HOW PEOPLE AVOID EYE CONTACT TO AVOID RESPONSIBILITYHOW PEOPLE AVOID EYE CONTACT TO AVOID RESPONSIBILITY
In the shared spaces of Nepali life—crowded buses, family kitchens, office meetings, chowks—we often find ourselves caught in moments where someone must step up. A task has to be done, a seat needs to be offered, a bill must be paid, a truth has to be acknowledged. And in that brief pause before action, eyes begin to wander—but not toward the problem. They scatter elsewhere: downward, upward, to the side, into the phone, into a pretend distraction. We become suddenly busy with something—anything—that doesn’t require us to meet another person’s gaze. Avoiding eye contact is not always an act of shyness or humility. Sometimes, it is a quiet strategy to sidestep responsibility. If we don’t look, maybe we won’t be seen. If we aren’t seen, we can’t be asked. And if we aren’t asked, we won’t have to say no. In Nepali culture, where indirectness is often preferred over blunt confrontation, avoiding eye contact becomes a subtle language of its own. It allows people to say I don't wa...