A TEENAGER from Nepal who found a new life in Oxford eight years ago has won a national poetry contest.

Mukahang Limbu, a pupil at Oxford Spires Academy, in Glanville Road, East Oxford, is the winner of the First Story National Writing Competition.

The 13-year-old impressed judges with his poem When I Came From Nepal after writing of his shock adapting to life in Oxford.

Mukahang, from Rose Hill, said: “I did not expect to win.I sat down for 30 minutes not speaking.

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“Many people find it very hard to move to a certain place. I wanted to write about my experience and share it so they can feel connected and adapt.”

The Year Nine student moved with mother Rina, a housekeeper at the Malmaison Hotel, from his hometown of Dharan in Nepal in 2007.

He said they moved to the city for his education, but found it difficult leaving his grandparents and father Mulukfing Limbu behind.

Mukahang said he was inspired to write the poem after a geography lesson about immigration.

He added: “Oxford felt surreal to me. Nepal is very loud and eccentric but here it feels more quiet and peaceful.

“Now I’m comfortable here and this is my home.”

Oxford Mail:

Mukahang receives his prize from Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. Picture: Richard Budd

Although he was not fond of British food when he first came to the city, he now loves to indulge in pastries.

He added: “You can’t get croissants or anything like that in Nepal. I’m a fan.”

More than 3,000 entries were received for the nationwide contest, sponsored by the Sunday Times.

His winning entry was published on The Sunday Times website after he received his prize certificate from Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. He also won four places on a residential writing course to share with his fellow pupils.

Emily Webb, programme manager of creative writing charity First Story, said: “His poem is an incredibly mature, delicate piece of writing that evokes so hauntingly the lost sights and smells of Nepal and the alien sense of his new home in England.”

When I Came From Nepal.

When I came from Nepal

As I clutched my suitcase …

thick hot sweat

built in the slits

of my palms, which

shook holding its cool

metal brace. We walked

into day-winds, thick

as dried out paint

on unwashed canvas.

The sky was painted

daffodil yellow. The ground

was a dirty grey.

There was a metal bird:

an array of fearful,

forgotten paint.

Missing the feeling of home

I smell the iron rust

of the Municipal Gardens.

The sour tang of home still

sits on the tip of my tongue

like the zest of sweet citrus

fizzing.

I did not know

of grey, gravel roads,

or the bright buzzing

of scarlet cars.

I did not know

of lonely red-bricked houses,

gazing strangers,

standing next to next,

military officers, in endless rows.

I did not know

of silence in the streets,

or the secret whispers on the buses,

or the sly gestures of restaurants.

I know now

In this place

where I did not know,

the things I did not know

embrace me in ways

I didn’t know