Bikash and I visited an active member of the Maoist Party in Biratnagar and interviewed him. Basically from the interview, the Maoists use every mean to get their voice heard and only as a last resort do they strike. Their strikes are always published ahead of time and often get the attention of even non-Maoists resulting in them striking.
After the interview, Bikash and I went to a restaurant, ate lunch, and translated the dialogue. We then went to Bikash's house where I photographed his family, which happen to be Madheshi (one of the ethnicities I needed to photograph) prepare for the nightly festivities. His sisters lit candles and his parents visited a temple. They had me participate in everything and didn't seem to care that I had no idea what was going on most of the time.
The priest at the temple had me take a tika and didn't mind me taking photos of him and the temple. After that I returned to the hotel where a band was playing outside and people were dancing. Something that's interesting: during the festival there are always tons of guys dancing in the street... no girls. The girls do not dance. When they tried to get me to dance at the hotel I replied with, "I only dance with girls." Everything ended around 8:00am and went to bed.
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