Kathmandu, officially Kathmandu Metropolitan City, is the capital and most populous city of Nepal with 845,767 inhabitants living in 105,649 households as of the 2021 Nepal census and 2.9 million people in its urban agglomeration. It is located in the Kathmandu Valley, a large valley in the high plateaus in central Nepal, at an altitude of 1,400 metres.
The Sherpa are one of Tibeto-Burman ethnic groups native to the mountainous region in eastern Nepal. The name Sherpa means "eastern people" in Tibetan. It is believed that all Sherpa lived in Tibet before their descendants migrated west in the 15th century. At that time, a Mongol King attempted to force them to convert to his sect of Buddhism. They are descended from Khampas from the Kham region in Sichuan Province.
Lukla is a small town in the Khumbu Pasanglhamu rural municipality of the Solukhumbu District in the Province No. 1 of north-eastern Nepal. Situated at 2,860 metres (9,383 ft), it is a popular place for visitors to the Himalayas near Mount Everest to arrive. Although Lukla means "place with many goats and sheep", few are found in the area nowadays.
Jiri is a municipality in Dolakha District in the Bagmati Province of central Nepal. At the time of the 2011 Nepal census it had a population of 13,638 people. Jiri, which lies about 190 kilometers from Kathmandu, is the main gateway to the Everest Region. Almost all the Everest expeditions, including the one led by famous climber John Hunt, Edmund Hillary had passed through Jiri. A company of the Nepal Army is stationed in town and visitors' equipment and backpacks might be searched. There are a number of lodges available along either side of the main road mainly in Jiri Bazaar.
Tengboche is a village in Khumbu Pasanglhamu rural municipality in the Khumbu subregion of Province No. 1 in Nepal, located at 3,867 metres (12,687 ft). Within the village is an important Buddhist monastery, Tengboche Monastery, which is the largest gompa in the Khumbu region. The structure was built in 1923. In 1934, it was destroyed by an earthquake but subsequently rebuilt. It was destroyed again by a fire in 1989, and again rebuilt with the help of volunteers and the provision of foreign aid. Tengboche has a panoramic view of the Himalayan mountains, including the well-known peaks of Tawache, Everest, Nuptse, Lhotse, Ama Dablam, and Thamserku. Tenzing Norgay, the first man to reach the summit of Mount Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary, was born in the area in the village of Thani and was once sent to Tengboche Monastery to be a monk.
Hinduism is the main and largest religion of Nepal. In 2006, the country declared itself a secular country through democracy, after the abolition of its monarchy. According to the 2021 census, the Hindu population in Nepal is estimated to be around 23,677,744 which accounts for at least 81.19% of the country's population, the highest percentage of Hindus of any country in the world. Vikram Samvat, one of the two official calendars used in Nepal, is a solar Hindu calendar essentially the same to that widespread in North India as a religious calendar, and is based on Hindu units of time.
The culture of Nepal encompasses the various cultures belonging to the 125 distinct ethnic groups present in Nepal. The culture of Nepal is expressed through music and dance; art and craft; folklore; languages and literature; philosophy and religion; festivals and celebration; foods and drinks.
The "Nepal Scouts" is the national Scouting and Guiding organization of Nepal, founded in Nepal in 1952. It became a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1969 and later became a member of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts in 1984.
Thamel is a commercial neighborhood located in Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal. Thamel has been the centre of the tourist industry in Kathmandu for over four decades, starting from the hippie days, when many artists came to Nepal and spent weeks in Thamel. It is considered the hotspot for tourism inside the Kathmandu valley.
Mountain Air was an airline based in Nepal. Its aircraft were re-possessed in 2002.
Christianity is, according to the 2011 census, the fifth most practiced religion in Nepal, with 375,699 adherents, or 1.4% of the population. Many informed observers have estimated that there are at least 1 million Nepali Christians. According to some Christian groups, there may be as many as 3 million Christians in Nepal, constituting up to 10% of the country's population. A report by Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary identified the Nepali church the fastest growing in the world. The vast majority of Nepali Christians are evangelical Protestants ; there is also a small Catholic population of roughly 10,000.
Sushma Joshi is a Nepali writer, filmmaker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. Her fiction and non-fiction deal with Nepal's civil conflict, as well as stories of globalization, migration and diaspora.
Yuyutsu Ram Dass Sharma is a Nepalese-Indian poet and journalist. He was born at Nakodar, Punjab and moved to Nepal at an early age. He writes in English and Nepali.
The Imja Khola is a tributary of the Dudh Kosi river in eastern Nepal. It drains the slopes of Mount Everest. The Khumbu Glacier melts into the Lobujya (Lobuche) River, which flows southward as the Imja Khola to its confluence with the Dudh Kosi at Tengboche.
The Everest ER is a seasonal tent-based medical clinic at the Everest base camp founded in 2003 by Dr. Luanne Freer, a volunteer physician for the nonprofit Himalayan Rescue Association (HRA) in Nepal and Associate Medical Director of Medcor, Inc. Volunteer doctors provide altitude-experienced health care and preventative education to the climbing community, their support staff and trekking-through public in base camp, using proceeds from this care to subsidize free/low cost health care for the Sherpa people of the Khumbu region of Nepal.
The Great Himalaya Trail is a route across the Himalayas from east to west. The original concept was to establish a single long distance trekking trail from the east end to the west end of Nepal that includes a total of roughly 1,700 kilometres (1,100 mi) of path. There is a proposed trail of more than 4,500 kilometres (2,800 mi) stretching the length of the Greater Himalaya range from Nanga Parbat in Pakistan to Namche Barwa in Tibet thus passing through, India, Nepal, Bhutan and Tibet. Although an actual continuous route is currently only a concept, if completed it would be the longest and highest alpine hiking track in the world.
Nepalese Muslims are Nepalis who follow Islam. Their ancestors arrived in Nepal from different parts of South Asia, Central Asia and Tibet during different epochs, and have since lived amidst the numerically dominant Hindus and Buddhists. About 80% of the Muslim community live in the Terai region, while the other 20% are found mainly in the city of Kathmandu and Gorkha and the western hills. The community numbers 971,056, about 3.8% of the total population of Nepal. Districts with large Muslim population include Sarlahi (9.9%), Rautahat (17.2%), Bara (11.9%), and Parsa (17.3%) and Banke (16%) in the western Terai and Siraha (7%) and Sunsari (10%) and Saptari (10%) Gorkha (13%) hill.
Tsering Rhitar Sherpa is a Nepalese filmmaker, screenwriter, and film producer. His first film, Mukundo: Mask of Desire, was Nepal's official entry for Oscars.
On 18 April 2014, seracs on the western spur of Mount Everest failed, resulting in an ice avalanche that killed sixteen climbing Sherpas in the Khumbu Icefall. This was the same icefall where the 1970 Mount Everest disaster had taken place. Thirteen bodies were recovered within two days, while the remaining three were never recovered due to the great danger of performing such an expedition. Many Sherpas were angered by what they saw as the Nepalese government's meager offer of compensation to victims' families, and threatened a protest or strike. On 22 April, the Sherpas announced they would not work on Everest for the remainder of 2014 as a mark of respect for the victims.
