Ch-ch-changes

#12 JAWAHARA

``On the point of diasporics drinking bottled water, I learned to do this the very hard way. ``

One day I along with my family went to a restaurant in Delhi. We took our seats and on the side table, a few foreigners were sitting. They were drinking water supplied in glasses by the restaurant.

Since I had my kids with me, I always ensure that either we take water bottles from home or buy bottled water, when outside. The first thing we ordered at the restaurant was Two Water Bottles. When the foreigners saw us drinking water from the bottles, they discussed something and immediately called the waiter to replace the glasses with the Bottles.

We started smiling and when they saw us similing ,they also started smiling.

Jawajara
Yes, we need to change with full velocity. Momentum is good for our minds.

Jawahara,
I agree with you.
one must change.change make the life colorful.
Now its up to the person to change for the good or bad.

Sorry for this late response to those who read and responded to this article. I was embroiled in some personal matters. Anyhow!

The point was that change (even before it is determined to be positive or negative) elicits this kind of knee-jerk reaction. Obviously everyone wants change to be positive and not negative (kind of self-explanatory which is why I didn`t spell it out) but very often just the fact that the beta or beti has changed in any way becomes a negative thing. Besides, since we are on this type of change topic....sometimes even early negative changes (and no I don`t mean living in a heroin-induced stage, but some experimentation with life) can lead to overall positive changes.

On the point of diasporics drinking bottled water, I learned to do this the very hard way. The first time I went back after a long time I so didn`t want to be cast into the firangi weirdo that I drank water from any source except a sealed bottle. I had lived in India for years without the need for fancy-schmancy water. Why start now? Apparently, the desi germs were very happy about it because I got the most virulent form of dysentry known to man. This lasted for about 3 months and clearly is not something I want to repeat....ever. So, I eat chaat on the street and drink sugarcane juice....but my water is always bottled and it`s not a firangi affectation.

As far as someone`s grandmother knowing more than someone who has moved beyond a 10-mile radius...what can I say? This is the kind of condescending (yes, I find it so; I think you`re wise so stop wanting something more for your life), feel-good, country wisdom that is repeated ad nauseam without really thinking about it. Is life and reality all about childbirth and cooking and whatever else good ol` grandma knows? This doesn`t mean grandma is ignorant or stupid. It just means...no, she doesn`t know more about life just because she is who she is and how old she is. Old age does not necessarily translate to wisdom or we wouldn`t have dear old grandmas helping burn their daughters-in-law, leaving girl infants out in the cold, doing jaadu-tona instead of real cures for their family ailments and oppose weddings just because of a one degree difference in caste of zaat .

Knowlege, even about life to some degree, comes from exposure and from travel and from thinking in different ways. Does she know about racism, ways to bring up children wihtout violence, about interacting with different types of people and coming to a common understanding, does she know about opening her mind to different realities, about world literature....heck, even Indian literature...the things that make life worth living?

Now there are Indian grandmas who lived life on their own terms, kick-ass grandmas...who have bucked convention. They do probably more about life than most people, because they faced their reality and did something active to help themselves. But, if we`re talking of the stereotypical, alu paratha making grandma...I am not convinced.

This does not mean she is not kind and loving and great. Heck, maybe she is the wisest person on the planet....I just need more evidence to believe that.

You have highlighted quite a few issues apropos to `changes` in a sentient being. I generally agree with your reflections on the subject and would like to make a comment.

What easterners find good about `local going foreign` people is that they dont change for bad. As in, acquiring habits that are considered as negative in our part of the world and likes. For instance, if a person changes into a physically/mentally mature person then that would be appreciated - I anticipate.

``Isn’t change a forward momentum in life``?.

Not necessarily. Social mandates and/or peer pressure often require us to change. Such forced ``momentum`` is seldom praiseworthy or needed. Change for change`s sake is not worth it. Why fix or ammend bridges which are not broken ?

Nice piece!!!

However, I feel that it doesn`t fully cover the aspects of change and its impact on our attitudes...
Agree with # 7 that construction and destruction represent change BUT there is no generic formula to outline and weigh both...

Kulharee Sahib`s grandma in India, who has never moved outside of the 10 square mile radius (I refer to post #3) has seen more ``life`` and more ``reality`` than a member of the US mass society where the scene has been standardized thanks to corporate culture from one end of the country to the other.

That said, why should the author of this article make a big deal of people being recipients of ``change`` why not be the AUTHOR of change? Why should we change living in US or UK and not cause change in those societies and do the natives of US/UK talk about being ``changed`` while living in India/Pakistan- that is the question all the ``love America till death do us part`` crowd needs to ponder and reflect over.

On side not:-
Which change are you talking about!!!
Construction is a change.
Destruction is also a change as well!!!!

Dear writer
Jawaraha
Good piece.
Change is better for the better growth of the human minds, but, if it is POSITIVE.
Remember, people go to USA and start picking up their negatives. So, what will you say about that? Haaann..............................

So, think before you write or speak. Though you did point out a very good topic for an open discussion. I also feel sameway, why people say, ohh, look he/she is so, nice hasn`t changed a bit. I take it this way, all it means is, he or she lives with same good values that we expect good easterners to be(though they are rare even in East, now). So, it is just an expression which accepts posivite change(the change to change country for more opportunities and sametimes, not changing their good values. Thanks

Well, agreed 1000000000000000000000000%, with some differences, of course.

``To me, someone who refuses to change, who digs in his or her heels mulishly, is someone…well, rather mule-like. ``

To me, someone who refuses to change, who digs in his or her heels pole-ishly, is someone…well, rather electrical-pole like...Bijlee Ka Khamba.

They go back home, pretend to not have changed, touching the feet of elders and wearing traditional clothes, saying all the right things, not questioning anything.

They are actually smart people knowing fully where they are going and more importantly What For.

In fact ,all changes are not good and all changes are not bad. When you go to college after your schools you change. You become more independent, more mature and more knowledgeable. This is positive change.

But at the same time, you start smoking, you start bunking classes, you start criticising everything around you, thats a negative change.

Change, in itself is not bad. The type of change i.e. for good for for bad is good or bad.

[....“He has lived in America for ten years. But he hasn’t changed at all.” I heard these words about somebody who was in India....]

Such comments are made more in passing - manytimes as a word of endearment, rather than any serious attempt at instant pshycho-analysis of the long-lost relative......Everybody knows and expects that there would some changes in any person over a period of time and space........

You chowk writers should find better ways to spend your time......instead of creating mountains out of non-existent mole-hills :) .....

Another “Desi-sporic” article from Jawahara. Being a Desi-sproic myself, I have couple of comments:

- there’s nothing “dishonest” about touching elders’ feet or wearing native attire when visiting back home. It is called getting in touch with one’s old self.

The ability to adopt is what might be working for some and not for other. There are happy people, and there are people who are never happy no matter what. Happy people adopt easily to any change, and unhappy people complain more an adopt less. It is for happy people to give in a little more (like 75 – 35) to unhappy troopers; because their ability to give more makes them what they are – happy. I think it is unrealistic to expect an 80 year old Desi grandma who has never moved outside of 10 square mile radius all her life not to react to things unfamiliar to her.

Funny thing, Indians in the US learn Odissi, we dance to salsa and cha-cha beats. My cousins crave for dried fish curries and certain leafy vegetables that they don`t get there. Frankly, we`ve not eaten them for ages ourselves. There`s a time lag....the expats think of their country as they left it, stuck in a time warp, and can`t believe change can (or should!!) happen hereabouts.

Jawahara, I have used that same phrase to refer to people I knew who have moved to the US.

I think you`ve gone off all half-cocked here. When I meet somebody after 10 years, them having spent it overseas and me having spent it in des, there are times when it feels like we are carrying off from our conversation of yesterday. That we have both grown older, have less hair, more flab, careers, families, etc. but fundamentally we are the same guys- we go to Golden Punjab for beer and chicken, saunter around the old alma mater laughing about the good times, feel as much at ease in each others` homes now as we did all those years ago, still enjoy the same things that brought us together- cheap matinee shows, Led Zeppelin, cricket...that he sounds a little different, r`s a little more pronounced and says ``you know`` a lot, but relapses into your growing-up dialect with ease when he tries.

And then there are those who pull out bottled Evians from their bags when Munna over at the canteen offers complimentary chai; they`ve forgotten (or chosen to forget) how great life was as a youngster in the home country- fond memories replaced by hollow references to the greatness of their current existence; they marvel (ironically) how things never change in India, at least not for the better; they look at you pityingly and suggest ways in which you too can cross over to the land of milk and honey; they proudly announce how they teach their kids only English to avoid any complex he may develop about their identity; they sniff, snort, pinch their noses shut, avoid, evade, shun, patronise, bully their way through the duration of their stay here and go back with the undisguised relief of prisoners spotting an open jail door. And don`t even get me started on those accents!

I think THAT`S what we mean. :)