And time stood still ....
Everybody has a tendency to romanticize/demonize the past. All the details of the past seem to blend into a few key highlights. Once the overall tone of the past experience is set, very soon, those are the only things that you remember.
Pilani, for example, was super fun. I had (and still do) a super great gang of friends, lots of free time, a great library, no worries, lots of movies. However, there was also the power cuts, 120 degree heat, shitty food and the run down labs. I hardly remember the bad things though, because the overall experience was so positive.
On the other hand, there are some experiences which overall left a negative impression on my mind, which led me to forget some of the nice things that it was accompanied by.
Indians living outside India tend to do something similar. India is either romanticized or demonized beyond reason.
India is either remembered as the land of solid morals, lack of confusion, family, festivals, color, laughter, realness, passion, a feeling of being alive, cricket, rain dances in white sarees, chicken tikka, witty grand parents, newspapers with substance, servants to do everything, a relaxed pace of life, breaking the law with reckless abandon, the indian flag, republic day parades, the software boom, india rising, india shining ....
Or
As a land of poverty, filth, corruption, long queues, crowds, death, sweat, power cuts, heat, dowry deaths, illiteracy, potholes, caste-based reservation, crooked politicians, slowness of progress, obstacles, being cheated, the need to cheat to get ahead, conservative people, nosy neighbors, dominating parents, irritating relatives, a feeling of being stuck, religious riots, flies, death on the road, filthy hospitals
So what is India ?
Its all of the above, of course.
However, India is changing everyday ...
Its losing some of the good stuff - Morals, respect for parents etc ...
And its losing some of the bad stuff - Less poverty, reduced corruption.
The problem is that Indians outside India have a static picture of India in their minds, a sort of time trap. And they want India to conform to that image when they go back.
People go to India and say "Shit, look at the clothes girls are wearing, shocking !" - They get upset when India moves away from the image in their mind.
"Wow, a movie ticket costs 100 bucks now !" - This screws up their image of India as being the land of cheap pleasures
And so on ....
Well, India will change, you cant expect it to stay poor, traditional and backward just for NRIs to go there and be able to reconcile the country with the image in their heads.
Take India as it is, with all of its good things and all of the bad - She is no divine virgin beauty and neither is she a beaten up, haggard near-corpse.
She is the best thing to be - She is real.
Pilani, for example, was super fun. I had (and still do) a super great gang of friends, lots of free time, a great library, no worries, lots of movies. However, there was also the power cuts, 120 degree heat, shitty food and the run down labs. I hardly remember the bad things though, because the overall experience was so positive.
On the other hand, there are some experiences which overall left a negative impression on my mind, which led me to forget some of the nice things that it was accompanied by.
Indians living outside India tend to do something similar. India is either romanticized or demonized beyond reason.
India is either remembered as the land of solid morals, lack of confusion, family, festivals, color, laughter, realness, passion, a feeling of being alive, cricket, rain dances in white sarees, chicken tikka, witty grand parents, newspapers with substance, servants to do everything, a relaxed pace of life, breaking the law with reckless abandon, the indian flag, republic day parades, the software boom, india rising, india shining ....
Or
As a land of poverty, filth, corruption, long queues, crowds, death, sweat, power cuts, heat, dowry deaths, illiteracy, potholes, caste-based reservation, crooked politicians, slowness of progress, obstacles, being cheated, the need to cheat to get ahead, conservative people, nosy neighbors, dominating parents, irritating relatives, a feeling of being stuck, religious riots, flies, death on the road, filthy hospitals
So what is India ?
Its all of the above, of course.
However, India is changing everyday ...
Its losing some of the good stuff - Morals, respect for parents etc ...
And its losing some of the bad stuff - Less poverty, reduced corruption.
The problem is that Indians outside India have a static picture of India in their minds, a sort of time trap. And they want India to conform to that image when they go back.
People go to India and say "Shit, look at the clothes girls are wearing, shocking !" - They get upset when India moves away from the image in their mind.
"Wow, a movie ticket costs 100 bucks now !" - This screws up their image of India as being the land of cheap pleasures
And so on ....
Well, India will change, you cant expect it to stay poor, traditional and backward just for NRIs to go there and be able to reconcile the country with the image in their heads.
Take India as it is, with all of its good things and all of the bad - She is no divine virgin beauty and neither is she a beaten up, haggard near-corpse.
She is the best thing to be - She is real.
Comments