I arrived in the US in the August of 1970. That means I have been here now for forty years---a personal landmark for me to look back and reflect.
This was not the way it was meant to be.
I had come to MIT for graduate studies. After finishing my doctorate, I had started applying for jobs in India. By the time the last summer of my stay came rolling by, I already had three offers in hand. I could have become a lecturer at IIT Bombay, an assistant professor at BITS in Pilani, or a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organization in Trivendrum, at a princely salary of about Rs.1000 per month.
Then came a fateful meeting with a friend of one of my cousins. I met this gentleman, a senior executive of an Indian firm that represented Digital Equipment in India, at the Howard Johnson motel in Concord. In about an hour he managed to convince me that I should at least get some work experience in US (and earn some money) before heading home.
That one and half year work experience under a “Practical Training” program led me to apply for Green Card, along with a promise to myself that this stay in this foreign country will last only for a few years…ten at the most.
Then came marriage and children. Ten became twenty. The idea of going back faded, as did the notion of what is “back”---back where? This was home now.
In doing this, I became one of the statistics---that representing brain drain from poorer countries. Instead of paying back to my country of birth and the fine education it had provided, I was helping a rich country become richer and in the process becoming prosperous myself. I did not get to spend much time with my family in India, and started drifting away from a network of friends I had left behind.
Forty years. Much lost….but much gained. Probably gained more than lost.
I can rattle off the usual benefits of living in the West----good living, material prosperity, few hassles, and raising children in a land of opportunity. However, to me an equally important aspect, if not more, is the opportunity for personal development this has provided. Living in a country like US gives you an opportunity to gain a global outlook, widen the scope of experiences you can have, and vastly increase the potential to learn. Being neither an Indian nor an American in the strict sense allows you to become both or, if you wish, a global citizen, equally at home in any part of the world.
Come to think of it, that is not a bad trade-off.
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You have expressed what so many of us 40 year olds feel..young and excited about life still, with s much left to do, e.g., me at 64!
ReplyDeletePerhaps living between two cultures and getting the best of them both had a good result for us,and at the same made us realize with sadness that there are so many in our birthplace who do not have much of anything at all..
and the land we have spent a greater part of our lives has become home for us, but our past and childhood is never far away..
Thanks for starting this conversation so we may reflect together on who we have become
Gita
Let me be controversial: Living in the USA does not automatically give you a global outlook - look around and you will find many who do not have the global outlook.
ReplyDeleteThe global outlook comes from the opportunities one leverages of working with and being friends with people of other cultures and travelling to other countries with real interest in people, cultures and customs. In a globalized world this opportunity is also available to Indians living in India and going on assignments to other countries.
The key to global lifestyle comes from a deeper social immersion in two or more cultures for multiple aspects of life - work, hobbies, peer groups, friends, relatives etc. -for an extended period of time.
- Sharad
I enjoyed reading about your past. Even, I was not aware of your intention of going back home when you graduated. Hey, we need to improve our communications.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with Sharad. I have seen many families, not only us, people from Indian Origin, who create a "Mini-Mumbai", But also we create "Mini-Havana" or "Mini-Whatever".
In my opinion, the real inclusivity comes from our sense of home. We can never go back home again. (Paraphrased from Thomas Wolfe). We can visit our home, but the time and environment which we seek are long gone. We can have two options, always be sad and reflect on "Things were and things might have been only if ...." or celebrate the opportunity as it presents itself now. We have to be confortable in who we are. I have to bve confortable with my 5'-6" frame. Once I am confortable, it would not matter if I lived here or anywhere else.
Dad,
ReplyDeleteI also didn't know you had intended to go back after you graduated. I think you would have had a great life if you had stayed in India as well. The reason you are a citizen of the world is because of the hunger for knowledge that you possess- and that would have flourished in any context, in my opinion.
I feel fortunate to have reaped the benefits of my American identity as well as my parents' Indian culture. However, there are certain aspects of Indian life that one envies - the general emphasis on family and respect, the history and richness of a culture that has evolved over centuries, and, plain and simple, woulda been nice to grow up somewhere I looked like everyone else. My point is-- there's no way to know what you lost by coming here, but the life you built is great, and I'm glad you have no regrets.
-Ami