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Brining up children with the
right Indian ethos and cultural values in USA has been a big
challenge for the migrant parents. Much like Ashoke and Ashima
Ganguli of Mira Nair’s just released film The Namesake,
a screen adaptation of Jhumpa Lahiri’s book of the same
title, the parents are a worried lot in the land of opportunity.
Pratik Khatri reports from USA.
Renu and Vikas Rana from Washington DC have two sons. Swayam,
the elder one started going to primary school recently. Just
six months at school have moved him away from whatever Hindi
vocabulary he had developed on his once a year trips to India.
“He stopped talking in Hindi, started cribbing about
eating roti sabzi, and started using such slangs as back off,
no way, etc. on us in response to our ways of bringing him
up that we got quite worried. So we decided to have him spend
some time in India,” says Vikas, a software engineer
who also runs a consultancy service.
In an attempt to develop some affinity to their roots, these
hapless parents planned a six month long stay for the kids
in India, and got their kid an admission to DPS, Rohtak with
a hope that a semester with his Indian peer group would bring
Swayam a lot closer to India as compared to the couple’s
desperate efforts here in the US.
This problem seems to cut across Indian parents with US born
kids. Once the kid starts going to playschool, the day to
day cultural leanings are bound to see a very steady shift.
The first casualty is the mother tongue. Till the time the
kid stays at home it is easy for the parents to make sure
that he/she converse in their mother tongue. However, the
uphill task starts once the kid starts going to school.
Vikram Singh, an employee with Pfizer Pharmaceuticals in Connecticut,
observes, “Within two months of going to Montessori,
my son Maheep stopped speaking Hindi, whereas before he ventured
out he was very fluent with not only Hindi but Punjabi as
well. So I had to look for a solution, now I practically bribe
my four-year-old son with candy in order to make him stick
to my rule of speaking only in Hindi for two days every weekend.”
But why is it that parents insist that their kids learn to
speak the language that they grew up conversing in? It seems
there is a small amount of guilt in their subconscious that
they are no longer physically close to their roots, so they
try to forge some strands of connectivity between their ascriptive
identity markers and their kids. Unfortunately for the kids
it is a very confusing situation, as they take a constant
feed of a distant culture from their parents, and do not see
any marks of that culture around their physical space.
Kendra Van Wagner, a psychologist who has authored a number
of books on identity crisis, observes that though kids born
to Indian parents are commonly referred to as ABCDs (American
Born Confused Desis), it is not the kids but their parents
who are confused as to what identity should the kid grow up
bearing in mind.
“The kid in himself/herself is very clear that he is
an American by birth and by surroundings and so would naturally
follow the American ways in terms of language, culture, tastes
and understanding of relationships. Their parents on the other
hand are caught in the middle of a transition from their own
Indian upbringing and adhering to the American ways of bringing
up their kids. That is where the schism arises, and gradually
it is the kid who is caught up in the mix of the two cultures,”
he says.
Food habits come a close second when counting the cultural
casualties parents suffer in lieu of bringing up their kids
in US. Indian parents in the US look out for homemade desi
food for their kids, though it is very likely that the kid
has had a good amount of American baby food and cereal-for-kids.
So once the little one is ready to go to playschool, the question
facing the parents is how to keep them from falling prey to
junk food. Most Indian parents are themselves not comfortable
with having beef and pork even though they are non vegetarians,
so they are not at all comfortable with the idea of their
kid having beef.
When the kid starts interacting with other American kids,
the desi parents have a tough time trying to convince their
kids not to build up a taste for eatables that they don’t
have a taste for. Ms Peggy Jacobson, a teacher at the Indianapolis
Baptist Church playschool shares her experience.
“As there are a lot of Indian families living in the
apartment complex close to our playschool, we get to handle
a lot of Indian kids here. The initial few times that Indian
moms come to drop their kids they consciously ask us to be
careful that their kids do not share their lunch boxes with
the American kids who generally get non-vegetarian snacks.
We do have a hard time trying to convince them that it is
important for the kid to nurture adaptability towards the
environment they grow up in and that the parents’ attitude
to limit the kids’ exposure as per the environment they
grew up in is actually thwarting the kids’ chances to
assimilate into their immediate environment”.
Seema Kumar is a worried mom. This housewife in Indianapolis
is getting sleepless nights wondering about how she can make
her three year old daughter Garima say yes to eating Indian
food, forget making her say it in Hindi. It has been six months
since Garima started going to a playschool, and ever since
her responses towards any conversations in Hindi have diminished.
She loves to have soda, as they call soft drinks here, and
can virtually survive on French fries.
”We are vegetarians but our daughter has started pointing
a finger towards chicken wings, and questions back why she
can’t have them when her friends at pre-school get that
along for a snack,” she laments.
There is one more aspect that this perplexity comes across
very clearly in. While the parents grew up in the warmth of
extended family, the second generation kids here have little
idea about what it is like to have a perennial presence of
immediate family as well as the extended package that comes
along. So when they go to India for vacations, the mela of
relatives is something very new to the kids.
“I love my privacy, and my parents have learnt to respect
that, so now when they need to talk to me they give me a knock,
but for my cousins back home this idea very strange. Parents
in India tend to be rather invasive of their kids’ privacy.
Here in the US things are thankfully different, I get my space
and in a few years will get to decide who is a part of that
space and who is not”, wisely sums up Shreya Reddy, a
five year old from Groton, Connecticut.
Padma Reddy, the mom, is concerned. She thinks that as soon
as their younger daughter turns one year old, she is going
to be flying to India with her grandparents, and won’t
be back till the age of eleven-twelve. “She is already
an American citizen by birth, so she will get to avail all
the privileges that come along whenever she comes back to
US. This way she will learn to speak telugu, like to eat Indian
food, and will not complain about how parents try to keep
their kids in excessive control back home. That would save
us a lot of trouble, though it would mean we get to see our
daughter only once a year when we go for vacations”,
reasons Padma.
Parents in USA are reliving the trauma of Ashoke and Ashima
Ganguli of Mira Nair’s The Namesake. Life and art imitate
each other in the Indian diaspora.
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