Insidious Outsiders

I was called 'rothi surath’ or cry baby in my toddler years. Or so my father claims. Everyone in our apartment complex apparently called me that because I cried the minute they made friendly overtures. My father, presumably schooled in the Rajesh Khanna school of thought with his memorable dialogue “Pushpa, I hate tears,” was mortified at his daughter's shortcoming.

My mother tried to mollify him, saying Hindi was an alien language to me, then all of two years. After having lived in erstwhile Madras, I had become fluent enough in Tamil to be called a local. Here I was now in a land where Bhai and bai were two words that meant the exact opposite!

Just when I started getting familiar with spoken Hindi, my parents moved to the capital of the country in search of better opportunities. There I struggled with written Hindi even though my spoken Hindi was almost pitch perfect.

The cyclical shifting every four to five years meant that we were always trying to fit in. New schools, new syllabi, new friends, new locations. We were always outsiders with no shared history.

We finally returned to Bangalore in my adulthood and irony of ironies, I could barely speak Kannada. My mother had homeschooled me in written Kannada while still a preteen. But in all honesty, I have to confess that though I might pass the tests used to establish literacy; in reality, all I did was indulge in some guess work. I tried to join the alphabets and figure out if the word made any sense.

I have realized over the years that a government office is the best place to get a sense of your identity. True to form, I learned of my status as an outsider while being an insider at the RTO, where I had gone for my learner’s licence. On that particular day they told me that forms in English had run out. I suspect they never issued them in English, but I couldn’t say for sure.

I met the inspector who was exasperated that I hadn't read the instructions and brought all the required documents. I explained helplessly that I couldn't read Kannada. A super jingoistic citizen standing just behind me in the line exclaimed that I should first learn the language before trying to get a licence.

Patience has never been my strong suit and I didn't wait to hear out his logic which might have been rational and well thought out. I'm ashamed to admit that instead of thanking him, I created a scene by asking what his locus- standi was and added insult to injury by telling him no one asked for his opinion.

It has recently dawned on me that I am not rooted in any place or identity, and worse yet, I don't even have strong prejudices. I do admit to judging people who don't like sweets though. I am convinced that it indicates a lack of sweet disposition. I also judge people who eat bhujiya with toast - that just shows lack of good taste!  

Despite that, I'm not able to join in with any conviction when anyone denounces someone’s identity. I'm trying hard to rectify this failing. It obviously shows how shallow I am. My commitment to my state, my religion, even my nation seems questionable.

I also seem to attract people just like me, people who have grown up as outsiders and can never belong even when they go back to their native land.

We try to act as parochial as possible. It's an act though. Our heart is not in it and the pretense shines through. We are wannabe misfits and I call upon the government to create a separate category for people like us. Maybe create reservation in jobs for us. Hopefully then, we can have a sense of belonging and from time to time take out morchas!