The Bohemian State

When I was growing up, living in South America and the Caribbean; I was always torn. Torn because you see, South American countries really didn’t think we were *South American*, because we didn’t speak Spanish, and that our South American-ness was so embedded in us, that it was so slight that you would actually have to be looking for it, to point it out. Plus, I was brown, not of European descendants, or indigenous people, so that automatically made you not South American.

It was okay, I thought – Brazilians don’t speak Spanish either, but they are more South American than any other South American country. [They are obviously of European descendants though]

Having similar historical contexts made us “Caribbean,” but because we weren’t really an island, but a country in South America, that really didn’t make us Caribbean to Caribbean countries. You’ll always hear those pompous Trinidadians say mockingly, “You’re really not Caribbean, because you’re not an island, you don’t understand the ‘lifestyle’” Regardless of their lack of history in their country, and that we’re not only a member but a founding member of many Caribbean communities, the trade community CARICOM – is headquartered in Georgetown, that doesn’t matter.

And that’s fine, nothing really matters because the colour of my skin, which is brown makes me, Indian. Makes me desi, makes me one of the brown folks. And so most of my life, I just knew I was Indian, without any doubts in my head. My mom spoke Hindi, other country people [I say this because I'm a snobby city girl] spoke a mixed up dialect of Hindi, English and French to make up the creole language. I did classical Indian dances for most of my life, I even learnt tabla. I ever learnt Hindi and failed out because of lack of effort, many times “What’s this secret code you’re teaching me, here?”

And for heaven sakes, I’m Hindu – I don’t think you get anymore Indian- brown- desi than that, that or if you’re Muslim. To the recent converts to Christianity, many of the old timers would look down, “with all the oppression we faced, we held our religion so high, and just because you want to be so ‘English’ you throw that to the wind?”

I was English too, but still knew where I belonged. Still knew what it was like, after all how could I forget it, when it’s been told over and over to me, over and over again. At every family gathering. And that’s one thing which I really hoped would change with my culture, with my family, that things stopped being oral and more of the written word.

So, when I became all, Americanized, and that of the northern Americanized [because technically, all my life I was American], when people asked, “Are you Indian?” I would say, “Hells yah!” And then the follow up question would come in Hindi, and I’ll translate as, “Where? What parts? Are you Bengali? How are you?”

“Ah – who? What?” I wanted to say, “Oh you stop that giberish right now, it didn’t work when my mom was trying to use that on me, and it’s not going to work now.” I didn’t say that, but it left me confused though, which lead me, many times then to peel my ears to those family conversations that I halved listened to, “We’re Bengalis, actually mommy was Bengali, and daddy came from Uttar Pradesh”

In this love for my ancestors, I once again made a terrible mistake – I’m not ONLY brown. I’ve got that South American, Caribbean thing too. Which means that’s another set of group of influences that I ignored, and another set of influences that ignored me also.

I need to stop this drama wama.

But all this is background information, it is to tell you how all these little parts of me, actually help me in the weirdest ways, unless I open my white-washed mouth. Most of these situations go well.

When an ultra fob sees me and talks to me, [and I actually understand him] I shake my head, lower it, and shyly walk away. This is obviously the standard of “good indian girls,” before I would be more out-spoken and demanding, “What? Excuse sir…? etc etc etc.” And from that I learnt how well you’ll learn from other people, other cultures if you just put your head down, and shut the hell up. People leave you in peace.

Also one of the most painful things to happen to me, was my ex -significant other of 5 years, in the end, after thinking of futures and happily ever after, he said, “Whatever, you’re not even Indian anyways.” Maybe to this day, that still stings, but then I smile because if in 5 years he couldn’t see my “Indian-ness,” then it wasn’t worth my time to understand my racist, Republican Gujarati from Pennsylvania ideas. I didn’t need to look further than that.

To the Caribbean people – I’ll always be the white-washed snob child of satan, because my accent doesn’t have that sing song rhythm that most, if not all of them have. Only perhaps a small percentage of .05% of Guyanese actually speak, traditionally the way I do – with what I would like to call a “Neutral accent.” English – with no dialect attached.  And oddly enough I’m pretty sure I know the other .05% that speak the way I do.  *translation : BONDING TIME* YAH!

To the South Americans : I’m not really Spanish, but you can really understand that South Americans who speak Spanish, are also snobby to Caribbean people who speak Spanish. And snobs can bond on snobbery. Ha – I kid, I kid. There are really deep, deep cultural similarities that no one really understands unless you see someone doing the exact same thing, until you get that, “OOOh! that’s why we do it” moment.

For example, because I can only think of this right now, when I was a kid I had a “home name” and an “official name.” Actually, it’s the same even now, not only when I was a kid – but when I was a kid, I realized how divided my world was, people who called me, “Darshini” were related to me, and people who didn’t call me that, were not. And that’s how it was. Because we were really weird like that. It was only after when I met another Bengali – Indian girl that had the same “Dhaak naam” and “official name” that I was like, “OH! It’s a crazy Bengali thing.”

So there are many, crazy Bengali thing, crazy Indian thing, crazy South American thing, etc.

And before, knowing all these differences, I understood that they divided me, so much that maybe no one will ever totally get me [not even people who have the same cultural past like I do] but now I wish to see how they unite me.

How because of all these different MEs, I can understand all the different YOUs.

That’s all.