Some of you may be under the wrong impression that our institutions of higher learning are full of goons. That is a slightly inaccurate portrayal of reality. They actually full of arsonists. They have invented fire and discovered that the office of the registrar is highly inflammable.
As a card-carrying cynic it is usually difficult for me to see alleged silver linings at the end of the so-called tunnel while also seeing the glass as reportedly half-empty. It is no mean feat, grabbing the Ass’ attention. I am upbeat this week because of a series of news items in the menstream media of Nepali geniuses. Tv has lavished airtime and papers column inches to the inventors by interrupting regular primetime programs to broadcast breaking news of indigenously-designed helicopters. Nepalis are today going boldly forth where no Nepali has gone before, and this includes migrating to the Federated States of Micronesia.
Last week, the Prime Minister flew by helicopter to Rukum to felicitate 17-year-old Manjit BK who has built a helicopter made of wrought iron and powered by a Pulsar motorcycle engine that was paraded around Musikot by thousands of cheering locals.
“The only reason this helicopter doesn’t fly is because the government hasn’t helped me,” BK told reporters, adding that he is trying to fix some minor problems like the fact that the rotors do not generate any thrust at all and the craft weighs half a ton. Prime Minister Dahal instructed Energy Minister Janardan Sharma to make BK’s chopper lift off. If Comrade Prabhakaran can end loadshedding, he can do anything.
Another inventor Anil Gautam of Rupandehi also made a helicopter that stubbornly refuses to be airborne. Gautam has found why it doesn’t fly: “The Prime Minister hasn’t yet come to see me yet.” He says the chopper that weighs as much as a Tata truck will fly if CAAN gives permission.
Imaginative Nepalis are not just making imaginary helicopters. Bhim Sunar of Baglung has made an SUV mysteriously named ‘Ocean’. He had made a dozer and a helicopter while in Grade 10. “If the government gives me Rs 300,000 I can make a car that will actually move,” he told a packed news conference.
The sky is not the limit for Nepal’s space cadets. Eighth grader Biraj designed a top secret three-stage, booster-assisted, sub-orbital launch vehicle with an optional warhead. We would never have learnt of this great leap forward had it not been for the national media which scooped everyone by publishing the blueprint. Biraj is now waiting to be contacted by the DPRK military. Asked how difficult it was to build the missile, Biraj replied: “It is rocket science.”