Nepali Times

Now that we are being told unofficially that the officious blockade being officiated by officialdom will soon be semi-officially lifted through the good offices of the Home Office we might as well start getting used to more normal pre-blockade times here in Nepal all over again. Pity, because we had just invested a considerable amount of time and energy getting used to this quasi-blockade.

Luckily for those of us who will soon be longing nostalgically for the five months of blockade, rest assured that normal times in Nepal means we will still have periodic LPG shortages. We will go on having to line up for two days to buy petrol every time NOC fails to pay IOC. We will continue to have 15 hours of power cuts every day. National prestige projects will be indefinitely delayed, blockade or no blockade. Transformers will keep on exploding from time to time. And those of you raking it in by unofficially bringing in contraband petrol through the Thori Jungle need not worry since smuggling has always been the mainstay of this country’s economy and will stay that way for the unforeseeable future.

As long as this country is run on black market and black magic by black-listed blackguards we will continue to be blackmailed and have blackouts. In fact, it will be hard to tell the difference between a blockaded Nepal and an unblockaded Nepal.

And thank goodness for that. The Ass was starting to get all worried that we’d all have to get used to buying a full LPG cylinder off the shelf at Bhaicha’s Store around the corner for the normal price without chaining the cylinder to a sidewalk railing for three days. Or that we could just drive up to Sajha and fill up the Yamaha with a full tank of petrol in 45 second flat. And what would we do if we couldn’t ride on the roof of buses, or secretly chop down the last remaining community forests for firewood?

I know we are already three weeks into the new year, but as the geo-political checkmate drags on and PM Oliji refuses to see that the game is up, the Ass has taken the trouble of listing all the possible scenarios that could transpire in this great nation of ours in 2016:

1. Pee-Em Khadga Prasad will continue in Balu Water and keep us all entertained with his black humour during the blackouts.

2. BRB’s New Force will be like the Old Force except without the ‘C’ word in it, but he will continue to be the Dictator of the Proletariat.

3. The indecisive Morcha-Gobblement talks will continue inconclusively till December punctuated at regular intervals by very many near-breakthroughs and false alarms.

4. In a desperate bid to dominate the media, PKD will try something spectacular like making a pilgrimage to Kasi and saying he was for Nepal being a Hindu state all along which was why he carried out so many human sacrifices.

5. SuKo will conduct the four-day Kangres Konvention 2016 while fast asleep and still be re-elected Party Prez.

6. We will resurrect the monarchy, and restore the Malla Dynasty.

7. The country will announce an international tender bid for a management subcontract to run the country for five years. GMR will win the bid and restore Terrible International Airport (TIA) to its past glory.

8. Nepal will have a trade surplus with India after April because of a dramatic increase in our exports of gin, rum and vodka to The Dry State of Bihar.

9. After lifting the make-believe blockade, India will re-impose a real blockade around mid-August, but it won’t tell us why and we will have no way to knowing what we did wrong. Maybe it will be just to teach KPO a lesson for going to China first. Or maybe not.

10. Prez appoints an Ass as the next prime minister.

There is no guarantee any of this will really happen, of course, but the least we can do is hope. Last one out, please turn off the lights. Oh, I forgot, there are no lights.

Read also:

Better days to come, Bidushi Dhungel

PM’s an Ass, The Ass

Happy New Earful, The Ass

In the absence of hope, Bidushi Dhungel