We Indian Ex-Pats (yes, ex-pats!) are a strange lot, and vary wildly from sub-group to sub-group.
What I do know about myself now, is this:
I may not follow most of the customs of my birth culture (mostly because of lack of time up until now — let’s see about next year — or perhaps, it was a lack of initiative or interest, since I was too absorbed in making music, or learning to be a teacher, and now, being a mom, and being in the day-to-day, here-and-now part of existence). I may not be religious in the least. I do not subscribe to any of the unthinking superstitions that governed previous generations.
And yet, and yet … there was certainty and comfort in their ways, the ways of the older generation. There was predictability and safety in patterns of existence, and ways of communicating.
What we are now engaged in doing, we Indian transplants, (or at least ex-pats like me) is the act of creating our own culture, grafting that which we can do onto that which we *do* do (no jokes here, please!), trying on this, and shrugging off that.
But these are what I miss:
I miss the smells of Diwali morning in Madras (Chennai), and in Pune — a mix of sweets and savories freshly made, of crackers going off in the mornings, of jasmine flowers and marigolds, of champa and sandalwood agarbattis, snaking past our noses into our clothes, our memories, our bones.
I miss the oil-baths with heated sesame oil, and shikai shampoo, which we had to endure, grumblingly at 4:30 a.m. on Diwali morning.
I miss the smell of Kancheepuram silk long-skirts and blouses, which were our parents’ gifts on Diwali morning.
I miss the sweetness of my mother and father blessing us, as we bent down to the ground in respect before them.
I miss the sweet ginger paste and juice especially made for that day by my mom, to help with digestion, after all the heavy sweets we would all eat.
I miss the casual ringing of the doorbell, which is standard in India, and the raucous entry of relatives or neighbors trooping in to wish us, and of our doing the same to them.
I miss Pongal, and Kanu, and Karthikai, and Ganesh Chaturti, and Krishna Jayanthi, and Dassera, and Saraswati Puja, and everything.
I miss the cries of vegetable-vendors and clothes-to-vessels peddlers (the batli-wallahs).
I miss the carts which would trundle through neighborhoods, where the man pushing the cart had a coal-filled heavy iron, which he’d use to press your clothes into creased perfection.
I miss the dogs on the street, causing chaos at any time of day or night.
Oh, and the pigs, the goats, the cattle, the crows.
I even miss the casual burning of rubber tyres by the poor on the sidewalks, to stay warm on cold Pune nights.
I miss the smell of mint rice, and methi parathas, of potatoes and peas curry and of aloo parathas, of thengai rice and lemon rice, of rasam chatham, of rotis and curries being made in neighbors’ flats or houses, and wafting past my senses, making hunger come on suddenly and fiercely, despite the fact that I might have just had a delicious lunch.
I miss the kindness of passersby, if you were in distress, and yes, people have been kind to me (don’t think that all of India is like how it is depicted in all this recent news about Delhi).
I miss it all.
And my heart aches with nostalgia.