To their added joy, the Khanal couple, residents of Kalanki, Kathmandu soon saw their second and youngest sons also heading for the ´land of opportunity´

 

“Though we sometimes felt like seeing them or talking to them in the flesh, overall we were simply happy about our children residing in America,” said 63-year-old Khanal. “But once, around a year ago, both of us were bed-ridden with high fever. We needed intense care from somebody and there was no one else at home. I need not exaggerate how it feels when your children are overseas during such moments” he added.

 

For the first time the parents felt sad and helpless and the father could not help sending long emails to all three of their children as soon as he was able to sit before the computer. “They also felt sad and phoned us. But coming over here and seeing us as and when we needed them was not an option,” the mother recalled. After going to the US, the younger sons have never visited Nepal even once while the eldest could make it back just once 10 years ago. 

 

This is a commonplace story for a huge number of households in present-day Nepali society. With educated youngsters lured by the Western dream and the less educated masses seeking employment in the Gulf, the number of ageing parents living on their own is well on the rise. According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, the absentee population in Nepal stood at 1,917,903 in 2011, or more than double that of 2001. And the highest proportion of absentees is from the capital. 

 

“Once they go, they hardly ever come back,” notes Rupa Joshi, communications specialist at UNICEF. “And not being able to meet each other during special moments is equal to missing everything in life. The pleasure of togetherness is all lost, and forever,” adds this mother of children who are also not in the country. 

 

The Khanal couple went through the same experience when they could not attend their eldest son´s wedding, nor could they be with the family when their grand daughters were born. Thanks to the internet, they later saw all that on the computer screen. They also went to America themselves later to meet up with the family, but that was not the same thing as attending those important occasions. What grandparents strongly miss nowadays is the company of their grand daughters.

 

“My eldest grand daughter needs a friend to play with, someone who would listen to her, enjoy with her. But in America, people hardly have time. During my short stay there, we became friends and she was so fond of me,” recalls the grandfather. Grandparents would love so much to see their grand daughters growing up before their own eyes, but the girls are too far away.

 

“If life is all about happiness and satisfaction, you need to have your grandchildren near you. After meeting my eldest grand daughter for the first time in the US, I realized what her company meant to me,” Badri Khanal said, sounding sentimental. “Sometimes, though not always, we tend to feel very lonely and restless, basically when we are not well,” the grandmother added.

 

According to Mita Rana, a senior clinical psychologist at Teaching Hospital, emptiness, anxiety and, most dangerously, the feeling of insecurity seriously affect the health of the elderly. “The number of the elderly whose children reside abroad is rising. While they feel empty and unhappy about not being able to see their children more often, they tend to become quite literally depressed, especially when they are not very well,” she maintains. 

 

Recently, Rana was treating an elderly woman who had some health issues. “But her psychological problem was even graver. She thought that she could die any time and her children would not be with her in her last day,” Rana said. 

 

A senior official at the Curriculum Development Center termed his own situation as "waiting for death". He was simply not happy about his children being unlikely to return to the country. “They have their own life there. Here we are just waiting for death.”