Viperidae, Elapidae. Of which Viperidae (Vipers)  and Elapidae (Cobra’s and Kraits) are extremely dangerous. While most of the Colubrids are non-venomous while few can be venomous but not lethal.

So basically in case of Nepal, there’s no reason to kill a snake at sight! Most of the snakes are non-venomous.  One can easily recognize a cobra, krait and vipers, just avoid those snakes and you all should be fine, apart from that, there’s no need to worry!

Here's a photo chart of Snakes Identification, described above

The Darkness

The boundaries are stretching

way beyond the place where

I can see the shadow lurking,

the lightness of the dark,

the voices inside me

warn me, don’t you dare,

but maybe there’s a silver lining to it

me, to myself, I speak

In fear, the fear of the known and the unknown

but the voices inside me are too strong,

I can’t take it anymore, I just need to

swing out of these swings in to the reality that

life is, the pain that life is and

The darkness, that the life is! 

फोटो हेरेरै फस्नेलाई मैले के नै गर्न सक्छु र

ग्र्याभिटीले खस्नेलाई मैले के गर्न सक्छु र
फोटो हेरेरै फस्नेलाई मैले के नै गर्न सक्छु र

नाम मात्र थाहा छ, अरु कस्ले जानोस
नचिनीनै मनमा बस्नेलाई म के गर्न सक्छु र
फोटो हेरेरै फस्नेलाई मैले के नै गर्न सक्छु र

इन्ट्रेस्ट छैन मलाई, बालाई छैन मलाई
भन्दा भन्दै मनमा पस्नेलाई म के गर्न सक्छु र
फोटो हेरेरै फस्नेलाई मैले के नै गर्न सक्छु र

न भन्नु नै छ मलाई, न अरु कसैलाई केही खबर छ
नजानी कनै मनलाई डस्नेलाई मैले के नै गर्न सक्छु र
फोटो हेरेरै फस्नेलाई मैले के नै गर्न सक्छु र

Manchester United Fixture's 2014/15

A Dawn of New Era under new Manager!!

Source : www.manunited.com 

Citation made easy

We have all been in to place where we need to make a report/thesis or any such research paper. And the most painful task in the content itself but the citation/references and the format of it! There are lots of formats and every one of them has got a different style of citing. It’s a tiresome job to write the name of the researcher, the date of publication the title and what not!

There’s an easy way to do it! You can download software called “Endnote” you can get it on the Endnote website; you can buy it or get a trial version for free, which lasts for 30 days or so. Or you can download it from Torrent for free.

After you download and install the software, you will see the endnote menu bar on you Ms Word. (Photo)

(Click on the photo to enlarge)

And to add the research papers on your Endnote library, what you have to do is, go to www.Scholar.google.com   (Photo) 

Then look for the paper you're interested in, as in the photo above, I've searched for all the papers in Gharial population. And you'll get a list of papers on your subject, now what you have to do is, look at the "Cite" button on the bottom of that paper and click it which will give you a pop out window like this 

So after that window is on, all you have to do is click that "Import to Endnote" option ! Then once the file is downloaded double click it and it will go into the Endnote library. 

After that Open your Ms word, and type whatever your content is and when you need to cite it, Click on the endnote option on Word.  You'll see an option "Insert Citation" on the left hand side below "File" 

Click that "Insert Citation" and you'll get another window like this 

Then look for the paper on that "Find" section and once you've done that you'll see all the papers related to that search key, which can be Paper title or the name of the person. Then Click insert and you're "Citation" will be inserted in the context as well as at the same time, references will pile up at the end of the paper with the format you desire. Either it is APA or MLA!! You can can change the formats as you like! 

For example, if you're writing about Gharial Population and you start with "According to (Someone) then After you write According to, click on Endnote option then insert Citation and then look for that person you're trying to quote and click insert and then the citation will be automatically added after "According to ...." along with reference at the end. 

Finally it looks like this!!

Lastly there's are lots of style for citation and you can use your desired format, for that you have to go to style (Photo: Below) And if you're desired format is not listed you can click "Select Another style" and you will find various options there!! 

Hope I've made my self clear!! If you haven't understood it yet, feel free to contact me via comment or twitter ( @mrophiophagus)

The Camelopardalis meteor shower

A meteor Shower happens when the Earth passes through debris that are left in the space by a Comet. When any Comet travels near the sun, the sun vaporizes it and many small chunks of that Comet is left, and when the Earth passes near the Comet, the parts of comet burns up in Earth’s atmosphere and radiates. A meteor shower is expected to be visible on 23/24 May. Since, it happens in the Constellation Camelopardalis, a name from Roman Myths, where the animals has characters like that of Camel and Leopard hence, Camelopardalis.  The constellation lies near the Ursa Major, on a Northern region.

The Camelopardalis shower will be debris from 09P/LINEAR a comet that orbits the sun every five years. The comet was recently discovered in 2004 by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research project, (LINEAR) a partnership between MIT Lincoln Laboratory, NASA and the U.S. Air Force. Its expected to have more than 100 showers an hour. That should be spectacular!

The comet is expected to be visible on May 23/24 mostly favored for North America, based on the time of prediction but can be visible from all over the world, nothing bad in trying! Personally the best shower I've seen was Geminids Meteor Shower 2 years back. I hope the sky will be clear for that day/night and we will see the shower from Nepal as well.

The Dusty Table

The clouds are fading,
but still the darkness lingers
the glance of a traitor,
a doubt-able approach to
ceasing the fire,
the fire in the heart
as the green fields below
burn down to ashes,
hopes and dreams,
right before my blind eye crashes

waves of imaginary illusion
passes time with me,
sipping time with every drop
of tea on the table,
with a layer of thin dust,
the same that I had built up,
that she blew away at once!

The semi clear floor of
wooden table, polished with paints,
just like she was, yet internally
it was just a raw wood with
a darkness inside, oh! Polished it was! 

The Travelers Pack

The life of a traveller, the dirty shoes thumping on the muddy roads and trails of every corner of Nepal’s young Himalayan flood plains to mid hills to the lesser Himalayas itself. The worn out jeans, a small handheld camera, and a dust riddled North Face bag and infinite road ahead. Never as planned, well nothing goes according to plan anyways! But as a part of a career in Wildlife Biology/ Ecology, travelling is a must. I do love being in nature, the sound of birds, the winds rattling the leaves, the cricket’s noise is melody to my ears, there’s nothing I love more than being in nature, the soft scaly wings of butterfly breaking the waves in a silence, flying past us, teasing us, “Take my photo, catch me if you can”.  I spent 20-30 minutes chasing a butterfly for a good photo, at times never getting it in the end.  Nepal is Nature at its best! What do we not have here? I could spend years and years of my life year, I don’t believe in past or next life but a single life is not enough to travel and praise the beauty that Nepal possesses. But every time I’m somewhere, weather is the floodplains of Terai, some deep forest of the mid hills or barren lands of snowline; I’ve always had a pack of Wai Wai with me. I hadn’t thought of it at those times but recently after few of those crazy expedition, I came to realize that where ever I’ve been to, I’ve have had Wai Wai in the most strangest of the places as well! Be it raw of , cooked! I always have a travelers pack!!

 Well the strangest to start with has to be a recent trip to Champadevi, sitting on top of the South Western hill of the Valley; Champadevi offers the shortest and good hiking experience for a single day. We reached the top and with our theory of never coming down the same way that we took, we took a different way, the one we had no idea about, shortly after few hours of walk, we were lost, guessed our way through the fragile trails, ended up in stony paved stairs leading down into some kind of valley floor. It was almost thick forest and we had no idea where we were going, but then we heard faint sounds of Madal playing then we realized we had touched a part of Makwanpur, and there was this small hut, a shop. Out of all places in that wilderness, there was one shop! Would there be a better place to have Wai Wai?

High up in the Himalayas, this time Langtang Valley, climbing up the steep ridges of Kyanjin Ri, without  even a bottle of water, well no body even thought of carrying a bottle of water,  and I took the long and the wrong way ended reaching the peak alone but could see ant sized friends way below. With hunger creeping into the stomach, where else could be the best place for Wai Wai other than 4800 meters? Btw, a single pack of Wai Wai costs 100 in Langtang, Glad that I had bought few in Balaju!

I had always heard about Kalinchowk, always wanted to go there. But never had a chance, sometimes some friends weren’t free and sometimes I was broke and all but then few months ago, everything lined up! Decided a day ahead, and then went to Charikot the next day. What I thought was that Kalinchowk is few hours hike from Charikot, 2 to be precise from what I had heard but it turned out to be far more than that, Kalinchowk was 1.5 hrs away from Kuri which  was 5-6 hours from Charikot, we reached Charkot at 3 PM! Then directly started ascending up the hills, well mostly flat lands for few hours! Before reaching this small quiet village with a different essence, rested there for a minute and again asked the shopkeeper for noodles, and Wai Wai again!
The stories goes on and on, regardless of where it is, be it Far West in Mahendranagar, or the birth place of Buddha or Chitwan, Pokhara, Palpa, Syangja, Jomsom Muktinath, Gorkha anywhere I go, there’s always Wai Wai!

The fun thing is, you ask the shopkeeper for a Wai Wai and he cooks up Mayos, Wai Wai means Noodles in Nepal! At least as far as I’ve known and I was thinking about this thing and a pact that I will be taking Wai Wai with me where ever I go and I will Eat wai wai in all the Districts of Nepal!! #BucketList
Rings a bell about that Wai Wai add, wherever it is, There’s Wai Wai in our heats! #HamroManMaaWaiWai

Save the Pangolins

Pangolins are Mammals of the order Pholidota, and family Manidae which has a single genus, The word Pangolin is derived from Malayan phrase ‘Pen Gulling’ which translates into ‘rolling ball’ or something that rolls up, while the term Pholidota came from a Greek word meaning ‘scaled animals’ the single genus is represented by 8 Species. Pangolins are known as Scaly Ant eaters! They are called “Salak” in Nepali.

Of the 8 Species of Pangolin in the world, 3 species are found in Asia of which two species are found in Nepal. The Chinese Pangolin Manis pentadactyla are distributed from the lower foothills to the middle mountains of Nepal while the Indian Pangolin Manis crassicaudata have been reported from western Terai region of Nepal. The peculiar character of Pangolin is that its skin is covered by large Keratin Scales. It looks like some primitive animal from Jurassic era.

The body looks similar to Pine cone. It is known to curl up into a ball like structure when it feels threatened while the scales act like armor. The Pangolin has an extremely elongated tongue which extend into the abdominal cavity. The largest Pangolins can extend their tongues upto 40 cm. Pangolins do not have teeth and are not able to chew, there’s a specialized glands in the chest of Pangolins which are specialized to produce a sticky ant catching saliva which helps to stick the ants in its long tongue. The diets of Pangolin consist of Ants and Termites. The Pangolins control the Ants and Termites and without them the population Ants could skyrocket. The life span of Pangolins is unknown but they are known to live over 20 years in captivity.

                                                                    Manis pentadactyla (Photo source : www.arkive.org)
                      

Status of Pangolins in Nepal:
The Indian pangolin, thick-tailed pangolin, or scaly anteater (Manis crassicaudata) Near Threatened (IUCN 3.1)
The Chinese pangolin (Manis pentadactyla) Endangered (IUCN 3.1)

The reason behind the Declining population:
The implication of medical importance of Pangolin is the reason for the declining population as the trade for Pangolin scales grows larger every day. It’s known that Pangolin and Pangolin scales are on high alert in the national and international trade market. They are mostly known to be imported to China, where most people believe that the scales have medicinal values. It is believed that pangolin is very important in healing rheumatic fever, asthma, joint problem etc. It is also believed that the Pangolins Uterus has high traditional value which is associated with avoiding abortion problems. The scales are also made into lockets which are believed to protect the children.

The only way to stop these illegal trade is; to aware the public about the status and importance of the Pangolins and the false assumptions that they are of medicinal uses! Even if there are, the so called healers or medicine makers and Scientist can work together to find the element or the thing whatever it is, the proteins or the chemicals responsible for treatments, if they can find a way to synthesize it that would of great help, but they never think of it like that, it’s just superstition that the pangolin scales are of medicinal uses, well it can’t be true but doesn’t mean we have the rights to over exploit it! The same chemicals, if true, found inside the pangolins can be synthesized outside to treat those diseases. Killing them endlessly is not an option. They are one of the most important animals in the Ecosystem. But in recent years, the trades of Pangolins have subsided. Hope this will continue if future as well and hope that there will come a day when that amazing species will be threat-less in the wild and both humans and Pangolins can live together in peace, which again will be helped by the pangolins, they are helping us control the Ants and the Termites and what are we giving them in return? Death? Is that fair?


P.S. World Pangolin Day is celebrated on the third Saturday in February

#SaveThePangolins Help spread the words!

Field Hike Day 1 : Ghyaampedada

This Saturday took us to right into the mixture of Urban-Suburban-sub rural areas within a few kilometers from the highway. The aim was designed in such a way to explore the Urban Wildlife of that particular area. I was accompanied by two of my friends for the reconnaissance survey. We started out late, well one because I took the wrong bus first and then the bus which roams around the city before exiting on to the outer road that touches that connecting road to Bhaktapur. My friends, both Environmental Science majors joined me on the way. We the got off at Bhaktapur then started walking towards the Suryabinayak Temple. The temple is, may be about a Km away from the main road. The road to Ghyampedada and pilot baba aashram lies on the left side of Suryabinayak temple. For the first few minutes you walk through a completed black pitched road, few minutes into the road and we’re enter a community forest, and slowly the pitched road starts fade, leaving the muddy “Nepali” style of road! The most striking part about that first few minutes was that, it was still slightly urban area, and even with those disturbances I had already seen bunch of different species of Butterflies! I had never heard about that place before, and hearing about the butterflies’ diversity of that place is out of the question. But I was overwhelmed after seeing such a diverse population of butterflies in such a short time span, and they were everywhere, plus the forest seemed so dense and undisturbed! The most common trees were
Dhale Katus : Castanopsis indica- Chestnut
Falat : Quercus glauca – Ring cupped Oak
Musure Katus : Castanopsis tribuloides – Chestnut
Seto Kath : Myrsine capitellata –
 Chilaaune : Schima wallichii

Also lots of Rhodoendron
We walked through the dense forest for about an hour, it would take less if you just walk without looking around the diversity in the forest but we took our time with it, photographing every strange or unknown leaf to trees and mostly butterflies and caterpillar. After walking for an hour we finally reached Pilot baba’s aashram. The aashram sits on top of a peculiar landscape, the aashmram lies in Bhaktapur and a steep slope south to the aashram drops into the southern face into a small valley separated by a river into Lalitpur and Bhaktapur. The slope had considerable number of Aiselu (Rubus sps.). The aashram resides on a very peaceful location with a touch of cold breeze even in the middle of a hot day. The temple premises are well maintained and extremely clean, and the garden is well managed as well with plenty of species of Roses, which I’m really acquainted with or else I’d write down the types or genus of those roses as well. While we were busy trying to take the photographs of the rose garden, the clouds had other plans and all of a sudden they broke into rains and started to pour down on us, draining our hike as well as my survey. We rushed to a small tea house right on the door of the Aashram.

We waited for the rain to end with a cup of black tea. While we were having tea, a foreigner walked into the tea shop all drenched in rain. She asked the shopkeeper for “Dudh Chiya” , again her wish of having a Dudh chiya was drenched by the shopkeeper just like the rain had drenched her, he replied with NO Milk tea! Only Black! She said, it’s fine; I’ll have the black tea. Then shortly we started to have a conversation, she was from Spain and had been to Nepal twice, then the conversation went along, while we were about to leave, I asked her if she was travelling alone, and she was,  so I asked to join us if she wasn’t in a hurry. She wasn’t, she joined us and then we walked towards the Ghyampe Dada, few minutes away from Pilot Baba Aashram. On the way she asked us what we were doing there and I told her that I was there on field visit and I was looking for some Leopards, she didn’t understand it at first, then after I explained to her she said “Ohh Leopaaarrddoooo” in Spainsh accent! She thought I was joking at that time! While having the same conversation we reached Ghyampedada. Ghyaampedada has number of houses and local hotels and as we learned that day that it was famous for local alcoholic products as well as it was a scenic hotspot from where, on a clear day, a wide range of mountains could be seen, but since we were walking in faint rain we didn’t see anything but a blurred out Bhaktapur city below the dark clouds. On the way back we took photos of lots of butterflies, saw one extremely beautiful butterfly, chased it for about 20 minutes but still couldn’t get a shot because the butterfly wouldn’t rest at all! Slowly and gradually we walked down the road and it started to rain again! We only had 1 umbrella and 4 people but we managed somehow, and kept on walking down the road, we did miss out on lots of butterflies because of the rain. But it was extremely fun trying to walk in the muddy slippery roads while it was raining cats and dogs! Finally the rains subsided and we reached the Suryabinayak temple. We had few cup of teas and Waiwai noodles and then had some Sapanish and Japanese lessons! Then as we moved into the urban part of Suryabinayak I had to ask some local few questions regarding my Thesis work, we found a shop where a and elderly man was sitting alone, so we picked that shop and went in to ask him few question. It was as if he was bored to death, he invited use like we were his family member, he was that happy even before I told him why we were there, he asked us to sit down and then I told him what was I looking for, and the pulled out a chair and started talking endlessly. He told me about everything I needed to know regarding the Leopard- Human conflict in that area, as per him, in recent years, there hasn’t been much conflict when it comes to human, because according to him the Leopards come into the urban area to feed on the Dogs! And since, no humans or other cattle’s are harmed there exists no conflict in recent years. That was an interesting insight for my research. He also told me that the Urban wildlife of those areas were, Leopard, the most common one then there were deer (Spotted Deer Axis axis) as per his description, Rabbits, Wild boars, Mongoose etcetera. I did learn about possible habitat and future conflict scenarios from that person, he was extremely helpful. And this is when our Spanish friend believed that we were there for field study and really looking for the Leopaaaardoo! Then we bid him farewell, thanking him for his time and sharing his knowledge. Then as we took a bus, and asked our foreign friend where she’d get off she told us that she had no idea where to get off because she had come to that place last night and had no idea where it was, she knew it was not in Thimi but outside of it, Thankfully she had phone number of that place, so we called them and asked for the location and it was such a location that even my local Bhaktapurian friend had no idea where it was, so we got off with her, asked the locals for the direction and dropped her off at the location. And as it turns out, the place where she was staying was a beautiful garden almost could pass for a Botanical garden with old style Bhaktapurian houses. It’s was an Organic farm plus guest house for peace lovers!

On my personal experience, for a short term hike that place is ideal, with a different cultural blend to natural scenic places to vast diversity of butterflies and birds! Take your time and hike the route!!

Sweats of summer

I'm late every day, even though I wake up at 6 am and start to get ready for the University, I end up being late. And these days with the excruciating heat, the nights feel longer and the summer's buzzing tourists have started to rejoin the blood feast, which again keeps me up till late night and also Twitter is there as well. But then back to the story, I’m always late! Well, all of you know that the traffic system is messed up to its limit, and we all know the scenario of the microbuses. In the morning rush hour, it jam packed, and I’m pretty sure that the  designer or the engineer of Toyota never knew that so many people could fit inside that small space in the microbus, he’d probably be shocked to know that they’d fit 10 people in it! It was fine during the winter, but these days every single one inside the micro bus has a drop of sweat trying to escape the hot surface of their nose and fall on someone else hair or body while trying to hold onto anything they can find inside the micro bus! The bus will be fuming with heat and even with all the windows open, the wind never gets through the barrier of that many people inside the micro to your head, and you can’t even move an inch, but still the conductor yells, “Thaau khaali chha” – There’s still some space in here, I have no idea of what his definition of Space is!! May be he knows too much of Physics stuffs and empty space. To top it all off , well Icing on the cake as it is said, or Sweats on the cake may be? Icing is too far, "Winter is coming" only in Game of Thrones, while we’re mushed up in sweats of summer. And these are the times when the bus driver is in no rush to reach somewhere and the traffic is freaked up. You get stuck in traffic for hours to such an extent that you get dehydrated sitting inside the bus with sweaty backs and fuming internal cabinet with 10 or more people standing in front of you, and you don’t really want to smell the variety of sweats! You can’t walk because it’s too hot and you can’t stay inside the micro bus for too long because it’s literally an oven. I don’t even know the solution to it, increase the micro bus number and then we will have more traffic and leave it as it is, it’s extremely hard to withstand, and most of you who take the microbus from NAC/Newroad area at the peak hour will know it, Try getting a comfortable seat from NAC microstand, you’ve got be lucky not to be standing!