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Nepal made history on Wednesday by electing its first female president. Bidhya Devi Bhandari is a long-time women's rights campaigner, a far-left veteran of the battle to transform the country from absolute monarchy to modern democracy. She's one of only a few female faces in parliament, and she wants to shift the country from being a traditionally male-dominated society, where women are expected to work only at home or on farms, to one in which they have equal rights and opportunities. The new president, however, is not the only communist there winning hearts and minds while changing gender perceptions, as Chris Haslam's been finding out at a somewhat unlikely venue.
Behind a steel gate on a dusty side-street in Kathmandu, there's a rather good bar. It's run by the Belgian consulate and offers a superb selection of rare Trappist beers. It's an odd place to meet Nepal's next sporting super star, a former child soldier, who ran away from home to escape a life of repression and has since risen to the top of one of the most extreme sports on earth.
Two things strike you upon meeting this young athlete. First, there are those eyes, twinkling with self-amusement. It's an absurd life. Secondly, there's the fact that Mira Rai is a woman.
Nepal has a shocking record on gender equality. The World Economic Forum puts the Himalayan Republic 121st out of 136 countries in the global gender-gap index, and women here are considered Paraya Dhan, or "someone else's property". Violence against women is rife and Nepal's long-awaited new constitution denies unmarried females the right to pass on their citizenship to their children. | 
发表于 2016-11-23 18:59:07