March 3, 2005

It is my pleasure to E-TALK with Ang Pasang Sherpa, a very special person with a unique background. Once a member of the Nepal Communist Affiliated Student Union in Nepal, his journey took him from the Sherpa-Land in the Himalayas to the Land of the Rising Sun, where he spent almost 14 years in a collectivist country, Japan. A graduate of Amrit Science College, Kathmandu, Nepal Ang Pasang is currently the President of TISI (USA) Inc., a subsidiary of a multimillion dollar Japanese international technology and information system corporation located in New York. I think Ang Pasang may be the first Sherpa to secure such a high position in the technology and information field, specially as a President of a Multimillion Dollar International technology and information Corporation. Ang Pasang now lives in New Jersey, USA with his lovely wife Tashi and children, Rintsen and Dolma.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: After the involvement in student movements and in politics my continuity in acquiring education was de-railed. I was a very faithful and hard working cadre in the organization. The more I knew about the organization the more I was frustrated. I can not tell all in detail here but things were not as I expected. This was the time the parent organization I was in had a big ideological clash at the top and started to polarize in two different direction. Around this time in 1985 I left Nepal to study in Japan. Things were not as easy as I thought in Japan. I started to study in a computer school and at the same time I started to work as a part time programmer in a software company. After graduating from the training school, I started to work as a full timer. I was supposed to return back to Nepal in two to three years but again due to circumstances I was not able to do so. As I always was looking one step forward, I decided to step up my career and I started to hunt for better Job. After a couple of interviews with different companies I was able to secure a Job with my present company. Since then it has been almost 14 years I have been working with the same company. Initially, I worked as a software programmer. Later as a project manager with different projects, different departments and in 1999, I was transferred to work in our subsidiary, TISI (UK) in London. I always liked to work as software engineer but in the contrary my company always gave me responsibility in management since I lead one important project to it's success. During the time I was working in London, with my suggestion we consolidated our London operation to our New York office. It worked fine and helped to cut 40% of the total cost. All my efforts and hardworking always reflected with a reward. As a result, my company gave me the responsibility of president to run our subsidiary here in New York. I will work here at least another two years and will go back to work in Japan. It looks like the journey will never stop.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: I have lived for 14 years in Japan, 4 years in Britain and now almost two years in America. I like all these countries in general. But I like Japan the most. The humid summer in Japan, the foggy weather of England and cold winter in New York are those I don't like.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: Actually they do have the word "racism". They also did have cast system same as we did in Nepal and it still persist in Japanese society in some forms. It would be wrong to generalize all the Japanese as racist but however some kind of racial discrimination can be seen in Japan in different forms. I myself have never had experienced any kind of racial discrimination, but it definitely is there. For example there is a group of people who used to be known as "Buraku" and later they were renamed as "Shin-Kokumin" (New Citizen). Until then they were not given any kind of citizen right and they were even excluded from the population census. In the same way Korean people who were brought to work in Japan during the colonial period are still not given right to work in public schools and other public offices unless they are naturalized into Japanese citizen. This applies to all foreigners but I specially mentioned here about Koreans because they were brought in Japan against their will unlike other foreigners.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: First of all I would like to thank sherpakyidug.org and yourself for admiring my achievement. TIS Inc., our head office in Japan is comparatively a new company, which has a history of only 34 years. TISI (USA), Inc., is a solely owned subsidiary of TIS Inc. in Japan and was incorporated in New York in 1991. In TIS everybody is given an equal opportunity to prove ones ability. In our head office in Japan we have people form all over the Asian countries like China, India, Thai, Vietnam, Korea and so on. But I am the only Nepali in a company of more than 8000 employees. I do believe that my honesty, sincerity, hard working attitude and my ability to understand the Japanese society and it's corporate governance style contributed a lot to my success. At the same time I was lucky to get to work with a company where all efforts and hardworking are evaluated and judged with no bias.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: The answer is both "yes" and "no". First let me answer the first part of the question regarding Japanese corporate managers. The answer is, yes, such practice still exist in some of the old styled corporation. But, no, in newer and more advanced companies. Actually one recent research showed that Japanese work roughly 100 hours less than the average American counter part in a year. The answer for the second part is again both "yes" and "no". Yes, in old days, but now it is changing gradually. There are companies that even have woman corporate directors. Until 10 to 15 years before the answer was yes in general. Until then women usually used to work 3 to 4 years after university or college graduation. In this period, they usually get their dream husband and they quit the job to work as fulltime house maker. This was necessary because men used to work long hours and they have no time to help their wives in household works, like raising kids and so on. Now more and more women are at work. They also hold very important post in the companies.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: I can not pin-point what kind of motivation I got from my parents. Actually we always had disagreement in different issues. He wanted me to study law, instead I study science. He never wanted me to involve in student movement and politics, instead I was involved in the forefront and spent years in jail. But, what I can say is that he was a hardworking person and he always gave a great care to us. He was very strict, and at the same time he gave us freedom up to some extent.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: I was influenced by the communist ideology since my high school time. Right after the student uprising in 1979, students were able to win back the right of organization. Communist party was still outlaw during that time but their influence in the students specially those from out of Kathmandu was very high. The progressive students were much organized than other students. We had a very efficient organization and we were successful to be more organized after we got the right of organization. I myself was very active in the organization, I actively took part in all sort of protest and demonstration and fought in the forefront. At that time our sprit was very high. I am sure all these helped us to be elected in the student union at Amrit Campus. Actually I was secretary but not president. Later I was elected as president of Saraswoti Campus. At that time former mayor of Kathmandu municipality, Keshab Sthapit was vice president in my union. I had a great faith in communism specially in a poor country like ours. But, Today there is almost no existence of communist country in the world. China too has changed its face. For that reason my beliefs may prove to be wrong.

Most of the Student leaders of your time, even many junior to you have secured high level political or administrative positions in Nepal since then. Do you regret leaving Nepal and did not remain involved in politics?

Ang Pasang Sherpa: I used to regret a lot, but not now. I regretted for not being able to continue what I started. I don't regret for not being able secure high level position as leaders, turned corrupted.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: Mr. Sherpalama this is a very hard and sensitive question that you put on me. If you excuse me, I would rather refrain from commenting on this. All I would like to say is that only an authentic democratic system can do good to our country. Authentic in sense that democracy must be brought by the people of Nepal for the people of Nepal. Democracy is some thing that must be won by the people not given to the people. It must be snatched from undemocratic element, but not begged.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: To have the Sharwee Khangba is our common goal. The committee has got many enthusiastic and energetic members, but it is lacking cooperation among leaders. We were talking more tactical aspects without a clear strategy. Lets organize and make it successful with all our efforts.

Ang Pasang Sherpa: I am very lucky to have married with a lovely woman and who happens to be Sherpa. I always think who I am today is not only my effort, but all the efforts and hardship that we together experienced and shared. To me wife is a faithful friend, not a faithful servant.

Do you have any suggestions for sherpa community in general?

Ang Pasang Sherpa: We Sherpas are very brave and capable not only to climb mountains, but also capable to climb all sort of political and social ladders as well. Now many Sherpas are into education, and well educated. This is very good. We have to give continuity to this spirit. Sherpas were oppressed for a long time in our own country. We were not given a chance for proper education. Only education will let us know what our rights are, and how to compete with others. Sherpa Kyidug USA is the largest Sherpa organization outside of Nepal. To have our own organization symbolizes that we have a great unity within us. I wish the kyidug will play a vital role for the betterment of Sherpas both in US and back in Nepal. At last I would like to thank you for giving me this great opportunity to E-Talk.