From 1990 onwards, we've has a competition in Nepal...a competition among educators to give their academic institution the MOST ridiculous and/or absurd name. I know because, noticing it, I did a write-up on it and even stalked about it in my FM radio program in 1998. So, after three decades, who is winning? All of them...and naturally education is losing out.
Nepali teachers, I have observed, do not use humor much or often. I am not sure why.
This blog contains embeds of two short clips from a presentation to students at a school in Kathmandu in which I use humor.
How a society uses information and knowledge depends a lot on the kind of society it is. An open and outward looking society uses information and knowledge to free their people, for example. A closed and inward-looking society, on the other hand, utilizes them to control their people. Nepal, being a closed and inward-looking society, expends a lot of effort into controlling their people, starting from when they are children.
Contrary to what many Nepalis believe and will tell you, raising a child to be a well disciplined one does NOT require "disciplining." In other words, to raise a well-behaved child, you don't have to scold, scream, shout, beat, or humiliate the child. All you have to do is to raise them by respecting, listening, and engaging with them.
As a primary school student, I loved the arts and was good at acting and singing, and did a lot of that. But acting was also an "out," a means to escape my own self, to become someone else, suffering as I had been from a number of personal issues.
Had I been born a different caste or in a different country, I would have probably become a performing artist as an adult.
One of the ways many private schools in Nepal try to mask the poor quality of education they provide: say that the education their school provide is better than other private schools. So, they require transfer students to take an admissions test and -- lo and behold! -- the child is found lacking in some academic areas and suggested to repeat the year (grade)!