Going Viral: Becoming a Celebrity Abroad

My second trip to Nepal included a very unforeseen event: my partner and I became celebrities.  Truly overnight, we went from being an anonymous (albeit unique) couple in our village town to being dubbed the "viral couple" who couldn't go anywhere without being recognized and stopped for a photo.  Read on to learn how we became famous, how I ended up recording an original song/music video, and more!

Reading time: 10 minutes

The Interviews

It all started with one interview.  

Sanam's friend had recently been hired by a Nepali TV channel, and he reached out to us asking if we would be willing to be interviewed.  We discussed it, weighing the pros and cons.  Pros: we could help his friend to gain respect in his new job, we could open people's minds to breaking the barriers of caste/race/status, and it might even be fun.  For these reasons (especially the middle one), we decided to go for it and do the interview.

We truly had no idea how much this choice would impact our lives - and our society.

Within one day, the channel had come to our home, interviewed us, and published 2 videos, both of which went viral.

8,300 views in the first 44 minutes // 159,000 views in the first 13 hours

The videos are kind of long and are in Nepali, but if you'd like to watch, here they are!

Youtube, Facebook, and TikTok are the three main 'news' sources/social media networks in Nepal.  Our videos went viral on all of them.

And then the snowball effect of our initial interview began in full force.

While we were driving home from a stroll less than 24 hours after the videos went live, we noticed that we were being followed by a strange car we had never seen in the village before.  They ended up stopping us, introducing themselves as hosts of other Nepali TV channels, and asking if they could please have 20 minutes of our time to interview us as well.  We were stunned and said okay.

Notice the sticker that says "PRESS" on their car!

They came to our home, waited for us to shower and get changed, and then interviewed us on our roof.

We did interviews for two reporters with two separate channels.

They took some high quality photos of us that are some of my favorite souvenirs from this experience!

That night, a variety of new videos were posted using footage from these interviews.  Again, the videos went viral, racking up hundreds of thousands of views in a matter of hours.

Within 2 days of the initial interview, we had 2 million pairs of eyes on us.  We truly had never expected that this many people would be interested by our story.

The comments were overwhelmingly positive.  

Many people wrote that they were inspired to see someone of their caste (traditionally a farming, hardworking, rarely wealthy caste) finding a partner from an esteemed country like the US.

Many people wrote that they had never seen a true love like ours, one that defies the societal constructs of nationality/race/religion/wealth.

Many people sweetly commented that they love my voice, and how I can speak/sing in Nepali.  (Foreshadowing...)

We were enjoying the experience at first, but then things began to happen that showed us the other, less pleasant side of fame.

The morning after our second set of interviews, we were awakened at 7AM by "reporters" coming to our house asking for an interview with us.  At the end of the prior day, I had decided that I wanted to be done with interviews for awhile; they were very exhausting and I needed to rest.  That combined with the very bothersome nature of these reporters' early morning visit made me storm downstairs in pajamas to give them a piece of my mind.  In Nepali, I said hello and asked them if they were aware what time it was.  I then informed them that if they really wanted to interview us, they could come back in 2 hours with 50,000 rupees ($500 / the equivalent of what most Nepali workers can make in 3-6 months).  It turns out that they were actually Youtubers from the nearest big city who were just obsessed with us and wanted so badly to meet us.  They did not create conditions for a positive meeting, that's for sure!  They looked very embarrassed, said okay and left.

Sanam knew that the amount I demanded should be enough to keep them away, and it certainly did.  We never heard from those guys again.

Later that week, Sanam received a message from a friend saying that we had gone viral on Tiktok.  Neither of us really used the app at that time, so we didn't know we had become popular there.  Lo and behold, we were sent an account which had been posting clips from our interviews.  Each video had between 10,000 to half a million views.  Unreal.

From the first day that our interviews were posted, we were getting recognized everywhere we went.  Near the village, or on roadtrips across the country, it didn't matter.  If we went to a restaurant, we were stopped multiple times by other customers or even people who worked there to take photos and Tiktoks.  While we were driving, people in shops and on the streets would call to us and ask us to stop and talk to them. 

In any given day, I was asked (forced) to take between 5-15 Tiktok videos with strangers.  If I was in a good mood, I sometimes took a video or photo with them too.  If I was in a bad mood, I would reluctantly do it... I learned that even if I said no, people would insist until I did it anyway.  This made me very resentful to the point that I didn't want to leave the house. 

Sanam had to remind me that the reason people bothered us so much was that they loved us.  He would ask, "Wouldn't it be worse if these people were calling out to us because they hate us?"  This helped me to re-frame and to feel more positive about the experience.

It is important to note something about this newfound fame.  We never actually wanted to be famous.  Some people work their whole lives to be famous - seeking out careers in acting, singing, dancing, politics, you name it.  We just agreed to do an interview, and the fame exploded before our eyes.  I want to make sure to mention that I am grateful for the positive consequences of this, but I also want to express that it was not all daisies and roses.

The Song

Sanam and I were both being inundated with messages, calls, and friend requests from the moment the first interviews aired.  One call Sanam received was from a songwriter in Pokhara, the town in Nepal where Sanam and I met.  The songwriter wanted Sanam to ask me to sing his original song.  He had heard me singing a Nepali song on an interview clip that went viral on Tiktok and was desperate to have me record his original work.  I was very honored and actually thought it could be a fun experience to record a song.  We were going to Pokhara soon anyway, so it would fit easily into our trip.  After many more insistent calls, I accepted the request and began learning the song.

Fast-forward to Pokhara, and we were ready to record!

We recorded the song in a small, private studio called "Krazy Studio" in Pokhara.  It took about four hours to record, including a few breaks due to power outages.  Gotta love Nepal!

It was quite fun to record a song, especially one that is mostly not in my native language.  It felt like a challenge that was so rewarding to complete!

Here is the songwriter, nicknamed Song Premil, and the sound engineer who owns the studio.

I would like to thank coffee, Mountain Dew, and my love Sanam for getting me through the very energy-consuming process of song recording!

The Music Video

Once the song was recorded, we thought we were done with the showbiz aspect of my trip... until the composer reached out asking us to film a music video to go with the song.

I had only a few weeks left of my trip, so the timeline seemed unlikely.  

That being said, I told the composer that if he could get everything together in time, I may be willing to record the video, on the condition that he would use as little of our time as possible.  Sanam is starting an institute for teaching English, and I wanted to dedicate my time to helping him with this, to being with our family, and to being with each other.

In my last week of being in Nepal, the composer came to our town to film the video.  It was quite the experience, to say the least!

I had Sanam's aunts dress me up in a sari for the occasion.  I always feel like a princess when I get to wear a sari!

Our first shooting location was around our home.  A sari is quite complicated to put on, and there were no women in the filming crew who could help me to adjust it, so I only wore the sari while we were close enough to home that I could get help from our family to fix it when it got messed up.  When it was time to drive to our next location, I changed into easier, western clothes that I could manage myself.

Our film crew was awesome!  They were hired through a local dance studio, who also provided the dance crew for the club shoot the next day (coming up!).

We filmed at a resort, where we did a pretty epic drone shot.  I can't wait to share the video with you!!

We also filmed an in-motion motorcycle shot at sunset.

Big love to our awesome crew!

The next evening, we went to the closest big city to film at a club called The King Lounge in Ghorahi, Dang.

Not gonna lie, singing with a dance crew performing in front of me was pretty unreal.  I never imagined that I would be singing in my own music video, with a dance crew, no less!

We also did some solo singing shots, and some shots with Sanam being my back-up/support.

There were quite a few random people in the bar who had come to watch us film.  One of them took/posted this video of Sanam and I singing together, which we were sent later.  So cute!

This is us with the choreographer, who is also a viral Tiktok dancer.  (If you use Tiktok, you can find him @Hemant.49 - he's awesome!)

This was the end of filming - or so we thought.

Days later, on the final full day I had in the village before I was set to leave Nepal, we received many panicked calls from the composer and editor saying that they didn't have enough footage to complete the video and that we would need to use my final day there to film.  They apologized profusely for their mistake and said that they promised that they would be able to finish the video if we filmed for just a couple more hours.  I was very stressed and not happy about this, but we felt we had come too far to give up, so we decided to film once more and try to have as much fun as we could.

I put on a kurta (typical Nepali outfit) and we went to a local park for filming.

I did have fun when I got out of my head and just enjoyed the process.

The choreographer taught Sanam and me some new dance moves.  Neither of us are great dancers (especially me), so I appreciated that they were patient with us.  Haha!

I have to say, Sanam has continued to prove himself as an incredible partner over and over.  He used to be super shy in front of the camera, but he has pushed himself out of his comfort zone to the point of becoming a music video star!  He also did his best to protect me from the stress of this experience, for which I am infinitely grateful.

And just like that, the music video was a wrap - for real this time!

The music video will be released for the public to see very soon... I've already seen it and I am THRILLED with how it turned out, seriously.  I will share it here as soon as it is published!!

Conclusion

Now, over a month after us initially "going viral," I have a few main conclusions to share:

1. "Fame" is absolutely a two-sided coin.  It was amazing to feel so special, but it was also incredibly challenging to feel like I had to act a certain way no matter how I was really feeling.

2.  It isn't cool to film/photograph someone without their permission and share that for the purpose of getting social media views or likes.  There are literally Tiktok videos out there of Sanam and I walking on the street that people filmed from their roof... it feels so creepy and like a violation of privacy.  Please get permission before filming or photographing someone, and definitely get permission before sharing it.

3. Things are never as glamorous as they seem.  More stress and work went into all of this than people realize from just seeing a social media post.

Thank you so much for reading, especially if you have made it this far!  I am deeply grateful for the experiences that came with "going viral," for the blessings and the lessons and everything in between.

Now, time to enjoy some anonymity in the United States of America!

Stay tuned for the MUSIC VIDEO!!

Xo,

"Viral Couple"

🎥