Our Environment teacher assigned us to conduct a research work. He warned us not to use readymade and fake documents to complete the work, but he allowed us to choose one topic. We formed a group and we were to write a report on the local culture, heritage and festivals of any place of Nepal after visiting and interviewing the people of that area.

What students usually do when they are given such an assignment is they try to get information the net, newspapers and magazines. But the information on the topic assigned to us was not to be found on the net or any other source. So we decided to do some leg work.

Our research based on the cultural and religious heritage sites and festivals celebrated in Harisiddhi Village Development Committee, one of 41 VDCs in Lalitpur district.

This place has many kilns, which pollutes nature, clean and healthy environment, and also reduces the fertility of soil.

The majority of people here are Newars, mainly from the Maharjan community. The people of this place are friendly and supportive. We had selected Harisiddhi village because this village is the residence of diverse people with multiple languages, cultures, religions and heritages. We were also familiar with this area.

Our aims were to

• Study the festivals celebrated in this VDC

• Know the government’s plan for the preservation of cultural heritages

• Study the historical background and events regarding this VDC

• Find out the differences between the Newar community of this village with respect to other Newar groups

• Assess and document local cultures, religions, religious places and monuments, religious shelters, ponds, stone taps, wells

To get the required information and data, we interviewed the former chairperson of the village and and visited several places and met all the criteria as provided by our teacher. While on this project, we got the opportunity to deal with people and build our confidence.

Our teacher liked this research as it was based on facts and information obtained through our hard work. We not only visited the places but also had a great experience of conducting a fieldwork, which was really interesting.