"He had complained, but kept working"

It’s been more than two decades since Khina Bista’s husband, Amit Karki, traveled to Qatar for the first time. They married twelve years ago, when he was back in Nepal during a vacation.

“Honestly, we haven’t seen each other much since we married. He spent his life in Qatar working, and only came home every other year. I raised our sons here but they never really got to know their father and now he is dead,” the widow says.

Her sons often told her they wanted Amit to quit his job in Qatar and come home

“I wanted him back too, and told him that we would do anything,” she says. “That we would make it together, figure it out, as long as he just came home.”

If it weren’t for the children, 11 and 7, Khina says wouldn’t make it.

“They ask and ask about their father but I have no answers, I can’t even console his 65-year-old mother,” she says. “If you haven’t experienced it, you can imagine what happens to a family when all hope about the future is lost. When the only person providing income dies.”

They knew Amit had not felt well for a while. He had complained, but kept working. One day when he came home to the apartment he shared with some coworkers, he was in such pain that they drove him to the hospital.

“He was dead when he arrived said my nephew, who also works in Qatar. I told him to ask around and then he learned that it was probably a heart attack, but nobody has told us anything detailed as to what happened and why,” Khina says.

Amit’s family got a little more than $5,753 from the Nepali government and another $11,500 from his life insurance.

“I don’t know how much was owed, but we have only gotten very small sums from [his employer]. He also didn’t have a real work contract at this latest job. His earlier employers have now paid out what he had accrued with them.”

The loss is even more traumatic considering that Amit had started talking about coming home for good, that he was finished with Qatar.

“We were expecting him to live with us here soon, and instead we got him home in a casket,” Khina says.

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