On Sunday 25 Nov 2007 10:37 pm, Shoba Narayan wrote: > Hello: > I am Shoba Narayan, a writer and newcomer to this list. Shiv brought > me on board. Poked around the archives...very interesting group of > people and topics. Hoping to participate but bear with me during the > long stretches when I am on-the-road and away-from-computer. > Shoba
Welcome aboard Shoba Reading about your very well written "Pensieve" of how you made the jump from the US to India brought back a lot of memories. I remember having many of the same thoughts that you did. But mine was a different era. Your narration of what the pretzel seller said was interesting. I never bought any pretzels anywhere. But in the UK I was constantly bombarded with the inputs of Indians who wanted to go back to India. Ultimately the only trick that is required is to want to go back. It is obviously perfectly OK to emigrate from India and live abroad if that is what one wishes. But I have found that people in India are often caught up in the collective psyche of the Indian family. You do not always do something for yourself, but you do it because significant people in your family desire that your actions should conform with their desires. My neighbor's son "got a great job in the US" and therefore I am burning with jealousy and I want my son to do exactly that. I want my neighbor's happiness to come to me through my son. And my son does that for me. Wow!! Luckily for my son, going to the West, or the US, teaches him the meaning of individuality and breaks him from the collective thought process. He can then decide whether he needs to keep living in the US to please me, or ask me to stuff it and move back to India or to Tomboctou or wherever. For an India the "yatra" to the temple of the West is essential for self realization and the existence of an entity called "self" that is separate from mummy, daddy, aunt, uncle. grandfather and grandmother. shiv
