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Bengali Nights
"At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance..... We end today a period of ill fortune, and India discovers herself again."
Happy Independence Day, everyone. Fly your kites high, for on this day, sixty one years ago, the British were kicked out! Well, sort of. They left behind their school system, their language (again sort of), their cricket and generations of inferiority complexes, but anyway.
I've been thinking a lot of about India lately. From my little cousin-brother moving here to start his ph.d., and observing his very first experiences with culture shock, discovering that I am, apparently, something to be warned about (!!!) as a corruptive influence (it is true that he's been here two weeks and has already been introduced to cocktails and *ahem* certain illicit substances - somehow my feelings are still hurt!) to thinking about Suzie Costello, and the weirdness of the South Asian representation on Torchwood and Who (a whole other post)...it's been on my mind.
I have such an uneasy relationship with the place.
Anyway, doesn't matter. It's still the root, no matter what I ever do, or how far I go. Nothing to be done about it. So happy birthday, India. I wish you all the best in outsourcing and industry growth, getting over the whole kashmir thing, and you know, while you're at it, finally getting over all that Hindu/Muslim turmoil. It doesn't look good on you, and it was fanned into flame by the British anyhow. Shouldn't we just get over it? Many happy returns & have a great day!
Love,
Kali
Happy Independence Day, everyone. Fly your kites high, for on this day, sixty one years ago, the British were kicked out! Well, sort of. They left behind their school system, their language (again sort of), their cricket and generations of inferiority complexes, but anyway.
I've been thinking a lot of about India lately. From my little cousin-brother moving here to start his ph.d., and observing his very first experiences with culture shock, discovering that I am, apparently, something to be warned about (!!!) as a corruptive influence (it is true that he's been here two weeks and has already been introduced to cocktails and *ahem* certain illicit substances - somehow my feelings are still hurt!) to thinking about Suzie Costello, and the weirdness of the South Asian representation on Torchwood and Who (a whole other post)...it's been on my mind.
I have such an uneasy relationship with the place.
Anyway, doesn't matter. It's still the root, no matter what I ever do, or how far I go. Nothing to be done about it. So happy birthday, India. I wish you all the best in outsourcing and industry growth, getting over the whole kashmir thing, and you know, while you're at it, finally getting over all that Hindu/Muslim turmoil. It doesn't look good on you, and it was fanned into flame by the British anyhow. Shouldn't we just get over it? Many happy returns & have a great day!
Love,
Kali
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It's the prerogative of older, more exciting family members to corrupt their slightly-youngers.
*laughs* yep! And I'm having a blast doing so. I just wasn't...uh... expecting the older generation to, you know, be able to predict it. I guess my reputation precedes me? I think they think I've got some kind of dark, decadent, opium den/brothel set up going on here. I wish!
Let me hope they never, uh, find my blog. Then they'd be SURE.