Let me celebrate my desi-pan with Gulab-Jamun

I have come to realization, after struggling much with myself; the word ‘desi’ neither has a derogatory connotation nor a sense of exaltation to it. It is just another word which represents certain demography of population—of South Asian Diaspora. I am pretty sure other migrating communities too have words to represent themselves, which I am unaware of.

 

In the beginning, I didn’t find myself a part of desi solidarity– in a cultural sense, nothing to do with politics and opinion, moreover, I made a conscious effort not to associate myself with the phrase, though I hail from Nepal–a quintessential desi sub-culture. My apprehension might have been the word itself desi, which sounds more of a Hindi than any other South Asian language, and how weKathmandu basi are blindsided by the aura of that superiority over the dhotis, definitely derogative, not surprisingly for the same reason Madesh is burning.

 

How that reminds me of a story of Manjushree cutting a gorge to let the water out to make
Kathmandu valley inhabitable. Allegorically speaking we are the toads that were left behind, when the water drained out, and who have never ventured out of the well—Kathmandu, furthest we have gone is Thankot check post that too for selfish reason, to bargain with god–Manakamana.

 

But, however cozy we are in our little bayou, we have to venture out once a while for different personal reasons mostly to the south of the border. And when we do so, our toad spirit is ruthlessly crushed by UPites, Bhiharis and Bengalis sharks at the border. Our bruised ego <b> (remember the bravest in the world)</b> clouds our rational thought, and we conveniently clump the whole nation—India as a thug. Matter of fact, every society has its criminal elements, and those goons do not represent their society, moreover they do not reflect the values/virtues of the society they live in. Likewise there is no shortage of mean spirited Neapli bastards among us, who often prey on hapless or Indian vendors on the streets of Kathmandu.  

 

Leaving arrogance and ignorance behind, ultimately it’s the matter of perspective, on what you want to see–similarity in dissimilarity, or dissimilarity in similarity. And all this time I had been working hard to do the latter. My conceit was hilarious; I was no pearl among the gems, desi community has nothing to lose from my indifference and my apathy. In fact, I was at loss, loss of opportunity of experience nearest to home—continent sub-culture.

 

Oh, how we (Nepali) love to hate, and poo-poo the idea of associating ourselves with sub-continent culture, predominantly Indian. We are the most chic among the bunch, while rest of the sub-continent was getting over the colonial hangover, we had the flower children flocking the gullies of

Kathmandu, foraging for local pots and hollow nirvana. When rests of the continent were listening to Nehru and Jinnah, we were listening to Hendrix and The Beatles, and we were so delighted to have the social rejects of the White societies—the hippies. (But I have to concede, they were far more interesting than those righteous conservative bastards, only White non-hippies were the missionaries, spreading the word of Jesus, nonetheless high on the divine directives, on the same breath, how we love to hate all Christians, but often miss the point that all the prestigious schools in Kathmandu were established by them.)

 

Coming back to desi-ness, among all the immigrants, only people I can relate to are Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and Bhutanese, in a cultural sense, since, I don’t give a fuck about religion, but undeniably that’s another strong bond. My language, food habit and even those social eccentricities* match closest with these communities.

 

How we drive the distance almost to the effect of KTM to Pokhara just to watch a Hindi movie, it becomes our obligatory duty to try any/every Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Sri-Lankan restaurant in every town we visit, and how we love to bitch about getting duped—selling same food with different names in these restaurant. And how we are bound to bump into at least ten Nepalis in every Indian stores anywhere in the US at any given time of the day.

 

Earlier, the thing I despised the most was, when any Indians would walk up to me and start taking in Hindi, taking for granted I speak Hindi. I do speak Hindi, at that better than most of the Nepalis. That put my mercury up, I was mistaken for their ignorance for arrogance. Then I realize, I do the same when I see some Tibetans, or Manange from Mustang, I talk to them straight away in Nepali. For these minorities, my ignorance might have come as my arrogance. But not that we are part of India, and we are supposed to know Hindi, as opposed to other minorities in Nepal ought to know Nepali. My analogy was just to shed some lights on disparities of cultures, and our presumption of them.

 

More than Indians taking to me in Hindi, I despise on how Nepali talk in Hindi. After watching hundreds of three hour long movies, and thousands of hours of Indian TV, and three years of Ramayan, and another four years of Mahabhara on TV, we speak a pathetic Hindi. What are we a dyslexic? With so much of practice for so long, even a dog can learn Chinese. There I go for the people, whose lives revolve around Bollywood, and can’t construct a decent sentence in Hindi—or may be they are just pretending not to know Hindi, in order to stay chic.

 

I don’t have to like my sub-continent brothers personally, but I can’t deny the fact I am one of them, and we are bound together with similarities than dissimilarities, like it or not. Then why not take delight in my desiness rather than deride it. 

###

Now, let me go and have three somosas, four gulab-jamun, and freaking spicy curry over some cheesy Salman’s number playing in background, probably from the Appu’s store from Simpson.

 

Social eccentricities* Digging my nose, scratching my crotch, clearing my throat loud and spitting mindlessly in public, smell like walking garam-masala, shamelessly haggling for price, and thinking all white women are promiscuous.

###

 

Side Note: Formating in WordPress is pain in the butt, let me know if you guys have a better tool.