Today (7 Dec 2005) my nephew, Pranav, asked, "What do Australians eat?"
I have no satisfactory answer to this question. I see most people eat sandwiches for lunch. I see people eat things—which look horrible to me but taste yummy to them—at BBQs. I am a vegetarian and most Australian food includes at least something which is non vegetarian. This makes it impossible for me to identify or give a description of typical Australian food.
Please have the patience to read the rest of this note and not prematurely judge my ignorance as arrogance or unwillingness to integrate with the Australian culture.
My nephew's question started a train of thought in my mind. I thought, in less than a year I would have lived outside India more than in India. Have I changed in all those years spent outside India? What have I learnt from my experiences? How much am I a different person now than what I would have been had I lived in India? How have I changed?
I realised that one thing is for sure, I have changed little in what makes me sad and what makes me happy. In those dominant feelings I think I am like most other Indians. I wonder if it is possible to capture what makes Indians happy and what makes them sad. I will try by giving one example each of the type of things which make Indians sad and happy.
Rare is an Indian who can hold back tears on reading Rabindra Nath Tagore's short story Kabuliwallah. I tell that great story here in short.
The story is set in a town in India. An Afghan known as Kabuliwallah (someone from the city of Kabul) went around the town selling dry fruits brought from Kabul. His family lived in Kabul. His coming and goings to Kabul had a pattern. He had a little daughter back home. In his town of business he got to know and dearly love a little girl called Mini as dearly as his own often separated daughter. He showered Mini with dry fruits and presents and Mini returned his affection in equal measure with her prattle and mischief. This arrangement was disturbed when Kabuliwallah got involved in a murder following a financial dispute. He was of a quick temper and in a rage, born of the certainty which only truth gives, he killed the disputant. He went to prison. After his term was over as he got out of the prison all his thoughts were for his daughter in Kabul and Mini nearby. The first thing he did after getting out was to purchase colourful bangles for Mini.
Now the story moves to the part where Kabuliwallah arrives at Mini's house.
He finds that Mini is to be married that evening. He seeks permission to meet her. He enters the room where Mini is getting ready for the ceremony. He takes out the bangles and presents them to Mini only to realise that Mini is no more a little girl and the bangles do not fit her. Then it dawns on him that his little daughter in Kabul is no longer the little girl still living in his heart.
The story ends here but Indians who read this story weep profusely and will not stop weeping till their thoughts are forcibly turned to something else. Most Indians who have read this story weep repeatedly whenever Kabuliwallah and the bangles and Mini are mentioned.
I have read the story several times and never has the weight of Kabuliwallah's realisation been less forceful or my eyes less tearful. I hope you enjoy the story when you get an opportunity to read it. Tagore won a Noble Prize for literature so, when you read the original, expect a much more vivid description of the Kabuliwallah, his daughter, and Mini.
Now an example of what makes Indians happy. The memory of the return of Ramachandra (Ram for short) to Ayodhya after fourteen years of exile provides unlimited joy to Indians.
There was a king of the city-state of Ayodhya who had an emperor-like influence over all other kingdoms. He had three wives and four sons. When his sons came of age he decided to coronate his son Ram who was born of his first queen. This made the second queen jealous so she invoked two special boons the king had given her. Firstly she asked the king to coronate her own son Bharat and secondly to exile Ram to a forest for fourteen years. Not to let his father down, Ram gladly accepted his brother's coronation and his own exile because "the family tradition is such that even at the cost of life, we honour our word." And in fact the old king did lose his life, unable to bear the separation from his dear son Ram. The younger brother was devoted to Ram and instead of ascending the throne himself, he placed Ram's footwear on the throne and became a caretaker ruler. During the exile Ram lived a simple life spending time discussing duty, devotion, and philosophy with other learned scholars and monks.
Towards the end of fourteen years his wife was abducted by a king who ruled the southern island of Sri Lanka. Ram had to wage a war to get his wife back. When the war was over so were the fourteen years of the exile. Ram took the air-plane of the vanquished king and flew back with his wife, brother, and one of his devotees to the kingdom of Ayodhya. They arrived in Ayodhya on the day known as Deepavali.
The return of Ramchandra is celebrated every year with great pomp and ceremony. The memory of Ramchandra arriving back to Ayodhya gives joy to millions of Indians even today.
The younger brother was more than pleased to make Ram the king on Ram's return. The rule of Ramachandra was a long one and a perfect one. The rule of Ram is a synonym for perfect rule in Indian. It conjures up an image of a society full of joy, happiness, and contentment.
I have lived for over 19 years in Australia, yet I don't know what makes Australians sad or happy. For the most part I am clueless. Charles Dickens might be the one to arouse their emotions but maybe I read in Charles Dickens something Australians don't. English poetry doesn't evoke any feelings in me so I cannot feel what Australians might feel. Shakespeare is all right in parts but I don't find any emotion in his works. I am clueless about western music and art although I have tried to feel it and understand it but without success.
I cannot compare Kabuliwallah and the return of Ramchandra to anything I know in English literature or western tradition. Homer's Iliad and Odyssey provide some comparison but I think its appeal is mostly to the intellect and not feelings. When I say feelings, I don't mean sentimentality. I refer to those feelings which when stirred raise our intellect to a higher plane from where we can get a better look at ourselves.
I have given only two samples from the vast Indian literature. Most Indians live these stories every day in their own lives. Their lives are filled with such life-enriching joys and sorrows. I suppose a bundle of all these joys and sorrows is what we call culture.
Perhaps I will live many more years in Australia but even then I may never know what makes Australians sad or happy. I write about feelings because there is a chance I can share their feelings but as I don't eat Australian food, it will never be possible for me to answer my nephew's question about what Australians eat!
Mine is not Byron's lightning spear,
Nor Wordsworth's lucid strain
Nor Shelley's lyric pain,
Nor Keats', the poet without peer.
I by the Indian waters vast
Did glimpse the magic of the past,
And on the oaten-pipe I play
Warped echoes of an earlier day.
Sri Aurobindo (1872-1950) in "To a Hero-Worshiper"
September 1891
Several times Swami Rama Tirtha (1873-1906) wept while seeing the setting sun in America and said:
Now you are rising in my beloved country. Drop my tears like dew-drops over beautiful water-fed fields of India.