Happiness is sum of little things.

Mary and I sometimes come together during work. Mary may be a decade older than my Mom, works very hard and is better known for her perpetual silence. She comes to work, works & leaves, utters very few words throughout the day. When somebody greets her, she replies with eyes, neither polite nor rude, but always tight lipped. Nobody knows much about Mary, her story remains untold as a story inside writer’s pen.

She looked same when I met her last time, expressionless and intelligent may be more than she actually is (her silence and specs aggrandizes her intelligence). I assumed she replied with eyes behind thick power glasses, when I said “Hi”. That day we both were involved in same project, our desks pretty close with glasses full of "coca-cola classic" on it. In course of work I took the glass of Coke (not realizing it was Mary’s) sipped mouthful but before swallowing I heard “That’s mine”. I spat immediately, dumped the glass, picked up new one and moved towards her. She was already on the move towards vending machine, I interrupted “I am very sorry, I will get new one for u”. She stopped and said “I prefer lots of ice”. I replied “sure” and moved towards vending machine, with my left hand inside left pocket searching coins. I was wondering why she had to wait until I sipped her drink. She could have interrupted right away when I picked her glass as I was just in front. Probably it was propagation delay from heart ( or mind or whatever it is) to tongue as she is not very much accustomed to speak. I returned and handed “ice & coke” mix to her and repeated “I am sorry” again. She was silent, may be she thanked through eyes once again.

Later, I had to leave my workstation for about twenty minutes. On return, I found my half filled glass was replaced with brimful glass of “Coke and ice” mix. I looked toward her, “I guess yours was warmed up and thought u would enjoy the chilled one”, she had actually bought it for me and this time it was not only eyes that spoke. I certainly enjoyed the “chilled one”; I enjoyed her kindness even more and now it was my turn to remain silent.


“It is not great deeds from which happiness springs, but just the sum of little things"

Down to earth person in a place high in clouds

Where there’s a will there’s a way. At this moment I can recall no other name suitable than Mahabir Pun to bolster the above statement. I first met Mr Pun in 2004 when he was in KEC for a brief presentation. By that time, he had already established wireless connection between his village and nearest city pokhara otherwise after hearing his unending stream of ideas; it would have been much easier to dismiss the disheveled man of forty plus as a hopeless dreamer. What he has done for the villagers of myagdi district is phenomenon and the achievement is testimony of his hope, determination and ingenuity. I was ecstatic and felt truly honored when I knew Mr. Pun bagged 2007 Ramon Magsaysay award for community leadership for connecting his village to global village.

Now, wireless network is expanded to embrace twelve villages – distributing hundreds of computer to local schools, connecting them to internet, which is very uncommon for government school in Nepal. It was all started in 1997 by a simple question from an Australian school child when he came to know about Nangi village through website – How many computers do u have? None, came the reply. The answer prompted the children in Melbourne’s Billanook college to raise money and send four old computers (two 486s, a 386 and a laptop) to the village. Now Himanchal higher secondary school ( in Nangi) has a computer lab of more than dozen computers and video editing equipment. The scenario now, may not be lot different from many Australian schools. The villagers still hang their corn under their shelters and proudly line the pumpkins on roof of their houses built of stones and mud but have access to web to e-market their local products. The other notable changes in myagdi are tele-teaching and tele-medicine. Good teachers in one school now instruct students in others and doctor less villages use Wi-Fi to consult specialist in pokhara.

I remember Mr. Pun repeating “Internet Bhagwan ki jay” many times during presentation and surely he is using it to the same effect to change the fortune of villages and he himself is like demigod for them. He plans to build a college in his village and provide computer courses to students which will open the door to produce computer programmers in the village, and produce software for the big firms around the globe. It may sound like a over ambitious idea to many but Mr. Pun has habit of doing such things and it seems only sky is the limit for Mr. Pun and Myagdi villagers.