Kathmandu, Oct. 4 -- Coming home for Dashain and Tihar is always equal parts amazing and awful. Amazing because obviously I get to meet my grandparents and dad and mom and also catch up with my cousins who keep meeting without me throughout the year. Not to mention all the glorious home-cooked delicacies I get to enjoy, and that too without actually having to chop or cook anything myself.

But I also dread this festival because it's when there's no escaping all the prodding, probing, nagging, and the eventual scorn. I mean as much as I enjoy putting on fancy clothes, meeting relatives for tika and sticking jamara on my hair with bobby pins, I wish I could skip the part where I get questioned about my life, career, babies (or lack thereof)...