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On June 1, 2001, at 10:40 p.m. Nepalese time (0:55 a.m. BST on June 2), the Nepalese royal tragedy that shocked the world took place in Kathmandu's new royal palace in a sudden happened. The 29-year-old Crown Prince Dipendra, rumored to marry Nepal's noble family's daughter Rana as his wife, in the palace and parents had a dispute, after wearing a military uniform, holding an automatic rifle, broke into the palace's living room, shot and killed, including the King Birendra, Queen Aishwarya, 22-year-old Prince Neelajan, the 24-year-old Princess Shruti and other 12 members of the royal family, eight dead and three wounded in an instant. And the crown prince ended up raising his gun and killing himself.
Since ancient times, the lives of princes and royals have not all been as glamorous and noble as they appear. Even Crown Prince Dipendra's ten-year love affair with Rana was not recognized by the queen. Although Rana was born a Kshatriya, her family was a political enemy of the current royal family, who overthrew the royal family in 1846 and ruled as a dictator for about 100 years. It was only in 1951 that King Tebriva restored the Shaha dynasty. It was decades ago, but it was enough for Queen Aishwarya to deem Rana unqualified for motherhood.
The most unfortunate thing is that King Birendra, who was the one who had the courage to give up absolute kingship and bring Nepal into the era of constitutional monarchy, had been immensely loved and respected by the entire nation and had also maintained a very good image in the international community. His sudden demise has left Nepal completely bereft of courage and direction. King Birendra's brother, Jalandhra, was away on vacation in Pokhara at the time of the bloodshed and was therefore far away from the disaster. His swift accession to the throne filled the vacuum of supreme state power in Nepal.
Later, I came across a book about the tragedy in a Tamil bookstore. The lady owner of the bookstore saw me picking up the book and started talking excitedly in Nepali mixed with English about the tragedy and how Nepalese people missed the dead king. I, on the other hand, basically couldn't understand her, but I paid complete attention to what she was saying and read the kind of mourning in her eyes as if she had lost a loved one. "We've all become orphans!" She said, still sadly, three years later.
There are many snippets of royal funerals in the books, and I have seen several photographs of Crown Prince Dipendra on various occasions, young, handsome and handsome, with no trace of fierceness in his eyes. He grew up as the legal heir to the Nepalese royal family and attended the British aristocratic Eton College. After this shocking royal tragedy, all kinds of rumors spread, but most of the Nepalese people were reluctant to believe that the Crown Prince was the murderer. See photos, I also can not believe, what kind of a thought and how deep that relationship, as far as casting such a big disaster, so that the well-mannered future king with such a tragic way to be burned to death, in a moment destroyed all the loved ones of the life and their own future?
Following the long procession into the new king's palace, it was later realized that common women could only see the queen, not the king. The new king, Jalandhra's queen, Komal, was originally the sister-in-law of the old queen, Aishwarya, who was there with her daughter and her son, the current crown prince, when the royal bloodshed took place, but with only minor injuries to her fingers. The old king's family of five all died in the bloodshed, no one was spared; the new king's family miraculously survived. This can not be said to be a miracle. Together with the prophecies in Nepalese history, this three-year old tragedy is still confusing today.
The line for the audience is long, stretching from the entrance to the new palace to the intersection of the Tamil neighborhood. It was basically local Nepalis, and I was one of the very few foreigners in it. In the back was a mother with two cute little daughters who live in Kathmandu. The older sister, Shristi, who is 9 years old, and her younger sister, 7 years old, both speak some lovely English, and Shristi is a camera-obsessed little girl, staring at me with big eyes as soon as I picked up my camera. She is amazed to see herself reflected on the digital camera screen and then circles me happily. shristi goes around looking for a ballpoint pen and asks people in line for one. Everyone looked at her strangely, wondering what she was up to. After asking dozens of people, she finally borrowed one, then came over to me, took my hand, and solemnly wrote on the back of it, Shristi: 5547054. "This is my home, this is my home." She said to me over and over again.
Komal, the new queen, sat behind a long table in the palace's reception room in a big red sari with gold embroidered phoenixes, white, fat and graceful. A row of photographers from a nearby photo studio carried their machines and aimed them at her. As I walked in with the Shristi sisters in tow, I saw a flash of surprise in her eyes. Walking up to the Queen, she stood and folded her arms in a shallow bow. "JAPPAN?" she asked. "NO, CHINA!" was a short question, and I saw another flash of wonder in the Queen's eyes. The Queen dipped her thumb into a bit of red vermilion, smiled, and dabbed it on my brow. At that moment, the camera's flash kept flashing.
Three days later I was wandering through the streets of the new district of Kathmandu when I came across the wooden boards hanging in front of photo studios with hundreds of photographs of subjects and kings and queens at the time of the Modi. It was easy for me to find mine inside as there were only two or three foreigners inside. I handed over 30 rupees to the photo studio and got back the photo of the Queen with me. The Kathmandu sun still shines brightly overhead, and the new royal palace still stands white and solemn and heavily guarded. But perhaps many years later, still no one has forgotten, here once happened a scene, bring the Nepalese how can not release the tragic pain.