The Mahakali river – named after a goddess, is the border that separates Nepal and India in the west. Today, I will take you to the part of Nepal which is beyond the western border that is across the Mahakali River. Two Villages named ‘Chandani’ and ‘Dodhara’ lies across the river. Though they are the part of Nepal and all administrative functions are under Government of Nepal, the Indian influence is higher. They almost fully depend on the Indian market. Due to the big river, India is much easier for everything. Till the time I was there, 2 years before, they ask for Indian currency if we have to pay for something, I was amazed. Even If they want to come across the river, they have to enter the indian territory to the bridge that linked them to the rest of Nepal.
I had read about the place in my social studies book at school. I am feeling lucky that I had a chance to be there at least once. Few years ago a suspension bridge was build to link those two Villages to rest of Nepal, Probably the longest one in Nepal. The total length of the bridge is approximately 1.5 kilometers. That is not only a bridge but also it eliminated the distance and made a complete Nepal.
I was in Dhangadhi, a city in far western region which is almost 60 kilometers from western border. I and one of my senior decided to go and see those part of Nepal. So got a motorbike and started our journey on a hot weather more than 40 degree Celsius. I tried to find the distance we traveled on Google maps. We still have to travel 10 kilometers more to reach the bridge. Since both were new to the place it took a little longer than usual for us because we took some wrong turns. Finally we crossed the bridge, traveled around the village , had tea, paid Nepali rupees equivalent to some Indian rupees and returned back to our base.
