It was on the front page of yahoo.

here is the link to

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081007/ap_on_re_as/as_nepal_living_goddess

Not sure if I agree everything mentioned  but .. Some Nice views here ..

But I was sick of reading gahugoro mentioning "don't attack others' culture" again and again. When did you started personalizing National culture as yours and yours' only ?
DUDE ...  its NOT others' culture. Its MY culture as well . Why do you think we should have been so concerned if it wasn't our culture to begin with? Its Nepal's Culture, MY Country's culture, embarrassing culture, hard to defend kind of culture, something like sacrificing Goat to fix airline engine problem culture ...that's the problem.
If it wasn't ours' , we would have probably just laughed around as we do with so many other stupid things from OTHERS' culture.

I do not call for Total abolishment of a certain tradition as each has its own importance within community...but helloooo ... I guess we can atleast do some modifications when the concerns has been being raised for YEARS now all over the world, especially voilating International Laws on National stage.
Ofcourse there are Child labor problems, Girl education problems too and I am sure many many others as well which I may or may not be aware of ... But I am sure they donot get CELEBRATED like this tradition in a national stage, not to mention WITH the help of the Government. Plus, You cannot leave a LAKH rupee Chor in front of your eyes saying that we have someone else to catch first who stole Two Lakhs. You should start from somewhere. Thats how things gotta be done.
Ofcourse, as someone mentioned, I am myself sitting this far away with IT degree and not doing anything directly to fix anything.
But Dudes .. I am at least changing my views and accepting Wrong things are actually Wrong. Thats a Start.. I suggest , you better Start doing the Same cause it will need a Lot of view changings before we stop feeling just jeolous about others' progress and actually start looking for a brighter and better future.

No logic can justify this inhuman tradition! Noone, even her parents, has the right to destroy one innocent girl's childhood. This should be abolished as soon as possible.

Mr. Vince, I second you opinion. There're many areas that need to be modified and changed. May be a kumari can be made only for a week or so during the time of Indrajatra because the main focus of Indrajatra is Kumari. That way, a festival is also preserved and kumari also doesn't become the victim as everyone is trying to portray her. All the animal sacrifice rituals can be abolished; cruelty to animal and any other rituals that bring sufferings should be abolished. But there're some people, who just doesn't want to see any of newari traditions; they have a big problem with newars speaking newari; calls 'chariot pulling' a joke as if all their traditions are rational. I don't like to play a game of mud throwing. Mr. Vince, if you call this as your culture and tradition and be part of it for the improvements; we can certainly do it and as I said, it needs to go on time and needs to be changed. But I'm still saying that I hate some people calling for the complete abolishment of it just because it's not their cultures.

Mr. Mysticboy, I was going to reply to you, but the reason I didn't reply is that it seems that you're arguing just for the sake of arguing with all your energy to prove it wrong. Your statement saying that 'if Kumari is made from any caste, it can still be continued' reflects your true intention.

I agree with Gahugoro that some reform is needed - not just the Kumari tradition but all aspects of our culture and religion, and that will happen with time. But, the self proclaimed IT crowd who live in a western world must look around them and understand that every culture, religion has their idiosyncharsies which doesn't resonate with the rationale of someother culture.