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Hi everyone. I’m Marty Logan. Thank you for clicking on this episode of Nepal Now: On the Move, where we speak with some of the huge number of people leaving – and occasionally returning – to this country wedged between India and China.

Bharat Adhikari is another former migrant worker who returned to live in Nepal, but his story could hardly be more different than Sushma’s, who we heard from in a previous episode. I chatted recently with Bharat at the Himal Media studio in Patan Dhoka. 

After more than a decade working in the retail sector in the Persian Gulf countries of Oman and Dubai, Bharat and his family decided it was time to come home. He describes the aha! moment when he returned home from work one day and realized that his mother and daughter had almost everything that money could buy to make them happy living overseas – but not a community. 

Bharat broke the news to his boss in 2020, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, and the man suggested he was crazy. But Bharat insisted that it was the best thing for his ageing mother and young daughter, and finally convinced him (although today he still gets offers from his former employer in Dubai to return). 

Aside from the decision to leave his successful career in exchange for society and culture in Nepal, what I find interesting about Bharat’s story is that his first venture here failed. Well not exactly – he gave up on starting a new business when he realized that he would have to ingratiate himself with government officials. Bharat understood then that having worked only in Gulf countries, he needed to be operating within a disciplined system. Luckily he’s now found it in his new job. 

Please listen now to my conversation with Bharat Adhikari. 

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Music by audionautix.com.

Thank you to Himal Media in Patan Dhoka for the use of their studio.