Myself Mrs. Ramesh What is the level of your education
How long have you been married … why no kids yet?
Myself Mrs. Das
Our hujhbands work for the embassy. She works!
It is so hard to find girl children especially for ashtami pooja … of course not everyone is unfortunate like us to have 2 girls!
I tell you India has become disgusting … boys and girls are living together without getting married … they say that they are friends … horrible I tell you!
Just some of the pearls of communication that we were fortunate to experience …
And Just NOT what we expected to encounter on 15th August – 10a.m. - @the flag hoisting ceremony at the Indian Embassy in Luanda. Sure we went to the ‘event’ with a lot of excitement and energy … excitement at going to apna des … excitement in meeting with our own people … oh how hard we fell! (Soumya more than me …)
Picture about 25 people … scratch that – about 25 men standing around … in groups of 2-3 … chatting among themselves and greeting everyone with the customary Indian smile …NOT! No smiles here …
We waited for a few minutes in odd silence … Soumya feeling kinda awkward … all the men huddled together and all …
The lone music-system started to feebly play some patriotic song and lo behold … a group of women appear from nowhere to witness the flag hoisting …
One second Soumya was standing by herself and shazaam! – this group of women walks out of the house (the embassy is a house!) and almost runs over Soumya … eager to view the flag or whatever other reason they had to be in front!
The ceremony was held in mind-numbing tradition
- men and women in neat separate groups standing 6 feet apart
- no one was smiling
- The “head” of the embassy gave a soulful speech! Sigh … he read out 4 lines from the Presidents speech and then … just shut up! He pretty much read out 4 lines verbatim!!! No excitement here!
- The crumbly flag was opened … there was clapping … and after precisely 73 seconds of subsequent awkward silence … everybody dashed towards the refreshments – cheap cake and wafers …
- Of course - the women picked up their paper plates and went inside the house while the men ate outside … silently ...
My conversation outside went like –
“Where are you from” … “What do you do?” … “Weather is nice no?” … “This country has seen a lot of war … ” … with generous (and awkward) pauses in between
Granted most of these men were oldish folks – in their late 40s or 50s maybe … but not one of them exuded an iota of intelligence … like someone later observed – they just seemed to be in Angola with the sole hope of being transferred later to the UK- where they could make more money and retire … nevermind that most of them did not even speak English or anything intelligent!(in no particular order)
I COULD NOT IDENTIFY WITH A SINGLE SOUL OUT THERE !
Of course while I was standing in excruciating pain … wishing that all this was a dream and that India is a great country and that all Indians are not like this … poor Soumya had to experience the rude and discriminatory behavior of the womenfolk …
and of course all this while being given a strict visual examination …
Seriously – I always believed that Bombay was not representative of the rest of India – especially of all the small towns in UP and Bihar from where these folks came … or any other small town for that matter … but the narrow mindedness is just plain unforgivable …
Soumya has a good argument - folks from her extended family are from small towns, and yet they exude a certain class … at least they aren’t outright rude or discriminatory!
I know for a fact that we (most agnelites) grew up in a different society – a more open society … heck I had trouble adjusting to the narrow mindedness of folks I encountered in Bangalore …
Then again … am I so removed from the rest of the Indians? Has the international ‘exposure’ spoilt me …
Sure you can pull someone fom the plains of rural Texas or Alabama and you would see similar ‘frog in the well’ attitudes … so I guess Indians are not exempt … still … its sad to have such experiences when you don’t want to associate with the 7 odd Indians in Luanda!
Mera Bharat Mahaan – for whatever its worth.
And oh - thanks to Anu (and santa-banta) for these images ... pretty much the only positive thing!
5 comments:
venky, i can identify with every single thing you've said here - but buddy, this is not about Indians in Luanda or from small towns or any such thing - happens to me all the time in Bombay - why no children? how much are you earning? gasp! she talks to men! (yes seriously) - I see this during festivals in the building I stay in - the women gravitate towards each other - recipes and kids and movies and mothers-in-law - and the men form their own group - and vamsi and I just stare at them in amazement :)
Charu
dang!! sorry that you guys had to go thru such nonsense.....you are absolutely right about the "international exposure" that has spoilt us....
HOWEVER, I do hope you realize that there are atleast a million odd Indians in the US living EXACTLY like they lived back home? I mean with no iota of assimilation whatsoever?
and what was the dig about bangalore and narrow-mindedness....NOT COOL!!!!
Cheers
:-P
I have yet to figure out what to say to people who ask demand answers to questions of a very personal nature. If you've got a deft yet polite way to turn aside nosy uncle/aunties, do tell, do tell.
In the meantime...do take heart in those few unexpected times when you and Soumya meet people who are kind, sincere, and take wonder in all of the unexpected things that the world has to offer. It doesn't happen often - but when it does, it's oh so sweet.
Venky, Can completely understand how it must feel to experience something like that. Just your luck that the odd bunch of Indians gathered there that day were so narrowminded and uncivil.
Narrowmindedness, fortunately, is not defined by geography. So going by stereotypes and branding small town India as narrowminded, is not being very openminded. Such people are everywhere, I am sure even in Bombay, just that you never moved in such circles or never came across such folks when you were there. I know people coming from small villages(forget small towns) in India and I am amazed at how open, warm and friendly they are. The kind of people you ran into that day, are a universal malady, definitely not representative of small town India, or even India.
So take heart. :)
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