Parya Sampada promotes intangible heritages on Yomari Punhi

Oh no the image is broken

Lalitpur, December 30, 2020: Parya Sampada projects, working on promoting the aesthetic value of tangible and intangible heritages has celebrated the Yomari Punhi dated on December 30, 2020.

Yomari Punhi is a festival celebrated on full moon day by making, eating, and circulating Yomari. This celebration is very mainstream among the Newar people group in Kathmandu valley and in Nepal. Yomari is a special steam dumpling that comprises of an outer covering of rice flour with sweet fillings (Khuwa, chocolate and chakus).


Fresh Yomari being prepared at Village Cafe 

SABAH Nepal, an implementing partner of Parya Sampada project has coordinated the fest including the Newari food, culture, crafted works, high quality dress, Newar Music and other corresponding outlets.

Krishna Silwal 38, resident of Lalitpur Metropolitan City (LMC) Ward No. 3 shared his thoughts after visiting different stalls The Village Cafe, Jhamshikhel. He underlined that these sorts of fest truly give tasteful culture of the Newar community. "The unconventional Newari food served in the stalls are truly tasty" he added.


Krishna Silwal, visitor, taking his delivery from Zyapuz cafe

Purna Laxmi Shakya from core part of Bungamati had a stall named "Maize Husks". She kept the diverse decorative items made from maize husk like sack, poppet, tea tangle etc. She was glad to show us the exhibition platform through the Parya Sampada project. Shakya and her significant other were in this business for last 15 years and had been supporting the family of 4. She earns 25 thousand every month and said that the Parya Sampada project help to explore the market of her items and give business advancement support.


Purna Laxmi Shakya holding a bag made up of Maize husk

With a cheerful face, Sugam Raj Shakya is explaining about the different wood crafts and items among the visitors from his stall, Sugam Wood Carving. He focused that the Parya Sampada project provides the exhibition outlets in different occasion to showcase the wooden products. As the wholesaler of such products, he is satisfied with the sales and monthly turnover in the business before COVID-19. His three family members out of 5, are engaged in this profession. He makes 2-3 lakh by selling the photo frame, stupa, kumari frame, clocks, and other decorative items in large number.


Sugam Shakya at his pavilion

Zypuz Cafe who learnt business abilities through Parya Sampada is serving the Newar food from their stall. The extraordinary Yomari, Bara, Newari Khaja sets are profoundly requested during the event. People can be seen que up for their delicious food items that were hygienically prepared.

The stall of Rato Machindra Griha Shramik Mahila Samuha is show casing the cleaning amenities such as Harpic, Phenol and liquid soap.  One of the members, Ramita Maharjan emphasized that after getting the training of liquid soap and cleaning amenities from Parya Sampada, most of the housewives are utilizing their leisure time in production of cleaning items after completing their household chores.  All three members in the stall are busy selling amenities of Rs 100/- per bottle.

The visitors from the Kathmandu Valley are enjoying the Dhime Baja, Live Music and Newari food in the event. Sambriddhi Dhakal, Program Coordinator of SABAH Nepal shared that most of the stalls are the byproduct of Parya Sampada project. They have completed the Entrepreneurs Development Training in Thankot, Pilechhen, Bungamati and Chovar cluster reaching 200+ beneficiaries. Beside this skill based training of Yomari, Bhoye, Wood carving, Dhime Baja, Lakhe Nach, Bhajan and food processing are successfully completed by the project.


Entertaining guests with Dhime

Robin Amatya, CEO of SABAH Nepal shared that this exhibition and whole exercises in Bungamati is a collective effort of all stakeholders. As the theme of Parya Sampada in promoting cultural heritage to foster tourism all implementing partners are focused on the same. He added that this project helps to develop a market chain through upgrading the local resources with indigenous skills aiming to promote tourism.

Around 700 + people have visited the exhibition and know about the aesthetic value of Newari culture along with the deeds of Parya Sampada project. The project is funded by EU, Switch Asia and implemented by UN-Habitat Nepal in partnership with CIUD, Lumanti & IHS.