It is always very pleasant when an artistic work opens new horizons and transcends its history to be able to make us discover new cultures or at least start an investigation. This is the case of For the sake of Sita, a Korean webtoon written by Haga (하가) and mostly set in Nepal Kathmandu area.
I warn that this short review contains many necessary spoilers, therefore I invite you to read the work first.
The story centres around two characters, a South Korean doctor and a former Kumari.
What is a Kumari?
Avoid triggering myself because as a modernist I absolutely do not believe that certain ultra-dated rituals should find a place in the 21st century, the legend says that: One myth — and there are several — has Durga visiting the king of the Malla dynasty each night until the king makes sexual advances ... and the goddess vanishes in a fury. She then appears to the king in a dream telling him: "Find a child from the Shakya caste. I will enter her soul and you can worship her as you worshipped me." The king complies, and the belief in the world's only Living Goddess is born.” (1)
Invested with sacred charges, the Kumaris who begin their journey after exceeding 32 characteristics (largely described in the webtoon) live from age 5 until puberty idolized, their feet do not touch the ground as they are the incarnation (proxy) of the Goddess. Their life lives are between comforts and hardships with difficulty in reintegrating into society after having had the first menstrual cycle and therefore losing their impurity.
With this historical background, our doctor meets a fallen Kumari who is savagely living after her first period and is forced to live a life of prostitution and starvation. In a swift first chapter, we travel through the couple's married life and death at the young age of Sita the Kumari who dies of a venereal disease she had contracted in her career as a prostitute.
Grieved, the doctor decides to make a pact with a deity and go back in time to try to save his beloved.
The webtoon exposes the life of a fallen Kumari with great sadness in detail (our Sita is banned and defined as impure due to the menstrual cycle).
According to the article I quoted written by Julie McCarthy, Kumaris are sent away upon reaching puberty, but not treated badly, they also receive a salary of around 6000 rupees monthly for life.
Now, how much this is true or how much it is not is all closed in an aura of mystery, given that for a decade the child goddesses speak little, and are deprived of any emotion since even a smile can mean "curses".
Sita somehow kicked out is saved by the badly aged doctor (remember he went back in time) who manages to keep her from starting a life of prostitution and consequently catching an illness. The rest of the girl's historical journey then continues as planned with the meeting with the young doctor (in this timeline), the wedding and the escape to South Korea.
A happy ending however leaves an aura of mysticism around it.
Many of the young Kumaris tell of celestial visions and a strong mystical presence within them. The author wisely decides not to undertake this side of culture, especially in the face of the various comments under his comics from various users from that area who asked to "be careful" with what was being told.
(1) The Very Strange Life Of Nepal's Child Goddess - May 28, 20155:01 AM ET
Heard on Morning Edition - By Julie McCarthy
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