I returned to Nepal in 2013 after nearly 25 years of studying, working, and traveling around the world. I went on a mission to re-learn about the people, the society, and the country I had left as a teenager. I traveled, observed, and listened. I read voraciously, took notes\u2014copious notes\u2014and published blog posts about the things I was seeing, hearing, learning, and observing. I engaged with fellow Nepalis in person and on social media at a level and extent I rarely had in my entire life. During this time, I served as the co-director of a non-profit, volunteered for the United World College Selection Committee, and visited schools across the country to share my life and work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In time, I discovered a painful truth: the society I had worked so hard to escape as a naive child in the 1980s was even more hollow and flawed than I could have imagined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Attempting as I was to recover from my personal issues\u2014not least of which was the fallout of the traumatic experience of eleven nights and twelve days<\/strong> in police custody in Doha, Qatar\u2014this realization drove me to declare Nepali society as “hollow” for the first time in a response to a post on December 4, 2020:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yeah a pretty hollow & deeply flawed society, if you ask me!
But then I guess if and when d social order really goes South, Vishnu's Avataar will come & restore order anyway. So, there's no need for us mere mortals to try to change\/improve d society in any way, for anyone! LOL!!<\/p>— Dorje Gurung, ScD (h.c.) (@Dorje_sDooing) December 4, 2020<\/a><\/blockquote>