The Expat Blog

Should India have its own 9/11 memorial?

Melissa A. Bell — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 06:40:00 GMT

Eight years ago, 34 Indians were murdered at the World Trade Center in New York. It’s not a huge number. Many more died in Bhopal, in Mumbai, in Ayodhya. But after the UK and the US, India lost the most citizens out of any other country in the world on that bright blue morning.

And now, according to an article in the New York Times, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (the company that owns the remains of the WTC), are offering cities free of cost the twisted remnants of steel that once stood towering over Manhattan. About 1,800 pieces are available to any city in the world that requests one. I’d like Mumbai to ask for one.

Every year on this day, I remember the worst day of my own life: the terror, the pain, the fear. But this year I also remembered something else. Those shining, beautiful days afterwards, in which we walked around shorn of our defenses and our pride. United by pain, but united nonetheless. It was a heady time. For a few weeks, we were not strangers, the world embraced us, and we were all just people vitally aware of our own fragility.

Tim Kreider wrote of this feeling today in the New York Times:

“Jealously tended hierarchies temporarily evaporated, and the worthless currency of human decency reacquired street value… Graffiti appeared that actually spoke instead of just marking territory, like the overheard murmurs of a city talking to itself or fitfully dreaming. I saw a spray-painted message that would’ve seemed trite or sentimental a week before: YOU ARE ALIVE.”

Rather than dwell on the terror wrought that day, the wreckage later strewn across Iraq and Afghanistan, the ill will the US has rightly brought on ourselves, I’d like to see the world celebrate what has lingered of that feeling—the walls that have been torn down, the relationships that have been strengthened. Eight years ago, India and the US were not close. Now, the US is lucky to have India as one of its strongest allies.

I’d like to see a 9/11 memorial in India. And I’d like to see a 26/11 memorial in New York. We need a reminder, not that terror exists, but that after the terror, we are still alive, we are not strangers, and we should all be embracing one another more often.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

On screen India: enough with the stereotypes already?

Ayeshea Perera — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 10:47:00 GMT

The television show 'Paul Merton in India' is quite old, but being a sporadic television viewer at best; I saw it just yesterday on Fox History channel. That days episode was on Delhi, so I suppressed my natural urge to switch channels and decided to watch instead. The first shot was of Paul Merton travelling through the narrow, crowded streets of Old Delhi on a cycle rickshaw, explaining that he had landed two hours ago and that it had been a long ride to the city - obviously insinuating that the cycle rickshaw had been his ONLY mode of transport from the airport. As he gave a little more background on the city, the visuals were overwhelmingly of Old Delhi with a few stock shots of commercial area Connaught Place thrown in.

Merton, it seemed, was on a mission to find unusual (read: weird) things about the city to talk about. One of these was a 'finishing school' where he wanted to learn proper Indian etiquette. His school teacherly instructor, had him burp, put marbles in his mouth to reduce his accent and sit cross legged on a chair before his "very important meeting the next day" that he had to develop etiquette for. As the show progressed, I lost interest but I did watch a weird meeting with a man who was trying to establish a guinness record for withstanding the most number of kicks to the groin. The concept of course, was meant to be whacky, but in some places I felt that it lost the plot, ending up teetering on the realm of the offensive instead. In lots of instances, it seemed, Merton was just saying "look - here is one big freakshow". Maybe it was a show meant to laugh at stereotypes, and goodness yes, OF COURSE these people exist, but the fact that the show was being shown on a Fox channel, especially when you consider its global audience, meant that it was also reaffirming those same stereotypes for a lot of people.

Of course Merton does say this is "my" India. But his India was by and large, no different to the portrayals of Indians as stereotypical tiger fighting, sabre weilding, turbaned barebodied males, that you see everywhere. (Read Krish Raghav's article on the portayal of India in video games HERE). But the question is, how much should this matter? Should there be outrage at these portayals? A cursory Google search showed opinion split down the middle on whether the show was funny or offensive. My initial reaction was "this is ridiculous" but really, maybe India should not even care anymore. What do you think?

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Why I live in India.

Melissa A. Bell — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 07:45:00 GMT

Okay, it took me slightly longer than a day, Jose, my apologies.

(For those not intimately engaged in our comment conversation, Jose, a reader on this blog, asked why I came to India. Something tells me he would prefer to ask why the heck haven’t I left yet—and he’d be happy to show me the door—but, as is his way, he was very polite.)

I think about this question—why India?—a lot because I get asked it a lot. I’m home in California now and no one who lives here, in this seemingly perfect little beach town, really understands the appeal of living somewhere it takes 24 hours on a plane to reach. And that isn’t right next to the ocean. And that doesn’t have Starbucks lattes on every corner.

But I left this town when I was 18 and I kept moving, almost every year, until I wound up in India where for some reason I’ve been for three years. So maybe the question isn’t so much why I came. But why I stayed.

After all, I came for the simple reason of procrastination. I did not want to get a job. My journalism school offered a program where, after graduation, you could go work abroad for an extra semester. I had already lived in Europe, so I said that I would apply for the program so long as they could place me in any country not in Europe or North America. That was the extent of my planning ahead.

They offered me Cambodia and India. India seemed sprawling, unknown, and also more present on the world stage, journalistically speaking. But Cambodia has beautiful beaches. It was a roll of the dice.

I wound up at the Hindustan Times with Aditya Sinha as my editor. It’s probably his fault more than anyone else’s that I stayed. He didn’t really know what to do with this naïve white girl that showed up in his office one day. Plus he’s got a strange sense of humor. Rather than have me hovering over him at the office, he sent me off in the care of Mayank Tewari, one of his most, well, insane-in-the-best-possible-sort-of-way reporters. I followed him around the city eating roti with Afghan refugees and singing late into the night with Sufi saints.

One evening, Aditya and the rest of his team introduced me to Old Monk. I got to know it very well. Then he told me to head off early the next morning to Old Delhi to navigate the crowded streets for ten hours in the middle of June. I spent the next evening in the hospital attached to an IV drip.

Eventually he started to suspect I would pretty much follow any of his directions. He tested this hypothesis by suggesting I go cover the sex scandal in Kashmir, a suggestion my graduate school strictly forbid. I wound up a few days later in Srinigar floating on Dal Lake, confounded by the world around me.

I was in love. It was a beautiful, messy, strange, constantly in-flux place. But when my internship ended, I headed home.

Once back in the US, Raju Narisetti, the former editor of Mint, gave me an offer I couldn’t refuse: come back to India and help launch a national newspaper with the financial backing to support it’s growth.

In the US, in case you’ve somehow managed to miss all the moaning and groaning of the US media, the newspaper has been dying for some time. Most financial backers are loath to support established, successful city papers. A person would be locked in the loony house if she attempted to try and start a new one. (And three years ago this was even truer than it is today. Now there is an intriguing revolution in the US media, with innovation and creativity pouring in as people try to create new ways to present journalism. But that’s neither here nor there.)

I wasn’t sure I should come back. I thought I should keep working in the US, put down roots, become a productive member of society—that old song and dance. But, at the end of the day, I had a pretty cool chance to experiment in the profession I love.

I stayed the second time around. Mint thought they were going to be rid of me after six months. But once I stopped walking around with the “whoa, look how crazy this country is” blinders on, I started seeing the country for what it is--and couldn't leave.

Part of it was a realization that it was not just my industry that was expanding like crazy. I had heard the growth story before I came. But it was an all-together new thing to experience the stark difference between a country stagnating and a country exploding. At that time the US was a country rife with apathy. I believe that more than anything else led my country in disastrous directions. People just weren’t excited about things. Even worse, people didn’t care. It was all about keeping to the status quo. In India, people cared. People wanted. People were fighting and experimenting and trying. You walked around and the air felt rife with possibility. It seemed that new companies, new ideas, new art, new music were stumbling and jumbling their way out into the world in every direction. It was a pretty addictive feeling to be in a place that felt so alive.

But there are other reasons too. India has something I’ve never known: a deep, palpable history. I remember visiting the campus of what would eventually become my university at Georgetown in Washington, D. C. I became enraptured with its main building, a gothic stone structure with a perfect clock tower pointing into the sky. It was so OLD. So rich! It was built in 1879. You take a wrong turn in India and you stumble onto a tomb of a man who died 500 years before the first stone was ever laid at Georgetown.

And likely the biggest reason why I’ve stayed in India, and why so many people probably do: it seems endless. Each May as the sweet quiet nights of winter disappear like a snap and the crushing blow of summer arrives, I say, “I’m leaving. I know this place. I don't need to live here anymore. I need to go find out about the rest of the world.” But I don't move. I know nothing about the place, even three years later. And the rest of the world is in India too.

Even the things that drive me crazy about the place is too often missing in the US. Take, for example, my invasive, nosy, argumentative landlord. She is guarding over the home her husband built next door to the homes his two brothers built 70 years ago. The home her children grew up in. The home her grandchildren left for college. The sense of family, unity, and community exists in degrees in the U.S., but nowhere as intensely as it does in India.

And slowly, wonderfully, India’s burrowed under my skin. I have people who love me who live there. And people I love live there. When I’m away I miss the morning crows on my roof, wandering Hauz Khas at dusk, sitting on my balcony late into the night as wedding fireworks light up the sky.

I don’t know how long I’ll live there. I suppose only until next May. I also suppose I might be saying that for a few more years at least.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Who is this Shahrukh Khan character anyway?

Melissa A. Bell — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 08:56:00 GMT

Kidding, kidding, kidding.

Let's just get this out of the way: Yes, an officer likely religiously profiled the guy. Yes, it sucks that we religiously profile and racially profile people in the US. There are small-minded people in positions of authority and that authority can be abused. But that's what this incident says about the US.

What does it say about India?

Yes, it sucks being detained at the airport. I know. I have been. About seven or eight times. Not because I have a Muslim name, but for whatever reason the security guys have come up with that day (flying on a one-way ticket, having a Pakistani visa, a rip in my passport, the list goes on).

It's annoying. It's not fun. It's even kind of scary. But there are a lot worse things than being held up a couple hours at an airport. Like being attacked by violent killers. Or others being attacked by violent killers.

I like what Salman Khan said, "The detention was for security purpose. And it is not a big deal....No 9/11-like incident occurred in US [since] because of strict vigil and I believe it is a good thing." (Disclaimer: This reporter thinks Salman is way cuter than SRK.)

All this brouhaha won't really change the racial profiling in the U.S., especially when it sounds like SRK is throwing a temper tamper. He says: "But I'm a movie star!" the security official says, "Come with me."

You know SRK wanted to hear: "Oh, sir, I am so sorry. I should have known. You are the man who dances even better than the Big B!" And when he didn't, he pitched a fit.

And all these calls of injustice from politicians and stars reaffirms the idolatry of VIP status in India. SRK shouldn't have been detained! He's a great movie star! Just google him and see!

So, what? Only movie stars should be exempt from racial profiling?

This whole incident recalled a moment my friend Anand Giridharadas wrote about in the New York Times when he was in Boston:

"The woman reached for my ticket. I had entered the parking lot two hours and a few minutes earlier. The first two hours were free, but I had stepped just across the line into paying territory. Would she let it slide?

She appeared East African; I am an American who lives in India; I imagined that she and I might have a shared sense of the situation. I was just a few minutes over, and in our Old Countries I might have been waved through with a flexible shrug.

But not here, not in America, where there are rules to bring human caprice under control. She asked for $2, and I paid, with a feeling of sadness at the coldness of our interaction and yet also a sense of admiration for the great human accomplishment -- the invention of patterns that apply to everyone always, not selectively and sometimes -- behind that coldness."

Okay, maybe this was a selective choice of a man with a Muslim name. But that same day, Bob Dylan was detained by police just a few miles away from the airport SRK sat at. Kind of takes the wind out of SRK's sails.

I think if SRK wants to make a mountain of a molehill about problems with the US, he ought to choose something a little less petty to get so indignant about. I can offer him a few options: the lack of access to health care by millions of citizens, the low literacy rate in girls living in the South, the conflicts arising from illegal immigration, the rise of hate crimes, the continued existence of laws such as "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and the Patriot Act. I can go on...

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Why I can’t find a good yoga class in India to save my life.

Melissa A. Bell — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 22:24:00 GMT

On a previous blog post (sorry, I can’t hyperlink to it in here, it’s called “The Great Indian Novel”), readers recommended a slew of books I should read about India. Last month, I finally got to Gita Mehta’s Karma Cola, one of Aditya’s recommendations. It’s a fantastic glimpse at the spiritual expats of the 70s through the eyes of a world-weary Delhiite. While so many India books are written from the outside eye, this captured the funny, sad, chaotic, insipid moments of the great Hippie invasion of India from a local’s perspective.

One thing in particular Mehta wrote caught my eye: “The seduction lay in the chaos. They thought we were simple. We thought they were neon. They thought we were profound. We knew we were provincial. Everybody thought everybody else was ridiculously exotic and everybody got it wrong.”

Okay, so things have changed a bit since 1970, but despite the realization that India has much more to offer to the West than just gurus and the Ganges, this quote still rings true. So many people in West still get India totally wrong. (Myself completely included.)

A perfect case in point: the yoga experience.

Until about five years ago—when us Westerners started seeking financial salvation instead of spiritual salvation in India—the concept of the country came from what the hippies brought back to us: the Beatles and their sitar; Mia Farrow and her guru; burnt out, bleary-eyed men in New York’s East Village selling tiny bronze Ganeshas and OM shirts. But one of the greatest imports to the West was the lovely spiritual and physical experience of yoga.

Every gym in America offers it. Gwenyth Paltrow and Madonna account their svelte figures to it. After 9/11, the law firm I worked at (five blocks over from the Trade Center) offered employees the option of counseling or yoga. It’s hip. It’s healthy. It promises countenance of mind, bolstering of spirit, and sexy thighs. At least, that is, in the US it does.

You see, we Americans love to take foreign ideas and make them more convenient, more multi-tasking and much less spiritual. Go to any yoga class in the US and the teacher would probably escort you out of the class if you said it wasn’t a spiritual practice. But, aside from a couple of chants of OM at the end of the class and a quick Namaste, it’s an exercise class, pure and simple.

I love yoga. Well, I love the yoga in America. It’s fun, soothing, and even meditative in its way. But I go cause I want my gluts tight, not because I see it as a path toward spiritual enlightenment. My guess is most of the other people in the class feel the same way too. They may like to believe that it’s their soul that gets them to class, but I know it’s their waistlines.

But they’ll never admit it. To them, yoga—and by default India—is still a mystical religious experience. When I go to a class in the US it’s always awkward when the topic of where I live comes up. My sister announces: “She lives in INDIA” to a full class of rapturous-looking, spandex-clad students. “India? Really! Who do you practice with? I’m so jealous. I’m planning a trip soon. I really want to get deeper in to my practice.”

And the class starts and I can feel everyone’s eyes on me: “What amazing Indian style yoga will she do?”

The problem is I suck at yoga. Really suck. I can hardly do a push-up, let alone a series of sun salutations. Why? Because I haven’t practiced yoga since I moved to India three years ago.

Yoga in India is not yoga in America. Yoga in India is a religious practice. With rituals and the idea of eternity behind it. Teachers here assume this will be a lifelong study and you’re in it to slowly, brick by brick, learn the ancient techniques. That is wonderful. That is sublime. That is not for me.

Listen, I wish I were more spiritually focused and I wish I put more time in to the pursuit of the loftier life ambitions. But, you know what? I don’t. I love India’s rich, beautiful, incredibly deep religious grounding. But I don’t live there to pursue religious awaking. And neither do 98% of my Indian friends in Delhi. They are living their lives, loving the wrong people sometimes, stressing about work, and fighting with their parents just like every young, urban kid everywhere in the world. They are not walking around in some exalted yogic state.

India has its spiritual side, but it isn’t all wandering sadhus and levitating yogis. Gita Mehta knew that 40 years ago. We in the West are still figuring that out.

So, to my yoga class in San Diego: No, I can’t do the bended crow backwards headstand. Sorry guys.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Welcome (?) to Incredible India

Ayeshea Perera — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 09:24:00 GMT

(A traveler’s tale and a plea for helpfulness at airports)

I found myself in a rather unusual predicament on my return to India from a trip to Malaysia a few days ago. I realized I was roughly 30 rupees short of money for a prepaid taxi. I tried both the ATM Machines at the airport and for some reason, both machines were unable to process my request for cash. I walked back to the prepaid taxi booth and asked the man in charge if I could pay the 30 Rupees when I reached my house. He said no. “It’s only thirty rupees” I pleaded. “madam, if I were to listen to everyone with a story, we won’t make any money – this is a government business” he said firmly and proceeded to look at a point past me. (I was outside by then in search of the ATM’s and couldn’t go back in again – and there were only prepaid taxis out in front)

In desperation I re-counted the money in my wallet and discovered around 20 Ringgit. I ran to the Thomas Cook agent at his booth and asked if he could change the money. ‘How do you expect me to change such a small amount?” he asked pushing the money back at me. “Please! I only need thirty rupees to take a cab! I’ll be stuck at the airport! It’s almost midnight!” I said. ‘Well I can’t help you” he said firmly. End of discussion.

In the end I was forced to lug my bags, walk out of the airport, hail some 10 mercenary autos and plead in my broken Hindi to be taken home for the amount of money I had. I eventually got home in one piece, but badly shaken and highly disillusioned. Not one person was willing to go out of their way and help out a little. No one THOUGHT about offering me thirty rupees. Instead they watched dispassionately (and I imagine, with a touch of satisfaction) as I grew more and more desperate and frustrated.

Airports are places of confusion. It’s their nature. They’re big, they’re intimidating and they have far too much going on. Between security checks, frenzied shoppers, emotional relatives/ friends of travelers and the confused passengers themselves, navigating through airports are no mean feat. Which is why we need helpful officials and nice people to get us through! Of course what happened to me is not something that happens to everyone, but I think its important that airport staff are trained to help passengers in trouble. Because like I said, airports are fertile breeding grounds for chaos and mayhem, and considering that they are the first point of contact for any foreigner visiting your country, it also makes good PR sense to help out.

“Incredible India” said the board behind me as I walked out on to the road with my baggage in tow. “You got that right!” I thought.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Can the Indian-American immigrant come home?

Melissa A. Bell — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 22:10:00 GMT

A couple posts back, Pankaj, a reader on here, commented that people in the West often have certain beliefs about India and aren’t really interested in finding out the truth about the place.

For some reason, it made me think of my friend Prashant. Not because my friend is uninterested in India--it's quite the opposite with him. Born to Indian parents in Illinois, Prashant is newlywed, even newly-er pregnant and he very much wants to move to India.

This is nothing new to me since everyone these days wants to move there. But his reason for the move was.

We were talking about Prashant’s future fatherhood and he had one concern I hadn’t thought of: he’s worried his children will lose their connection to India. He’s already American. Now, they’ll be Americans born of American parents. And his wife is Irish Catholic, so that’s already one-half removed from India. The divide he straddles and that his parents straddle even more (“the best of both worlds”) will disappear.

I never really considered this as a possible reason why so many NRIs are eager to come back to ‘try-on’ India. But unlike so many of us mutts in the US, they are in the very generation undergoing the great American assimilation. Prashant says it happened to the Italians, the Irish, the Poles all before him. Now, it’s happening to Indians. And Prashant, for one doesn't like it.

It’s evident in the culture: we’ve moved from Apu in Kwik-e-Mart to Kal Penn in the White House in 20 years. And it’s evident in the lifestyles of the generation born to the Indians that moved over here in the 1970s to find a new life. Prashant had a fro, listened to jam-bands, was one of the most popular kids on his college campus—especially with the girls. He was not really big on the culture of his parents until now that he’s facing parenthood himself.

Assimilation is a mostly sad, sometimes good fact about the US. We do maintain some semblance of uniqueness, but a lot of that ancestral identity doesn’t go much beyond the “I’m Irish, hence I must drink lots and lots of Guinness on St. Patrick’s Day.”

Immigrants notoriously cling to their national identities, but after the first and second-generation passes, well, they don’t call it a melting pot for nothing.

Indian immigrants of this generation are also in a rather unusual position because they do have the option of returning home. For many American immigrants, returning to their homeland wasn’t an option. The countries were poor, war-torn or it took too many generations to move from laborers to college-educated. Prashant’s generation doesn’t have that. His parents came over with $7, but they were trained physicians. Now they can send him back to a prosperous country with a medical degree and plenty more than just $7.

So Prashant is faced with a choice: keep up the close-knit ties to his parent’s country as long as he can or stay in the US and face the slow fade of his idyllic India in his family’s collective memory.

Thinking about all this assimilation and migration got me off on a tangent. How do you really know a place? Do you have to be born there? Live there? Visit often? What is it to know a place?

I’m also thinking I’m thinking too much. Long car rides will do that to a person.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Hooray for Gays! Goodbye, Section 377.

Melissa A. Bell — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 14:34:00 GMT

After an arduous cross country road trip (actually a really incredible re-introduction to the US; Iowa is actually beautiful), I made it home to San Diego, CA. When I left for college, I wasn't terribly sad to shake the sand from my shoes of this foggy, sleepy town. But I've always been proud of where I came from. California is notorious for being the trendsetter for liberal ideas and inclusiveness for the rest of the country. And it was a liberal upbringing: a friend was the first adopted child by an openly gay man. Two kids came dressed in drag to high school graduation. My dad's law firm supported the gay pride parade way back when it wasn't the must-attend event of the year.

But yesterday, driving in to San Diego, I saw a bumper sticker: "The fight has just begun: Overturn Prop 8."

In case you aren't up on California politics (I'm not and I'm from here), Prop 8 was a measure passed by the voting public in California in November, 2008 and then upheld by the California supreme court that defines marriage as one between a man and a woman--there by striking down an earlier legalization of marriage for same-sex couples.

On election day, after Obama nabbed an early win and the atmosphere seemed tilting to the left, it was a huge blow to see Proposition 8 upheld. Where was the inclusion? The forward-thinking liberality of my home state? To make matters stranger, anyone married before Prop 8 was still allowed to be deemed married. One blogger wrote: "We are now collectors items: Limited Edition Married Gays." Funny. But sad and true.

So, back to India. In a place lambasted by people on both sides of the ocean as tending too far toward social conservatism, it made me so proud to see my new home repeal Section 377. While one city (San Diego) stagnates in backward laws, another city (Delhi) overturns them. Of course, this does not mean the fight against inequality has just been miraculously won in Delhi. The bumper sticker I saw here could aptly hold true there: the fight has just begun.

There are already dissenters. In the New York Times article about Section 377, quotes Maulana Abdul Khaliq Madrasi, a vice chancellor of Dar ul-Uloom, as saying the decision brings Western culture to India and will “corrupt Indian boys and girls.”

But that's what so great about this. It isn't a Western culture insidious idea. The court decision repealed a law super-imposed by the British Raj. So, in fact, it could be seen as a decision to push off the relics of Western culture. Now India can judge homosexuality by its own laws, not the West's.

Especially since it seems we're not doing so hot on that issue right now.

Well done, Delhi. Maybe you could send a message to the California supreme court, too?

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

This expat is no longer an expat.

Melissa A. Bell — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 14:09:00 GMT

Sigh. So, I'm sorry to my two readers, (hi, mom!) that I've been so silent of late, but I've had a bit of a hectic month behind me, and a couple more to go. For family reasons, I've had to come back to the states for the next two months. My bosses at Mint have kindly given me leave (or they're just finally heaving a sigh of relief that I'm out of their hair). I've been so busy getting things organized I hadn't really had much time to think about coming home. And now that I'm here, well, it's weird.

The one question I get the most: when are you moving back?

Then I get: What do you like so much about India? Why did you move there again? Isn't it hard to deal with all the poverty? Was Slumdog Millionaire accurate? Do you think it's a good place to invest?

At lunch yesterday a business owner said he tried a few Indian firms for data entry outsourcing, but could not use them because of their copy editing errors. He seemed kind of angry, like I was to blame for it. You say India's so great Melissa, but two companies didn't cut it with me! Explain that.

People want to know more, but they don't really want to know too much. I sometimes expect people to be so curious, that the whole night would be spent asking and answering questions. But the interest passes in a few minutes.

Then it's back to the economy, stupid. The weather. The baseball line-up.

I'm not saying in India everyone is so outwardly looking and worldly and curious. But it feels right now that we're pretty self absorbed on the American side of the planet. There are reasons for it. Most Americans don't grow up learning Hindi, or watching Bollywood films. Indians watch Hollywood movies and listen Bob Dylan. The rest of the world knows about the US all too well because we're running around as The Most Powerful Country on Earth and well, that gets you some attention. Just would be nice if in all that running around, we also learned some things about the rest of the planet.

But who knows? OnDemand, a really popular TV channel over here that lets you choose your own movies, now has a Bollywood option. Maybe things will change.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

The International Community and Sri Lanka

Ayeshea Perera — Fri, 29 May 2009 10:15:00 GMT

Disclaimer: the author knows that she is susceptible to being accused of doing too many Sri Lanka posts.

There has been a strong international outcry against the Sri Lankan government for its handling of the humanitarian crisis in the Vanni. The UNHCR recently adopted a draft resolution calling for an investigation into possible war crimes and UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown recently warned the Sri Lankan government that it would have to "understand the consequences of its actions". The US and UK raised some subtle objections to a IMF loan to Sri Lanka on the basis that the government had refused to respond to a call to cease hostilities and save civilians trapped with the LTTE. The issue has received much attention globally with a number of columns in influential publications calling for a boycott of key Sri Lankan exports such as garments and tea.

This outpouring of concern and anger is both understandable and needed. The scant regard that the government paid to the thousands of civilian lives during its last push to defeat the LTTE was more than a little disturbing. But in all honesty its a little hard to swallow. What were you doing, I want to ask these countries, when Israel bombed Libya, killing thousands of people and destroying enough infrastructure to set it back by fifty years? It did nothing. Then are we supposed to ignore the fact that the civilian casualties from US air strikes in Afganistan are mounting? Or that the ground situation in Iraq has improved very little?

The fact is that this hypocritical attitude by the international community rings hollow. While it is easy to stand from a pedestal of higher power and shout down at a third world country like Sri Lanka, it does not make those words very credible. Nor its intentions. Should anyone believe the international community when they are doing more of the same?

This is not to take away from the severity of what has happened and what continues to happen in Sri Lanka. All human lives are sacred. And that precisely is what we must not lose sight of. The civilian death in the Vanni is the same as that in the Gaza strip. And until the international community is willing to truly show that it believes that and act on it, its words will mean nothing.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

I'm more creative than you are.

Melissa A. Bell — Thu, 21 May 2009 14:09:00 GMT

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but, I'm really creative. Well at least, statistically speaking, I'm like a whole 28 percent more creative than most people. (Actually don't believe that--I think I failed out of my statistics class.) The point is, scientists now say that living abroad makes people more creative. According to The Economist:

"Anecdotal evidence has long held that creativity in artists and writers can be associated with living in foreign parts. Rudyard Kipling, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, Paul Gauguin, Samuel Beckett and others spent years dwelling abroad. Now a pair of psychologists has proved that there is indeed a link."

Of course, William Maddux and Adam Galinsky (our two intrepid psychologists) only tested this on foreigners living in the US, but I'm sure it can hold true to any expats anywhere.

This isn't very surprising stuff. If I lived in San Diego, I would never have to try to understand why my landlord yells at me for putting plants on my desk. But here I get to flex my creative muscle to try and imagine in what universe my plants damage the environment. I also get to be creative in coming up with all sorts of reasons for my parents as to why living here is better for my career than living down the street from them. And I creatively converse with my co-worker Bobby every day when he speaks to me in rapid Hindi and I determine whether I should nod and smile or scowl and say "nah-hi".

Just all part of the training for my future career as Picasso Part Two.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

What does Prabhakaran's death mean for Sri Lanka?

Ayeshea Perera — Mon, 18 May 2009 11:45:00 GMT

Prabhakaran is dead, the LTTE are finished and the war is over. A war that has been such a big part of my life, that its difficult for me to envision Colombo without its hundreds of checkpoints, the necessity of carrying identification papers at all times and the half expectation that either me or someone I know will get blown up in some random bomb explosion.

So how do I feel now that its over? If it means that all my family and friends can now live safely and happily, that the high cost of living blamed all these years on the war will go down, and that this will initiate a new era of inclusiveness and a willingness to address certain fundamental issues, I’m elated. But really, as much as I wish/hope/dream that this will be the next step, my more immediate reaction is one of apprehension. I’m afraid that this military victory will be used as a tool with which to legitimize some things that should never be accepted. The current Sri Lankan government’s track record in terms of corruption, human rights violations and economic management (to use a euphemism) has not been great. Ministers and their spoiled offspring have been allowed to run amok, (see a report here on how deputy minister Mervyn Silva assaulted the head of a television news channel and click here for a report on how the Presidents son along with his bodyguards attacked members of a rugby team he was playing against just yesterday). Chances are that general/presidential elections could be brought forward to capitalize on the euphoria of victory before the significance of the win fades away in public memory. Then what?

And you can call it collateral damage – you can question the sanity of a decision to stop a war when one side is clearly at an advantage and you may say that the lives lost over the last few weeks are nothing compared to the lives that would have been lost if the LTTE had been let off the hook. But the governments almost blatant disregard for civilians holed up with the LTTE as they made their last stand is to put it mildly, a little disturbing.

I also fear that there will be a tendency to ignore some very real issues of identity and citizenship now that the war is over. The fact remains that despite the fact that Tamil has constitutionally been given parity of status with Sinhala as an official language, many Tamil citizens still are unable to register complaints or defend themselves in their own language in a police station. They are unable to avail themselves of civil services in many areas across the country because public servants are not proficient in Tamil. The issues are real and they must be addressed. Tamil people have to feel included in this new “united Sri Lanka” that is being trumpeted in all the headlines and this has to be done without delay.

Of course the potential of what can be achieved with the war over is huge. The Colombo stock market was the best performing in Asia during the 2002 ceasefire (when there really was a ceasefire) and Sri Lanka can hopefully use its high literacy levels and resources to develop economically. How we go forward from here is crucial. And that’s what scares me.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Who'd have thought? Elections bring out the sap in me.

Melissa A. Bell — Sun, 17 May 2009 12:11:00 GMT

November 4, 2008, I had just flown back to Delhi from New York and came straight to my office. With five editors, I watched Barack Obama accept the US nomination for presidency.
Wow. Even typing that I get tears in my eyes. You should have seen me that morning. As one editor put it, “Melissa could solve the water crisis.” Another said that our budget for the amount of Kleenex I used was going to put us in the poorhouse.
Yes, I’m a sap, but crying over an election? It just didn’t feel right. I’m a diehard, long-term cynic. I exploited my secure, happy childhood, my country of opportunity, my life of relative ease, and I became a grandiose peanut gallery sneer-er.
Actually believe in change? Actually be inspired by politics? Not in my lifetime.
But the Obama aura sparkled and crackled and excited people across the world. It was easy to chalk my crying up to a once-in-a-lifetime moment, made more palatable by the fact that it was also a huge backlash of relief.
So I quickly settled back into my cozy cynic’s chair. When the elections started here, I hunkered down and smugly sat back: They’re so boring! I whined. Where’s the excitement? The story!
This time it was an even easier seat to take. Sure, I have preferences about who should be running the Indian government: I base it solely on how cute a candidate looks in a pink turban (I’ll give you a hint: my vote this year would have gone to the dimpled darling. What? He wears a good pink turban.). But I don’t have a vote. And there’s just so much I don’t know about this country, still. How can I say who should lead Kerala? Karnataka? South Mumbai? (I never saw those candidates in pink turbans.).
Fast forward to May 16, 2009. I found myself in the same position I had been in six months before: in a gang of reporters watching around the exact same televisions as another country’s leader accepted victory.
This time the faces were not new, young faces of change. It was rather the opposite: embracing the status quo. But still a charge filled the room—a hope, a possibility.
I left the office and the streets rang with shouts and songs. Five trucks drove by me, a voice boomed from a loudspeaker, “Thank you, people of Delhi! Thank you for your vote.” Men and women in the backs of the trucks danced and waved and shouted “Jai Ho!”
I came home to fireworks and people shaking hands in the market. My serious, subdued friend called from Kolkata, “We have broken free of 32 years of oppression!” He sounded like a child, excited, laughing. I almost didn’t recognize him. On Facebook, my friends lamented and crowed.
It was a good day.
I don’t know if democracy is or isn’t our best option. I do know it’s not easily forced on anyone. And I do know corruption and apathy can be its bedfellows.
But, man, on Election Day, for that moment I realized how foolish is my cynicism. It’s not just some sparkly politician that excites me. It’s not even about the politicians. It’s about the voters. The possibility that we are in control of our own destiny, that we have a choice and a power. The fact that we all can participate in the election unifies us as countrymen, whichever country it is, even though it may divide us temporarily onto sides. Oh man, I feel so corny. But, hot damn. It feels good.
I am proud of India, of democracy, of all these corny things I never like to admit to. And here I go again: tearing up like a baby. Maybe I’ll have to start getting used to this.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Expats say the darndest things

Melissa A. Bell — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 12:42:00 GMT

This may come as a surprise to people, but I don’t actually like to go out, especially to cocktail parties where I don’t know many people. I always wind up talking to the one person at the entire party who either wants to tell me the entire saga of his blighted love affair that ended ten years ago or the girl who really thinks the guy likes her—right? he does, right?—even though he hasn’t called in a week.

Despite this aversion to public gatherings, I wound up on two consecutive weekends at two expat parties. I started to think that perhaps it wasn’t that I disliked going out—I just hate going to expat parties. Because expats say the darndest things. Especially new kids to town. As an old timer—all of three years now—I saw it fit to write a small primer on what not to say to help all the wayward folks making their way to the balmy shores of India.

(As a small tangent: Have you noticed how many foreigners are flocking here? I know, I know. Everyone says that every year. But in the last couple months alone, I feel this place has been inundated with folks fleeing the recessions at home, no longer searching for the spiritual India, but simply the cold hard successful India.)

My token disclaimer: Of course, I’ve said all these things at one time or another (except for the pajama pants; I wouldn’t be caught dead in those). I’m trying to help you learn from my mistakes and, yes, I am generalizing as a crude attempt at humor. I am sure you are all beautiful, good people. And I believe the cross pollination of ideas that we bring with us and that we take away is invaluable to India and to the countries we return to. But sometimes you act like ninnies.

"Oh my god! You’re from New Jersey! And I’m from California! That means we’re probably going to have so much in common and be best friends forever. I am SO excited to have met you!”

Just because my ancestors and your ancestors moved to a similar country years ago, and then we’ve both decided to move to this country does not mean that we have anything else in common. There is no way you would be friends with me back home—I’m a dork who loves Jane Austen. I’m sorry to say I don’t think I’d be friends with you either—you like going to Urban Pind and talking about football. It's just not going to work.

I love how you greet me so gleefully as we pass each other on the street. I almost feel like I’m running into a long lost friend: “Hello, there!” But then I realize we’ve never met. You’re just amazed to see another white American traipsing through Defense Colony market. Trust me, there are plenty of white Americans in Defense Colony. It’s more embarrassing that we’re both here than anything else; best pretend we just don’t see each other.

"I love my pajama pants.”

Where do you even find those pajama pants? And why do you think that’s the appropriate attire for this country? Have you ever seen a single Indian out of the width and breadth of this country wearing those ridiculous things?

Also, even if everyone in the world was wearing them here, do you realize that you look like MC Hammer in them? They are not flattering! You are a pretty girl wearing parachute pants! It’s just wrong!

"It is so dusty here!”

Or insert “smells so bad”, “so hot”, or “so loud”. Yes, we’ve heard the honking. We know about the certain corners that stand in as urinals. We dust our houses too. We live in a tropical country that has 600 million people below the poverty line. There are going to be smelly street corners and loud traffic noises and dusty, hot days. Get over it.

Okay, it is fine to mention this once or twice. It is 42 degrees outside. And that corner does smell really bad, especially in the 42-degree heat. But if your entire Indian experience can be summed up with the above sentence, you need to go back home.

"Isn’t the poverty just so heart breaking? It’s so hard to pass the street kids every day. I just wish I could be doing more. Could I get another glass of that Rs1,000 wine, please?”

By all means, have that glass of wine. I wouldn’t begrudge a person a drink ever. And by all means, be struck by the need to help others less fortunate than yourself. But simply talking about how sad the situation is does not in fact help anyone. Unless you are spending your entire day slaving away at Mother Teresea’s orphanage, find another topic.

Also, that’s very sweet that you choose certain street kids to give biscuits and water to. But that is not enough. Nor is paying your servants extra. Find a charity. Donate your time. At the very least, give some of your old clothing to Goonj.

"Is Rs3,000 enough to pay the ayah?”

As a friend so brilliantly put it, if you think entrusting your child’s growth, health and happiness to someone for the price of a dinner for one at the Imperial, then by all means.

You’re going to pay a bit extra than locals do. But if you’re earning more than 80 percent of the population, don’t you think you should?

"I just can’t stand how much the men stare here.”

You are eight Norwegian blond women in an ambassador in tube tops and black skirts. It’s not quite the most common sight on the block. Even I’m going to stare at you.

Ah, heck, it’s not the skirt. If you’re in a salwar kameeze, men are gonna stare. So are women. And children. People stare here! It’s a country that loves other people’s business. Get over it. Enjoy it, in fact. People are curious about you. You’re curious about them. Stare back.

"Yes, of course, I bathed my baby in Evian. Just for the first six months. Its immune system is from the mother. I couldn’t take the risk.”

I love how much you care about your child. But, honestly, that is the funniest thing I’ve ever heard a person do. And I will continue to make fun of you for it until your child is old, healthy and gray.

"I have a ton of local friends.”

Your one token Indian friend does not mean that you’re getting to know the country. And Americans with Indian parents definitely do not count as token Indian friends.

And just as a tip, traveling through the city in a pack of ten to fifteen expats will not encourage local friendships to flourish. Delhiites, especially, have friendships that go back to kindergarten. There is no reason for them to try to make friends with an entire herd of strangers. And if you're going to "Expat night" at a bar, seriously? That's not really branching out, folks.

Just to ensure I wouldn’t let my people off easy, I asked my token Indian friend to come up with a few more:

Squeeze the pennies at a bargain shop when the Rs 20 they saved after twenty minute haggle means peanuts to them – perhaps just to get the kick of a bargain. (This is very true, it pisses me off no less when I see dollar-earning people trying to haggle for 20 rupees).

Explain the visiting country’s economic and social situation (or the lack of it) in twenty minutes flat quoting this fabulous book that another expat wrote ten years back.

Pass that smug smile while being ushered in the ‘white only’ lines in hotels and other queues.

Not having the smug smile but instead feel a gentle guilt announcing to the hassled crowd of skins in the queue “Sorry foreign tourists; sorry could you let us pass.”

Back from visiting the tigers in a national park and hearing about the tiger deaths, talking about how sad it is that India is unable to protect its magnificent beasts.

“The palace was beautiful if only they could restrict the number of people coming in everyday it would be so much better an experience.”

They learn to say "chai" and "namaste" and beam when equally irritating Indians find their accent so cute.

“Do you really think I could attend a true Indian wedding when am there?” And once in India, put on the mehndi, do a silly dance, laugh to glory, and later write a blog post on the silliness of it all.

Expats think going to Neemrana is the ultimate Indian experience ever. They come back gushing that they stayed two nights in an Indian village when all they saw of that village was half a kilometer of bumpy stretch through dark tinted glasses of a chilled SUV.

I came here to find myself. This country is so spiritual. Or any variation thereof.

“Reading Amartya Sen made me realize how beautiful this country is really.”

What else we got? And, guys, try to not be TOO mean.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!

Cheers for IPL deals!

Ayeshea Perera — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 07:22:00 GMT

Pubs in Delhi are good places to be these days. Now that the IPL has been moved to South Africa (as a friend so aptly put it) "Only a really suicidal pub won't have some IPL deal going on".

So what this means apart from the fact that you can watch the matches on big screen, is that you get some great offers on food and beer (yay!) and free carnival atmosphere. So pick a team to support (if you want to play it safe go with the Delhi Daredevils), head down to a pub, avail yourself of the 'IPL' deals and hoot, cheer, heckle and make merry with the rest. Even if you don't like cricket or have no clue as to what the HECK is happening on the screen, just being there is an experience you simply should NOT miss.

The question of course is where to go. I would say try as many places as possible - the matches are going to be on everyday for at least another month. (You never know what deals you might be missing out on if you single mindedly go to the same place over and over again)

To start you off, I've compiled a quick list of the IPL deals that are being offered at some of the pubs around the city. The caveat of course is that this is a very rudimentary list - I'm still in the middle of my "research" myself. So additions and other suggestions are more than welcome. Here goes:

* Blues Cafe - Connaught Place

If you want to come here, you're going to have to get in a little early because there is one big screen in front of the bar and prime seats get taken very fast. There are two smaller screen televisions for the unlucky latecomers who have to sit to the side of and behind the big screen - if you don't like cricket, be nice and sit here and allow the fans their watching space. There is an "IPL menu" which features for (some strange reason) tandoori chicken, but the true deal is on the beer - you get "5 pint" deals - where 5 pints of any local beer goes for Rs 400. Carlsberg is slightly more expensive.

*All Sports Bar - Connaught Place
Now this alas, is a bit of a rip off. Undoubtedly banking on the fact that their apt name will bring all the sports fans running, this pub has upped its premium. First a cover charge of 500 per head, which is redeemable through coupons. So far so good. The coupons are in blocks of Rs 25 each and one sheet of coupons is worth 250. The catch is however that everything has to be bought via coupon, you have to buy a minimum of one sheet of coupons at a time (nothing less) and if you have coupons left at the end of the match they aren't redeemable. These guys have deals on pints as well. A cooler of 10 pints goes for a 1200 - which can be hard to work out with coupons and the complex way in which you ust purchase them. Plus the food is not that great. Coverage wise however this can be a pretty good bet.
If you're early enough to grab a booth, you have the luxury watching the matches on your own personal tv. If not, there are still plenty of televisions on which you can watch the matches.

*Bennigans Pub - Saket and GK
Bennigans is showing the matches on big screen and dont't charge an entrance fee. Nothing special on the menu for IPL just yet, but their awesome "recession time drinking" offer conveniently falls into the same time slots that the match is aired. Buy two get three free on any local spirits.

*Turquoise Cottage - Gurgaon and Vasant Vihar
Turquise Cottage is offering "Happy Hours for the duration of the match. So one plus one for as long as they're playing. The good news is that the deal is applicable on both domestic and foreign liquor. The matches themselves are being shown on two plasma screen televisions and one big screen. So running to get good seats is like at Blues, highly advisable.

Share this post: email it! | del.icio.us! | digg it! | newsVine!