Nepal and South Africa

Insight, wit and analysis from BBC correspondents, journalists and writers from around the world - prestented by Pascale Harter. In this edition:

"I know it's racist, but ..."

In the words of Nelson Mandela, South Africa has had "no easy walk to freedom". The country's road to democracy has been long ... so is the nation nearly there yet? Is it now really a country for all its people, Blacks and Whites and so-called Coloureds?

The laws that underpinned apartheid were officially dismantled nearly 20 years ago. It’s been 18 years since the African National Congress first became the party of government. And yet the idea of a rainbow nation is still something of a pipe dream for many people. Tara Neill traces today's attitudes to race through that most telling of barometers, bureaucracy. Just which box should be ticked on behalf of her mixed-race daughter?

Heads in the clouds, feet on the ground

Getting around in Nepal has never been easy, which is logical enough when you consider that it's set among the mountain ranges of the Himalayas. Recently, though, Chinese investment has been funding lots and lots of new roads. But how will locals - and the tourists who flocked to the country to trek its breathtaking trails - take to the new routes? James McConnachie boarded a bus to try them out ... and wished he hadn't.

(Image: A bus for Black people only in Durban, South Africa, circa 1985)