My New Analogy

"Explaining Kamasutra to Eunuchs- Explaining lndia to NRl kids"

Aaravind Adiga's The White Tiger got him a Booker but it got me an interesting punchline, something l was trying to figure out for a really long time to run it in a parallel comparison.

I haven't yet read The White Tiger and I don't think I've time for it in the near future, but the only one phrase repeatedly mentioned and published and talked about is this one 'Explaining kamasutra to eunuchs' and I am just adding to it, by making a grave comparison absofuckinglutely analogous to it!

No offences intended to any particular caste, creed, sex, nationality, religion, my NRI friends and so on, but this one is dedicated to those kids who're a complete identity crisis,within themselves and outside.
Those kids who label themselves 'desis' but frown upon everything that is desi.
I am writing about the Non-Resident lndian kids, born and brought up in other countries, but some of them surprising even holding lndian passports but can never speak hindi with out an accent ,sometimes l doubt it!
l think they're pretending!

Those kids who can not watch Bollywood films without subtitles, they are so ashamed of being called lndian infront of firangs, that they say they 're born and brought up in a blaa blaa place and they've no connection with lndia, but on the other side, they talk of patriotism more than we do .
Someone ask them who was Bhagat Singh or Rajguru. You bet they'll say it was a hindi film!
They say 'lndia is my country-my home'. But on the other hand, they don't want to live in lndia, they say they will marry lndian NRl kids ONLY, they say they hate the heat,the cold and the traffic jams in lndia, they say they cannot survive in lndia more than 14 days.
They find the joint family system 'weird'.
They don't want to come to lndia because then they'll have to speak hindi and wear decent clothes, which means no spaghettis and micro minis.
They boast about their fathers owning BMWs and lamborghinis and condominiums with swimming pools.
Someone tell them l pity them, 'coz they are hanging up their on the 10th floor in 2 bedroom flat ,they call a condominium.

Ask them if they've ever lived in a 'real' house, with a lawn in the front and a kitchen garden at the back,with a huge terrace, with lots of noisy neighbors, a gardener, a dhobii and domestic help.
Ask them if they've attended a cousin's marriage where everyone is crazy dancing and singing and wearing a new dress every 6 hrs?
Ask them if they 've ever attended a wedding of the brother-in-law of their aunt's daughter's neighbor's friend and bought a new dress for it?
Ask them if they've ever had the joy of watching 3 bollywood films on the trot?
Ask them if they've ever celebrated Diwali with their grandparents and uncles and aunts where everyone prays together, lights up the home together and have all the fun?
Ask them if they've ever been in a sabzzi-mandi or waited for a delayed train for 6 hrs?
Ask them if they've ever been on a rickshaw ?
Ask them if they've ever had a lizard on the wall of their room or a cockroach in their bathroom?
Ask them if they've known the joy to live with their grandparents and loads of cousins?
Ask them if they've ever had 'real' lndian friends who speak hindi with a crazy lingo like 'le-le or de-de swearin a million times in between, friends who will stand up for you every time, who will embarass you to death infront of your crush, who will watch the same movie 6 times with you, who will chat with you on sms all night, who will borrow your shirt and never give it back, who will gossip with you about the latest love affairs,who will crib about not having enough money, who will talk endlessly and make you laugh till your sides hurt,with whom you're buying projects instead of making them yourselves, with whom you're exchanging farras during exams, with whom you cook maggi at 3.00 a.m., with whom you can sit up all night on a terrace and talk,with whom you also fight but make up?
Ask them if they've ever been in a discotheque and danced all night,with out getting drunk ?
Ask them the definition of meditation?
Ask them if they know Dilip Kumar or Mohd. Rafi?
Ask them if they even know APJ Abdul Kalam?
Ask them if they 've ever been in a tough entrance examination where 2 lakh students fight for a mere 200 seats or even 500 students fight for one seat?
Oh, infact ask them if they know what IIT or IIM is?
Ask them if they've know what bharatnatyam is?
Ask them more about hindu mythology and find out if they know the backgrounds of our Gods? if they know their stories and epics?

The questions might never end.I find it so ironic, but at the same time, it is sad, because the look lndian , have roots in lndia, also sometimes have passports that are lndian, but they dont have an iota of an idea what lndia is all about.

For them, India means cheap shopping, too many noisy relatives, lots of dirt and dust!

But the most appalling thing I experienced was how conservative are the parents of these Indian kids!! May be a 100 times more conservative than mine or yours.

For a midnight party , I could tell my parents I am going out and with whom and when will I come, but those kids lie to their parents about going to a friend's place for a project at university.Their parents are the generation who have lived in lndia and moved abroad for better opportunities, but I think it even shocks them to see what they've given birth to. They greet each other with a 'Ram-Ram' or a 'Jai Shri Krishna', they wear saaris and kurta-pjamas, the mothers are housewives, the fathers still pack a dibba for his lunch at work, they will make sure that on diwali they go to the temple, oh ya, also they get decked up every Sunday in the heaviest of lndian attire and go to a gurudwara.
The parents might've tried pretty hard to raise these kids in an lndian way,but the sorry part is that it has been too superficial. Just sayin Ram Ram is not enough, they ought to know who Ram is.
Another influence in their lives in the stupid lndian television. The K-serials, the saas -bahu conflicts and then they think all families in lndia are like this,which makes them even wicked and bitchy!

The fact is they are lndian only because of their color , but what exists under that superficiality is 'the gori chamddi with safed khoon' , they're cold -blooded and arrogant!

Even when l write this, l know l do've some great friends and a few cousins who belong to this category and they may 've been subjected to some confusion or anger or pity whatever, if they read this, but somewhere they also believe that it is the truth and they also accept the identity-crisis they're badly in and they don't find a way out of it!
I don't know the solution and I don't blame them or their parents, but they're made to be like this. Unless some parent realizes this fact and make sure their kid experiences the 'real desi'.

While I write this, I also face a dilemma about 'settling' abroad, because I would never want my kids to be like those ones-> they ought be loud, noisy ,freaky, hyper energetic,they ought to run around on streets, distribute sweets on their birthdays in an orphanage,meet their grandparents every weekend,play 'ghar-ghar' or 'teacher-teacher' with their cousins, like we all have been since we were little .

But since india is shining all glitzy and snazzy, I would probably make sure I come back Home in a few years,from wherever I am, after global education and some mooolah and lots of more such experiences!
The bottom line is that It is cool to be Indian only if you've known and experienced and lived the real India,lived among the glares of the bihari bhaiyaaas,screaming mottu maids,a poor kid running behind you beggin for money outside KFC, the richest man in lndia living in a mansion right across the poorest man in lndia, where Bollywood entertains, where some great artistes have been,some dirty politicians and also some funny new channels where the headlines is that Jaya Bachchan is fasting for Amitabh bachchan on karwachauth along with bahu Aishwarya Rai Bachan! ;-)

I hope I 've succeeded in explaining kamasutra to the eunuchs, unlike the Adiga guy!