What will I teach my daughter?

Re: # 118

Hamid Sahib… my experience is a bit different. My wife is a 3rd generation Greek American, and fluent in Greek (she seems to think she is not). My boys know every Punjabi curse word, are conversational in Greek and get by with their English as well. Teaching your kids their heritage (of which language is a major part) is important. I am making a conscious effort to teach my kids to read and write in Urdu instead of sending them to our local mosque to get brainwashed.

I agree with Azmat about his basic premise about passing on one’s values to one’s kids. However he is taking it a bit too seriously. In time to come, it may not be important for Azmat to have passed on his traditions on to his kids, but they will certainly feel cheated in the absence of it.

malikj,

``I would hate a son or a daughter who would respond to me my urdu questions in english.``

why ?....... my father spoke potohari (a rather obscene version of punjabi) and my mother spoke pushto (even though her father spoke persian), but we grew up speaking urdu and never saw anything wrong with it ............. and now, praise be to al-lah and the white man, the wife and i mostly speak in english to our kids and everyone is communicating just fine ........both of them can speak urdu when they have to, but they still think in english and sometimes the translation (or transliteration) comes out rather funny ............ look, most of us cannot carry on a serious conversation in our mother tongues without resorting to english in any case, so what is your beef ?

...... desi-americans are no different than other hyphenated americans - the ``mother`` tongue lasts only one generation, and that is the way it should be ........... there is nothing sacred about a language ........ it is all a bunch of hooey designed to keep third world poets and publishers in business .............

...... and then there are those that think we should all be speaking arabic !

``Just let the little girl be a little girl. Let her tear newspapers. Get fascinated by the ants and the cat. Let her demolish small towers of blocks. Let her pluck flowers and mess up her clothes.``-NHK 78

:)

Azmat:

Sorry, I haven`t been following this thread, so the point may have been made before.

What you want to teach your daughter also depends upon whether you want her or YOU to be happy. The two are not necessarily the same thing. Your daughter may be quite happy if she marries or finds a Hindu, an Afro-American or a lesbian partner, but it would probably make you or your wife miserable.

Kulharee #111: `In my village it was acceptable to date a Khoti, but never a Majh.` reminds of a joke.

`` Sahib, sahib! men are getting restless and want a pass to go to the bazaar`` Jamedar requested the captain.
``No Jamedar, Afridi log abhi shoot karata hai. Not tonight`` Happened two or three nights in a row. Finally the sahib relented.
``Ok, use the company camel``
Next morning Captain enquired ` How was the trip to the bazaar?`
``WE did not go to the town Captain``, jamedar said.
`` Why not? I thought your men were getting desperate``
``True, We did what uou told us and a stepladder``.

Zahra J,

There is no such thing as `children`s own beliefs`. Its a reaction to a combination of ideas floating here and there, in the contemporary society, parents, local tradition, personal incidents.... No human mind is capable of knowing what is outside of its capability and no belief is convincing enough to be the ideal. I think a rigorous proof is not needed.

Hamidm,

Seems like you purposefully ignored responding to most of the stuff.

While being a brown gora (aka ABCD) is not a bad idea for our future generations, it sounds so ordinary, so impure and so purposless ! And then, we have this tendency to see our next generation as the projection(forward, of course) of our own self. I would hate a son or a daughter who would respond to me my urdu questions in english.

Re: # 111

kulharee mian,

......... i think you misunderstood me ...... my comment did not have anything to do with inter species sex - i simply meant that if my father had listened to his father and had stayed in the village instead of joining the army, i would have been herding livestock ............ but if beastiality is your thing, knock yourself out !

Re: # 106
Hamidm Sahib:

ABCD v FOB
This is another story altogether. I have two ABCD daughters (personally, I think they enjoy being confused), and a FOB niece who thinks only Bangalore is the best.

All of them that I do not know India, because I left a long time ago. Most interesting is the envy in each of them. My daughters think my niece had such a great growing up with all her cousins and aunts. My niece thinks my daughters grew up in the blended environment. And the worst of all my friend from Connecticut and I think that we didn`t know how to bring up our kids, our sisters and sister-in-laws in India did a better job in growing up our nieces and nephews.

Anil

Re: # 110

Hamidm2 Sahib… you were a Majh Choud (Buffalo lover)? What village was that? In my village it was acceptable to date a Khoti, but never a Majh.

I am in total agreement with your #106.

Regards.

Re: # 109

zahra,

`` Also, avoid unnecessary humor. That can be very irritating to the youth.``......... good point, but bad taste is in the genes - the other day my younger daughter asked me if i could teach her how to burp on demand ........ i think she is looking for new ways to irritate her mother !

....... i agree about driving - my daughter has been driving to school since she got her permit ......... and she hasn`t had a curfew since she was a senior in high school - if you are going to do something it doesn`t matter what time of the day or night it is ............ i don`t know about gibran, but my father once told me, ``if i had listened to your grandfather, you would be running around bare footed chasing a water buffalo`` ......... the next generation, in order to be better, has to be different............. and they are always better ....

Re: # 94

Hamidm:

I associate driving with taking control of your life. The earlier you start taking that step the better it is.

Gibran`s philosophy of life cannot be applied towards all South Asian parents. There are only select ones who can even think and act on those lines. Don`t quote Gibran unless you can really do what he has recommended in his message. What`s the sense of appreciating poetry for the heck of it? Where the hell is practicality?

The rest of your concerns are just fatherly concerns. The best parents are those who let their kids evolve and lead their life based on their own beliefs. Again, the latter is not every parents` cup of tea. Just keep on being supportive to your daughters. Also, avoid unnecessary humor. That can be very irritating to the youth.

hamidm #106 actually the only ones confused are those who confuse values with rituals and religious customs. Thus, for example: eating halal meat is a religious custom, not a value. On the other hand, honesty is a value and not a religious custom.

Case in point: We had a family from Pakistan last year where husband wife and children came to the US for 6 months. When visiting us, the wife made a big deal about how her children never ate at outside restaurants where the meal served is not halal. The children sat piously nodding their heads. Later, i was informed by my offspring that they had taken these children out to see the town earlier that day, and those pious Pakistan Born Unconfused Desis had asked if they could stop by at a Popeyes where they happily stuffed themselves with ``haram`` fried chicken. Thus: they were taught religious customs (that is, to make a big deal about ``halal`` food), but were not taught values (honesty).

hamidm #106 actually the only ones confused are those who confuse values with rituals and religious customs. Thus: eating halal meat is a religious custom, not a value. On the other hand, honesty is a value and not a religious custom.

Example:

We had a family from Pakistan last year where husband wife and children came to the US for 6 months. When visiting us, the wife made a big deal about how her children never ate at outside restaurants where the meal served is not halal. The children sat piously nodding their heads. Later, i was informed by my offspring that they had taken these children out to see the town earlier that day, and those kids who had been piously nodding their heads had asked if they could stop by at a Popeyes where they happily stuffed themselves with all the ``haram`` fried chicken they could. Thus: they were taught religious customs (that is, to make a big deal about ``halal`` food), but were not taught values (honesty).

malikj,

i hate to inform you that there is no such thing as an ``abcd``........ according to my daughter, it is a term coined by insecure fobs who feel intimidated by secure desi americans who are quite at ease with themselves ........... there is nothing confused about a kid who prefers baseball over cricket, or macaroni and cheese over nihari or thinks gays have a right to be legally married just like fornicating hetrosexuals ..................... we should be thankful to our kids for putting up with our desi idiosycracies - idiotic things we try to pass of as ``values`` .......

........a large number of desi kids are forced to lie and cheat and sneak behind their parents back because they are expectd to live up to these alien ``values`` without any discussion ......... sooner or later it is the the parents who end up ``confused`` and disappointed ........... the kids do just fine

Indeed the writer of the article is confused about many things.

hamidm,

Refering to your true prophet`s tenents, I don`t think this idealism could work.

The mere fact that your kids were born to you and your wife (not to somebody else) suggests that you are influencing their lives a lot.

If you decide to take a vacation each year and fly to a place in africa where people are dying of hunger, I can bet you will be influencing the `tomorrow` and that your kids will respond to the stimulus one way or the other in their lives to come.

Do you think that ntsyed or malik99 lack some hamidm genes from their forefathers that they are the way they are? Or their kinds are cursed by some black magic?

When Mrs. hamidm says that the kids should fast and you look at your daughter with `that look`, do you think it means nothing?

Isn`t it correct that we are the ones with the power to suggest where the tomorrow will go?

If you say that you let this stuff happen in most natural way, i.e. only behave as we do according to our idealogy, isn`t it still an arbitrary choice? What if the chemicals in your brain had chosen the way of the other many muslims in north america? Then do you doubt that you would have raised some confused ABCDs (if I remain kind enough to accept that this is not the case now)?

scout,

``i`ve seen countless pakistani american families bribing their children to follow rituals and it is the stupidest and most backward thing ever..... ``

........ the bribe remark was used for dramatic effect to illustrate the comparitive value (or lack of worth) of religious rituals ...... in any case, these kids cannot be bribed to do anything since they already have everything a kid can possibly want or need ............

.......... but if you are talking about religious rituals being ``stupid and backwards``, i do agree ........ however mrs hamidm disagrees and who am i to disagree with her! ......... but so far we seem to be doing fine with and without rituals - i have not caught the kids praying yet, but once in a while they do get caught up in this fasting business .........but, alhamdolliah, it is only a couple of days a year and i think it has something to do with all those iftar parties that we go to ........ and then, of course, there is eid which even i celebrate with great fervor - my kaleejee gurday are appreciated by true believers and not so true believers alike ........... there is nothing wrong with being a cultural muslim as long as it doesn`t become a bad habit for the rest of the year ............ heck i even get caught up in the christmas spirit - specially with the egg nog and the fat man in a red suit ...................

.......... this year, as usual, i am giving up tonic for ramzan - only martinis for thirty (or twenty nine) days ............