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🇰🇷 South Korea /Disasters & Emergencies

“May You Live in Heaven”: A Wife Whispers Three Times to Her Flood-Dead Husband

From Hankyoreh · () Korean

Translated from Korean and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Ongoing story
  • Nepal’s flood death toll has approached 1,000 as authorities continue recovering and identifying victims seven days after the disaster.
  • At Kathmandu’s Pashupatinath Temple, customs official Nawakul Sharma was cremated after rescuers found his body nearly 100 kilometers from the border post where he worked.
  • Survivors at a Kathmandu hospital described lost relatives, severely injured family members and the anguish of waiting for news about missing loved ones.

The wife stroked Nawakul Sharma’s face, covered with flowers and marked with red powder, before leaning close to whisper the same farewell three times: “May you live in heaven.” As a traditional Nepalese instrument played, flames rose around the 33-year-old customs official’s body at Kathmandu’s Pashupatinath Temple.

May you live in heaven.

— Nawakul Sharma’s wifeShe whispered the farewell three times during her husband’s cremation at Pashupatinath Temple.

Smoke and white ash drifted above the Hindu holy site and cremation ground. Ash that did not rise was released into the Bagmati River beside the crematorium. Sharma was among the victims cremated there after his body was found days after Nepal’s catastrophic flooding.

On the morning the floods struck, Sharma had been inspecting cargo at a border checkpoint in Timure, between Nepal and China’s Tibet. Relatives said rescuers found him in the Gorkha area, nearly 100 kilometers away along the Trishuli River. His relative Kadili Diwak said the family identified the body at Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital only the previous day, after waiting near the hospital in hope and fear.

Only two people, including me, survived among the friends who were around me.

— Subash KuldergaThe flood survivor described the deaths of fellow truck drivers.

The disaster’s toll has continued to rise as bodies are recovered and identified. An initial estimate of around 100 deaths grew to nearly 1,000 by the seventh day. At the Kathmandu hospital, walls were covered with notices from families searching for missing relatives.

My daughter-in-law and wife were swept away. My grandson was probably swept away too. My heart is in great pain.

— Gurkha TabaThe hospital patient spoke about relatives still missing after the flood.

Survivors spoke less of relief than of guilt and loss. Truck driver Subash Kulderga, rescued in Lunga below Timure, said only two people from his immediate circle survived, while most of roughly 40 fellow truck drivers nearby died. Another survivor, Gurkha Taba, lay in hospital with pneumonia and worried about a son in intensive care, a wife, daughter-in-law and grandson who remained missing. Yubaraj Lama, who had been searching for his three-year-old nephew, continued returning to the hospital because he had nowhere else to go but wait.

There is nothing else I can do except keep coming here. I hope that if I wait, someone who knows where he is will appear.

— Yubaraj LamaHe continued searching near the hospital for his three-year-old nephew.
About this summary

Originally published by Hankyoreh in Korean. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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