And so it has
been every day of my life here in the United States, not that anyone cares,
really. But I care enough to have noticed a few points and have come up with
enough to write another post in my blog.
It is indeed,
delightful to be recognized as an Indian here in the United States. People are always interested in
our accents, where we come from in India, what brought us here, and how long we have
lived here. Some are curious about how many languages we speak and if our
children speak it. So there is never a
dull moment when we meet new people, there is always something to talk about. I
love it. Through my several trips to a few countries over the years, I have
found myself to be a representative of India
that I have even memorized some statistics and can almost always knock the ball
out of the park with that. Recently, I was invited to a book club (not mine) to
talk about India. It was a delightful 3 hour discussion! Every time, my book
club(which is the #1 in the world) reads a book on India, I am thrown a bunch
of questions and I just love handling them. At those moments, I am fully aware
that I have survived the move to another country, survived the culture shock
and am living this dream in a country that I have embraced with all my heart
and now telling intrigued friends about the country I am from. When a friend
visits from out of town, sure, let us meet in a Indian restaurant..., when
friends come over, sure it is Indian food. When I misspeak or be flagrantly
inappropriate, "Oops! I am sorry, I am from India. English is not my first
language". So yes, I do milk it a bit ;)
And every coin
has two sides, does it not? This other side is my dilemma. Some are quite
obvious and in my face while others can be very subtle. Either way a delight
can turn to a dilemma in a second. Say for example, when I am chomping at the
bit to give a smart quip and someone turns to me and asks, "Is that how it
is in India?". Suddenly, I go from having anything remotely intelligent to
say to being labeled as a citizen of another country. Slowly, the air has
deflated from the intelligent moment to agreeing with my Indianness.
Or when I am mistaken for the one other overweight
Indian mother in my son's school....it leaves me to wonder if that is how I am
viewed. Not for my genuine niceness(!?) or my intellect(!!??)but for my Indianness. Or the random stranger who
tells ,"Oooh! I want to go to India and do yoga" ....probably has no
idea I am not into yoga. Never was, never will. Forget the strangers, when I am
in deep, serious conversations with my friends and the topic suddenly veers to,
'Indian food'. Or the never ending questions of 'Did you have an arranged marriage? 'Was it
arranged when you were kids?' or 'when did you learn to speak English?' There
it is again. All my energy and thought now hangs on me handling my Indianness.
I still muster something. Sometimes smart, sometimes sassy. But I always hold
my chin up.
You have to understand
that when I say dilemma, it is NOT death, it is just a dilemma. It washes over in
a while and I am fine again. Ready to be delightful and to ready be delighted
with life. It is a fine balance (no, not the Indian book). It is a tight rope
walk. I am proud to be an Indian. Proud to flaunt it in a foreign land. Proud
to prove that it can be done.
It's just that when I am asked to prove it over
and over again, it gets a bit old.
