During the observations, I also found that almost all the time, girls would be in their groups of two or more same-sex peers. They were much more likely to be holding hands, hugging also as shown in photo 6 (in the next page) and also sometimes combing each other’s hair, putting eye makeup on each other. As mentioned above, the secondary level girls spent most of their break times by chatting with peers from their same gender in balconies or at the playgrounds margins as shown in photo 7 in the next page.
Regarding the recurrent topics during the chatting, girls mentioned gossiping about other students and people in their community, sharing their problems like menstruation, talking about the television shows and sharing beauty tips. Nisha, grade ten female student in the semi-urban school, thought that it was a good time-pass and also informative to talk about other students and other community people. As she elaborated, they frequently talked about the grades, regular or irregular attendance and attitudes of other students. Moreover sharing the personal problems mainly about menstruation, other health related issues and also incidents of harassments by the boys outside
the school helped them to deal with it. Nepali family dramas and comedy serials like ‘tito satya’, ‘jire khursani’ and ‘meri bassai’ on television, and Nepali along with Hindi movies were another recurrent topic for discussions among them. I believe that due to such craze, when I asked them to name their role models, almost all of the female students in the urban
school and majority of students in the semi-urban school named television and movie actresses including Karisma Manandhar (Nepali movie actress), Deepa Shree Niroula (Nepali television actress) and Ashiwarya Rai (Indian actress and former Miss World). Only few girls named Anuradha Koirala (Nepali social worker), Chari Maya Tamang
Photo 6 - Girls holding hands and hugging
(Nepali social worker) and Pasang Lamhu Sherpa (Late Nepali Mountain Climber) as their role models.
During the interviews, most of the girls stated fashion as another popular issue for chatting. I observed that girls were interested and responsive whenever the topics of fashion or make-up came up during the interviews and informal chats. In the urban school, there was a group of three girls in grade ten who appeared to be more fashion aware in their outer appearance. During the interview, Manju, one of those girls, stated that she was very conscious about their looks and the way others perceive them. She thought that it was important for girls to look beautiful and to have a good figure. While most of the girls were in school dress (blue skirts, white shirts and black shoes with simple school bags), they usually wore different color tights and sneakers, sometimes also sandals and had colorful side bags. During the observations, I found that during the break times, those three girls would generally gather their same-sex peers and teach them hair styling and how to put eye and lip make-up. The other girls seemed very excited to learn the art of make-ups and hair styling. There were also some girls like Ganga, a grade ten female student in the urban school, who thought that only those girls who had homes around the main highway had access to and also could afford to be beautiful, as she explained:
Some girls are more worried about their self-image. They think that wearing make- up and fitting dresses increases their maturity and popularity. I do not believe in that, and to be honest, I cannot believe in that. I do not have money to buy those expensive make-up kits and dresses.
However, a majority of the girls in the semi-urban school did not give that much importance to make-up and fashion in the school as Nisha. As a grade ten female student in the semi-urban school, she thought that the purpose of coming to school was to get education, not to be beautiful. Sarita, a grade ten female student of the same school also stressed the inner beauty not the outer appearance, and thought that it was time to concentrate on studies not on their appearances.
In the case of boys, during the observation I found that apart from occasional shoves in the playgrounds, they would never touch each other. Despite being close peers, teasing and making jokes about each other was also popular among boys. As Rabin, a grade ten male student in the semi-urban school, stated, rather than forming a group and chatting, they would be involved in sports activities. Boys, in both schools, regarded forming groups and gossiping as a ‘girly thing’ to do. They spent their time mostly playing football or taking about sports including football, cricket and the latest wrestling matches. They told that often they had gatherings at a friend’s house who had cable to watch sports on television after the classes or during days off at school. When I asked them about their role models, almost all of them named players which included Cristiano Ronaldo (footballer from Portugal), Lionel Messi (footballer from Argentina), Sachin Tendulkar (cricketer from India), and United States’ wrestlers and Hollywood actors like John
Seana and The Rock. Unlike girls, most of the boys in both schools did not give
importance to their looks or fashion. During the interviews, Rajan, a grade ten male student in the semi-urban school, thought that their age represented maturity, so being a ‘man’ meant to be rough in their appearance and he wanted to represent such an image. However, a few boys like Amir in the urban school thought that boys should also maintain their looks. He showed me his comb in his pocket which he thought would help him to have good and stylist hair and get noticed. He added that none of his peers teased him for having comb.