Expat musings

on August 3, 2008

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GV

What does it mean to be Indian? What criteria must one fulfil to be acknowledged and accepted as an Indian?

The way I see it, even Jamie Patel, who has no memory of her homeland, and most likely possesses a Canadian outlook on life since she was born and brought up here, is an Indian. The colour of her skin, her last name, certain nuances about her that I’m sure exist that are telling of the Indian influence, all make her so.

Then there’s Georgina. A lot of people consider her and think of her solely as an NRI, an outsider. Someone who may think she’s an Indian but isn’t really. Because she wasn’t born there, because she doesn’t speak the language, and according to some, doesn’t entirely look like one.

I naturally disagree. Why should she have any less claim over her birthright due to an upbringing in a foreign land? Why is it that she must be made to feel alienated? Of course she doesn’t think and have the same views or same passions as one raised in India, it’s only obvious since she was raised elsewhere. According to many, however, she is still less Indian than someone who’s fresh out of India and is ashamed enough of his/her national identity to refuse to acknowledge it in public. How is that fair?

Then there’s me. Born and raised in the motherland, came abroad to study at the age of seventeen; at the start of what I consider the formative years that shape and mould one’s personality, principles and character. I have doubts about my Indianness. I have travelled within my country, I have been to rural places as well as other urban centres. I have certainly seen more facets of my country than someone who wasn’t raised there. I’ve had a sheltered upbringing, and I’ve always been far too comfortable in my own little world to venture out of it much. So, while I have viewed my culture and its people with curiosity, it was never enough to pull me in to absorb me into living it.

I am told I haven’t seen the real India. But then again, how many people have? How many of those other people in my building, how many of the kids I went to school with, have experienced an India, a “real” India outside of their own structured, self-sufficient lives? How many care? How many are simply content to be ignorant of the essence of our people? Does a lack of experience in meeting different people, going to different places, learning more, seeing more make me less Indian than someone who spent their last three years studying in India? Does a change of location early on in my life somehow brand me to a lifetime of divided identity? Does it make me less Indian if I don’t see myself spending the rest of my life in India?

I’ve only been here in Canada for three years. The dominant part of my life was spent in India, yet it would seem that the dominant cultural influence on me is Western. Am I trying to be too Canadian? I don’t think so. I’m being myself, wherever that leaves me. I’m not smart enough to pretend to be something I’m not. If I act a certain way, it’s because I am that way.

Is my thinking not Indian enough to satisfy some? Does my lack of experience mean that I have less right to talk, discuss and have opinions about any thing Indian than someone who knows more? While some people are close-minded enough to believe that absurdity, for the most part, people believe the image one projects. So if I think that I should just shut up in a discussion about Indian culture because I have experienced less of it, then that’s what people will expect of me. I am just as Indian as the oldest, most experienced person in our country, and just as much so as the next fifth generation Indian living abroad whose idea of Indian culture is Bollywood and curry.

The difference lies in the experiences. Those are what develop our ideologies, our beliefs, our goals. I would have possessed the same personality I have now were I born anywhere else in the world. The expression of certain behaviour, certain quirks, certain beliefs over others are thus dictated by experiences. While no one has the right to call me less of an Indian, what’s even more foolish is when I doubt my own identity as one. I can spend the rest of my life living in Canada, maybe my family will even be scattered all over the world for all I know, but even so, I would never hesitate before answering when asked where my home is. India is my home.

Just as some people live with their parents and their birth family all their lives, there are those children who move out early, but that doesn’t mean that home is any less important to the latter, or has any less of an impact.

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