Remittances have helped the Nepalese economy gain a great deal out of the migration that the state is undergoing now for a considerable period. The discourse is that dependency creates vulnerabilities that posit variably on the scales of social, cultural and individual fronts. The paper is concerned with how migration affects and aids the Hip-Hop and skateboarding communities in Nepal.

Drawing on research conducted in Kathmandu, Pokhara and Butwal, all skate parks and hip-hop gatherings in Nepal, this paper documents the travelling, ‘within and outside’ of home, through an ethnographic account of a migrant first generation skateboarder to USA. How are these journeys undertaken, as single mobile workforce and a journey towards the entirety of an experiential space and self! The trans-national cultures though become an avant garde for the individual growth of the individuals hip-hop scenography is more prominent and flourished therein, the subtle elimination of the persona back at home is inevitable. However, this absence can also catalyze the emergence of memory-based representations where the figure becomes symbolic of historical influence rather than active participation.

Through this study, I argue that migration posits a discourse that adds to the community in its upheaval, though it produces a cultural fragmentation paradox within these communities. While the physical departure of artists and skateboarders often leads to expanded creative exposure, the displacement generated at the origin scene reduces the immediacy of their influence. The paradox complicates the notion of cultural sustainability, as there is what I call a diasporic drift- where cultural figures come to be remembered more for their departure than their contribution. This study builds upon but extends Bourdieu’s cultural capital and Glick Schiller’s transnational social fields, emphasizing not just the exchange of cultural resources but the incomplete reintegration and symbolic afterlife of migrated figures within home-based creative networks.