Do people living in Nepal understand Hindi?
Yes Ofcourse. I am a nepalese and I can not only understand Hindi but also speak it fluently in a good indian accent. Hindi has become one of my favourite languages after my mothertounge. Not only hindi, but I can easily understand other indian languages such as Punjabi, Rajasthani, Bhojpuri, Urdu, Hariyanvi etc. But I can speak hindi fluently.And all the credit goes to Bollywood and indian TV serials. Though I am a nepali, I prefer Bollywood over Nepali cinema. I've been watching Bollywood movies, TV serials and listening to hindi songs since my childhood. I really love them and also heavily influenced by hindi cinema. This is the secret behind my fluency in hindi. Sometimes, I even try to learn south indian languages like Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam etc.Nepalese can definitely understand hindi because of their ‘Bollywoody' environment. We love listening to hindi songs more than our own nepali songs because we know that our nepali entertainment industry sucks at everything. We are interested in Bollywood and Hollywood celebrities more than our own. Because everyone loves better things.And Next thing is, Nepali and Hindi doesn't have huge difference. Both of these languages are like brothers and are so familiar to me. Most of the words are the same such as; Ghar, Parivaar, Sanskaar, Paani, Khana, Khazana, Heera, Moti, Chandi, Sifarish and many more. Overall, Hindi cinema contributes Nepalese to learn hindi.
How well do people speak English in Nepal?
It depends upon the kind of school the child adopt.. Most of the Nepali children are still far from the light of education and they don't have any way to learn english and other source of education... There are mainly two types of school child goes ... they are 1. Government School: Most of the families of Nepal are Poor and Nepal is therefore considered as the poor country. In government school the children have only one english subject to study and other all subject are in Nepali.. So therefore, most of the children learning in governmental school don't know how to speak and write nicely ( no good structure) 2. Private School: The middle class families and high class families of Nepal prefer to send their child to Private school as they have 1 nepali subject and all other subjects in English.. Most of the people living in cities go to these kinds of school and pay more to the school as a school fees.. however there are some school which are runned through the donation of people from abroad.. but most them don't fully donate and provide the facilities to the student as per the donation they recieve... However, the children of private school specially from Kathmandu, Pokhara and Biratnagar.. have a good command in English.. but Other schools of other cities are good in Writing and no good command in speaking... Hope this answers your question well.. For donation for the poor children to study please visit www.thisngo.org - this is one organisation i have seen who promptly works in the most remote area, Humla, in sector of Education, Health..etc. and are loyal.. Tenzing http://www.a1excursion.com
Why do people refer to Indians as Desi?
Not just Indians, but Pakistani's, Nepalese, and Bangladeshi's are as well. I personally don't like being called just 'Indian' - because I am Punjabi - and India is an extremely genetically diverse country, culturally as well - branding all Indians under one 'race' has always seemed stupid to me when we are all completely different racially, and culturally from one another. I'm Punjabi we look like this: http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/4548/gicover1tr5.jpg South Indian: http://blog.zap2it.com/pop2it/Sendhil%20Ramamurthy.jpg North-East Indian: http://www.the-aiff.com/images/team/senior/Bhaichung-Bhutia.JPG lol, do all these people look like the same race? I have always found the 'Indian race theory' rather patronizing - especially when people say 'this celebrity doesn't look Indian is he/ she mixed?' - because they have a stereotypical view of what all Indians should look, sound and act like - people need to understand that Indian is just a nationality - calling 'Indian' a race is just as stupid as calling 'American' an ethnicity.