Udaaya (Samaj) Museum App - An effort to save the culture of Kathmandu.

Udaaya community is a community of Newar Buddhist merchant caste of Kathmandu in Nepal. These nine groups are :

1.Tuladhar (scale-holders)

2.Kansakar (bronze metal worker)

3.Tamrakar (gold/silver/copper - smith )

4. Sthapit (Carpenter)

5. Bania (local trader and ayurvedic pharmaceutics)

6. Shikrakar (tile roof builders and roof repairer)

7. Shilakar (stonemasons)

8. Silalik (confectioner)

9. Sindurakar ( weaver of special cloth for making dresses for deities)

These 9 castes are the ethnic people of Kathmandu valley, which follows ancient tradition passed down from centuries and hence has one of the unique social cultures and heritage in the world. But in recent years, Kathmandu is getting heavily modernized and becoming a metropolitan. The modernization and globalization has also affected the traditions and social customs that had originated and unique to Kathmandu, which is being forgotten by the new generation, replaced by the new ways of life.

Udaaya Samaj is an organization formed for preserving and reforming Udaaya Social customs and traditions consisting of these nine caste groups. Among many other things, it also preserves the information about Udaaya community and even runs a museum in Assan, Kathmandu. The museum exhibits detailed information of each of the sub casts and their contribution to the society, cultural jewelries, and accessories used in the different festivals and occasions, old coins of Kathmandu and many more.

The museum wanted to make this information more accessible to the world and also make the museum visiting experience more interactive. The museum contacted us, Semantic Creation.

Udaaya Samaj has it's the annual day at 1st Magh B.S., and the organization wanted to demonstrate the app to the members and guests at the event. So we had to work with a deadline of fewer than 30 days.

We developed an android app, which stores the information available to the Udaay Samaj offline. The information is more valuable to the members of society living abroad who want to learn more about their family culture and heritage. But however, this information is equally valuable to anyone who wants to learn about the civilization in Kathmandu. The app also has QR Scanners, which can scan the QR Codes in the exhibits at the museum. When scanned the app opens a dedicated page of the exhibit which provides detailed information of the exhibit and also the audio narration of this is available. Related images, videos and also other information is provided.

The app was demonstrated at the annual event, with Mr. Bidya Sundar Shakya, Mayor of Kathmandu Municipality, Mr. Satya Mohan Joshi, scholar and honored as "Man of the Century" by Nepal Government. The app was very well received by the visitors, especially those of the younger generation.

This has been a wonderful experience for us to learn how impactful information technology can be for the preservation of social cultures and traditions. We are very thankful for Uaadya Samaj for getting us involved in this project. We hope to work on more projects that works on the preservation of history and cultures.