Ramblings On the Fence

i haven`t seen rabbit-proof fence (rainbow centre hasn`t acquired rights yet.) though i was reminded of one of mira nair`s films, mississippi masala, about an indian family expelled from uganda and running a motel on some US highway. how the father is in constant effort to try and reclaim his land from the government and when he does finally go back it`s only to realise that ``home is where the heart is.``

Jawahara,

You are too young, too early on the trail. There is the next stage, when the children have grown up, on their own path of realization of their potential, the dog has died at the age of twenty, having survived only on the left over Indian food, as it is in India. Then the short term memory fades and the long term one is enervated as though to close the birth death cycle. Then you remember the childhood, the long walk to the primary school, the care free nature of your child hood and feel sad for your own children in the developed country, you feel a longing for the land that endowed you with that indomitable spirit, the pursuit of knowledge, vidya, the greatest wealth. The dilemma dissolves, you return, to go to your old college, talk about aircraft long range operations, tell them why even a B747 cannot follow the shortest route, why it has to be 180 minutes from an airport. And they ask you a lot of questions, many are surprised by the intricacies of aircraft engines, the flight envelop protection of A320 where the machine over-rules the pilot, and they give you a traditional Kerala oil lamp, as a mark of respect for coming back after 35 years to kindle the spirit of enquiry among a new generation. You come home, light the lamp every day, which you never did before, in silent prayer to the spirit, the spirit of the land. You feel a completeness, from dust to dust.

Regards

Jayaprakash

P.S.

Then you get on the chowk to do some paki-bashing, you see tahmed seething in rage, godot on perennial attacks, temporal quotes from posts of yester years, ylh starts posting lies about abdus salam, then you realize that you are also a catalyst for evolution, the bipeds are evolving to Homo erectus pakistanicus, and you go to sleep with a smile.

Godot and Jay Sahibs,

If you are unable to appreciate more experimental writing, i.e. non linear personal narratives, I suggest you temper your responses with that admission. Otherwise, it sounds like both of you are two have some kind of definitive monopoly on what is ``legitimate`` longing for identity and safety-which Jayaprakash Sahib I am waiting for you to claim exists in the West lately and legitimate genre adherence-and Godot Sahib, I refer you to A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius for genre busting that will spin the socks off your ankles.

Until then, the writer has raised some genuine issues. Perhaps we can actually discuss them now.

Re: Jay, #18

``godot on perennial attacks``

Oh, please, Jay! This essay sucks and you know that. It’s just bad writing. But I suppose one wouldn’t know bad writing from good if one doesn’t read good writings!

This is not the first time that a less-than-mediocre writing has been hailed as mark of excellence and “moving” at Chowk, and it’s not going to be the last. Many Chowkies need a lesson as to what constitutes quality writing. You are one of them. This essay isn’t quality.

Jawahara
Well written, thanks, particularly this is very familiar :``But when you peel back the layers, the only thing that remains is: I want to go home``.

I think many NRIs have found that one good way to partially reconcile with the complications and contradictions you talk of, is getting involved from overseas in supporting unambiguously useful causes at home. For example primary education, AIDS awareness, health care.

This way, the fact of one`s being nonresident can be seen to even be an advantage. For example, IIT alumini who made their millions in pardesh, were able to donate millions to IITs` corpus? funds in desh. There was a NY cabdriver who by spending approx $2000 per year of his earnings runs a whole girls school in his hometown. Another example is of a well-to-do doctor settled in the US whom I personally came to know of, who has been running a mobile clinic in his home state for over last many years.

AND such activism(which should be of the benign constructive kind of course!! not like `friends of Bajrang Dal `:)) gives a sense of connection and involvement with home. Of course this should be within limits. I knew of someone who got admitted for a PhD in a prestigious US school, arrived in the US and got so involved in worthy causes `back home` that he returned without completing his studies.

Re: Samina, #20

Samina, it’s not that I’m against “genre,” it’s a matter of what is good writing. I believe I have an ability to distinguish good writing from bad. For me, the overriding aspect of any writing is “how” it is said and not “what” is being said; the use of words, metaphors, analogies, allegories, imagery, reign supreme over theme. Written well, a lousy theme can be very powerful; and written badly, as in this case, a good theme can leave the reader regretting the time wasted reading it. “Ramblings On The Fence” is a good theme; it’s the execution that’s atrocious.

If you want to talk about the theme of the essay, that’s fine. Just don’t go around showering accolades on a third-rate piece of writing.

I try never to defend my writing so I will not start now. My work is what it is; some people like it, other`s don`t. That is a matter of personal taste.

I will say that while Molly, her sister and cousin faced angst and fear and anger, most of us willing immigrants do not. I was not writing about ``home,`` as that one place frozen in time in India (or wherever) else, but ``home,`` the idea, the longing and the yearning for a sense of belonging.

Is this something that tears at me everyday, making me a misfit in the U.S., isolated and ghettoized? No. This is just one of the delicately shaded intervals of my life, free from true angst. For the most part I live a fulfilled, regular life, free from strife and struggle.

Though the root of his article (for me) has an emotional base, it was largely an intellectual exercise. As Samina says, I wanted to raise some points which I would like to discuss. I have no answers and do not claim that I do. This, like other things in life, is open-ended.

re Jay #18:

I wish you`d post more stuff like that. Too bad you had to slip in the PS to spoil it.

Regards
-sac

Re Jay #18
What do you mean left overs. Ours would refuse to eat her chappatis unless my mom had made them herself. And there was this strict vegetarian Iyer family one of them whom would cook meat on a daily basis because thats what their Alsatian`s diet required :).

Jawahara,
I didn`t know smart people thought and felt the same way I did. Thanks for the affirmation of sorts.
As always, found you writing penetrative and elegant in simplicity.
rgds,
PM

Here`s a poem that reflects on the `diasporic condition`

A Better Life
~~Diane Mehta

Driving on midsummer`s deserted roadways
past the forts and empires, temple idols
praised like liberty, the abandoned tires
in your expression

How the evenings spread like a rooftop fire
in the heat of winter; Diwali sparklers
making citizens in the sky, your gilded
gardens with fences.

Countries have no sympathy; only praises
amplified like distances for the newer
land: the housing gauntlets we had to enter,
stripped but with freedom!

Standards change like faith in a foreign country:
how the slurs ignited like gas; remember
when he lit the match, then the flame was dancing,
swaying like cobras

Don`t you miss the rains in July, your mother`s
hair in wet braids, sandalwood-scented, spices
shaped like cones on plates and the servants laughing,
chewing on peppers?

Did you pledge allegiance to lawns and fences,
better lives for us; the best western education?
Neighbors take the place of extended families,
freedom expires

like your father dying in Bombay, hardly
sixty when he leaned into whiteness. Packaged
smoke unfurled and pulled him with yellow fingers
past all the rooftops.

Now you drive on highways to work and homeward.
Winter cuts the windshield with blistered fingers,
feeds you flashes: corn in the husk on street-grills,
red with paprika.

re. Umair, #4:
``There is such a place. It is called Toronto :-) ``
By golly, I think you may be spot on!

re. #17 by Ansari
``i haven`t seen rabbit-proof fence (rainbow centre hasn`t acquired rights yet.)``
LOL!
Didn`t know you`re in Karachi! Maybe we could organize a Karachi Chowk association through which we could have to go along with real, live, interacts :)
rgds,
PM

Godot,

I disagree. I felt a certain amount of recognition and sadness in the questions the author was posing because I have asked (as I`m sure many of us have) the same questions. For example, today I took part in a discussion with a group of 4 relative strangers on the subject of war against Iraq, our current administration, the current scare for some of us. Four women, one a Jewish American woman in her 60s, a Dominican woman in her 50`s, an Israeli Jewish woman in her 30`s and me. The Dominican and Israeli woman were working on the Jewish American woman`s and my hands-and let me tell you- I get a manicure every six months with extreme self consciousness. So imagine all the reference points of ethnicity, class, political viewpoint, citizenry in that one room. I was really not sure how the conversation was going to go-esp. when the Israeli worker said, ``you know these people-they don`t value their lives- all they know is Allah``. I was of course, compelled to disagree and give my point of view based on my reference points and my family`s experiences in India, Pakistan and America. The Israeli woman gave her reference points-she came here to escape the insanity of the suicide bombings and arrived just before 9/11. ``There is no where in this world that is safe anymore`` she said. While I understand that her viewpoints have a legitimacy, I could not accept the tenor of her arguments-which was as I suspect, not very loving towards Arabs or Muslims. The Jewish American woman turned out to be quite critical of the Republican party and said that her nephew was marrying a nice, educated Indian girl, and the Dominican woman worker (who is a grandmother with her entire family in NYC) has been going to church everyday lately. ``There are a lot of crazy people in all religions``, she says. The thing is here-how would that conversation had gone had I not been there? If I had not said, my family is happy to be here and Pakistani but we are not intolerant and neither are the majority of Pakistanis whom I am certain are more reasonable than they are given credit for, and esp. more reasonable than the fundo element? What would have been said had I not said, ``My yoga teacher is a Muslim woman``, and told them of her identities as a Indian Muslim living in Africa, the UK and now here? Or that what happens in Iraq is not as simple as Iraqis have no value for their lives?
I wonder.

And after I got home, that conversation played in my head over and over-because they are not easy to have and are sometimes quite draining. Can I tell you that I have respect for these women as workers-I am cognizant of the fact that today, I was able to afford a personal service, and that I imagine providing these services is hard work? And while I was very uncomfortable with the claim of the Israeli worker that ``Those people don`t value their lives``, I sympathised that she was worried about her ma in Israel-while the subtext of Palestinian statehood was unspoken? (And I think she guessed I was for it)

This is why I particularly liked this part of this essay:

``But is the place we long for home, or a memory of home and how things used to be? Is it a tribal, immigrant longing for familiarity and dignity and culture and its knowledge? Or is it just a desire to be in a place where you can truly fit in?``

My answer is, I don`t know. And that in itself is profoundly disturbing to me at this moment.

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Jawahara #13 Romair, I am buying my ticket to Toronto right now. You will pick me up at the airport right? :-)

I would come and pick you up, however I have myself yet to move. I will be driving their in a month or two. So you can come along for the ride, if interested.

I don`t think there is any perfect place in the world, where one feels settled, if one has made the decision to migrate once. I have had the chance to live in quite a few places. The place where I felt the most uncomfortable was actually in Pakistan. That was mostly due to a feeling of a lack of opportunity to progress. So I ended up in the USA. Progressed quite a bit. But now I don`t feel comfortable here. Mostly due to the fact, that I think the US society is one terrorist attack away from sideling Pakistanis, and Muslims in general (hope I am wrong). So I am off to Canada. The only place left to investigate, that I have heard good things about, is UAE.

Basically, I am looking for a place where my kids will live. I am close to the point of progression in career, where I can go back to Pakistan, without worrying about a lack of opportunity of progress. So I will eventually move there, hopefully after an early retirement, while my next generations will probably be Muslim Canadians.

Home is where the heart is. It is where most of your family is. It is where most people are like you in looks, thoughts, language, customs, desires etc. This may or may not be the place where one happens to be living at the moment.

My ultimate criteria for home is, as follows: It is sports team you cheer for in a tournament. If in a USA versus India match, your heart cheers for USA than that is your home. If it cheers for India, then India is your home. It doesn`t matter if you have not spent a single day in India.

For me, my heart still cheers for the Pakistani team. After that, it has now started cheering a bit for the Canadian team. But it has never cheered for any other team, regardless of how much I have tried to force it to do so.

So my home is Pakistan - good, bad, indifferent, crime-filled or peaceful, poor or rich, fundamentalist or liberal, military-ruled or democractic, till death do us part.