Female rice farmers are plowing their fields at night in the nude to please the rain god during a dry spell in southwestern Nepal. A 35-year-old farmer, Ambika Tharu, said she and other women were daring to bare all for the rain god because of a delay in the annual monsoon season and the need for precipitation for their rice crops. "My mother-in-law said the God would be pleased and make rainfall if women till the land naked," Tharu told the Himalayan Times newspaper.
| The Rain God told me he likes the ones with the big, plump honkers... |
The delay of the monsoon rains, which usually begin in the first week of June in Nepal, have prevented farmers from planting rice. Weather forecasters in the capital Katmandu — 310 miles northeast of Baijapur village, where the naked farmers are appealing for rain — said the situation is expected to improve in the next few days. |