In this photo by Niranjan Shrestha, farmers play with sludge as they plant paddy saplings in a field outside Kathmandu, Nepal, on Asar Pandhra day. Nepalese farmers consider the day to be auspicious for planting paddy. Playing in the mud, planting and eating special foods are common ways to celebrate the festival, which coincides with the beginning of the monsoon season. More than 80 percent of Nepal's population depends on agriculture, a sector that was damaged by the two earthquakes that killed more than 8,800 people in April and May.