“What are your future
plans?” Ask this question to youngsters in Kathmandu, and pat comes the answer,
“I’ll be going abroad.” Dig deeper and you’ll find they already have a list of
colleges tracked out. Invariably, the majority will be those in the United States.
Well, it’s a pity, really. Most of them don’t know what they are getting into;
a pit full of trouble, a quagmire of problems. While there may be some for whom
money is not a problem, their parents having the big bucks needed to see them
through four or five years of extreme expenses, for most others, it’s simply
not worth it.
Living expenses alone
could well total close to a lakh a month, and even if there are all sorts of
gambits of colleges to acquire students, such as scholarships, it’s advisable
to read the fine print. First thing students got to realize is that nothing is
for free out there. You’ll probably have to shell out another lakh or so every
month for fees, books, insurance, and so forth. Does it make sense to spend so
much money to get a degree that will use up all your parent’s hard earned money
or probably put them into debt? There are many youngsters (and parents, too)
who are under the illusion that after the initial investment of a year’s
expenses, students will be able to take care of it themselves. A dangerous
illusion, to say the least.
For one thing, students
cannot work legally; permission is needed, and even if that, they can work for
limited hours only. For another, it’s a tough task having to work and study at
the same time, especially when you know that the educational system out there
is heavily geared towards projects that take up a lot of the student’s time
outside college. It’ a fact that many students (even the locals) do not finish
college within the expected period, because they just cannot pay the fees every
semester without taking off time to earn by working more hours.
Now, there’s one
question that’s pretty much unanswered till now—how useful are the degrees you
get abroad in Nepal’s context? One thing is for sure, it will take you a long,
long, time (if ever) to recover the expenses incurred in getting that
degree. So, the query is the same, does
it make sense to go through all the hardship and uncertainty, and the expenses
you can ill afford?
Nobody can say for
sure, but there are perhaps quite a number who have returned without finishing
their studies due to paucity of funds. And, there could perhaps be quite a
number who have abandoned studies and are living illegally abroad, the
conditions of their student visas having long been violated. Whatever the case
may be, many youngsters surely must be regretting their impulsive foray into
colleges abroad.
Actually, if you think
about it, common sense should prevail; the Nepali rupee is one hundredth of
currencies in many lands students go to. So, tough times ahead are a given.
Okay, a spirit of adventure and all that is fine, but not when you know that
you’re going to land in a situation where you can neither swallow nor spit it
out. It’s hard to abandon dreams and harder to sacrifice the investment already
made. And so, you keep on toiling, and toiling, and toiling.
All those young
exuberant years when you should be having fun, enjoying a great social life,
and building long term relationships. What a waste!
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