Search Results

As the 2022 Winter Olympics kicked off in Beijing, President Biden made the untraditional executive decision to not send government officials to the Olympics, although athletes are still allowed to participate. This diplomatic boycott is in response to the human rights crisis of the Uyghur Muslims and the “crackdowns on pro-democracy protests” in Hong Kong. Given the obvious conflicts with China, other countries have taken similar actions, including the U.K., Canada, Australia, and Japan, to name a few. While Japan has not gone as far as other nations in declaring their actions, they are sending officials responsible for the Tokyo Olympics instead of government officials. Various U.S. news outlets have reported about China’s response, stating that China has warned other countries to stay out of their domestic affairs. The Chinese embassy in Washington declared the U.S.’s boycott a “grave distortion of the spirit of the Olympic Charter.” Liu Pengyu, a spokesman from the embassy, stated that in reality, these diplomats' presence would not impact the success of the Winter Olympics and that “no invitation had been extended to the U.S. politicians, ‘so this diplomatic boycott simply comes out of nowhere’.” The China Institute of International Studies also responded to the diplomatic boycott by saying that the U.S. embellished the issues in Xinjiang and Hong Kong through organizations such as the G7, the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, and the U.S.-E.U. summit. According to the Institute, this boycotting of the Olympics is all in effort to “incite international anti-China public opinion and [to] engage in ideological confrontation,” and when faced with concrete evidence will no longer be valid. The Institute calls into attention the history of political manipulation as a central aspect of the Olympics, citing the Cold War, where boycotts of varying scales left “eternal regrets and wounds in the hearts of athletes and the general public.” After the Cold War, international political tension eased and the Olympics were no longer used to incite political confrontation. This gave birth to the 1992 “Olympic Truce,” an ancient Greek tradition that contributes to the greater goal of a peaceful future for mankind through sports, which was launched by the International Olympic Committee and the United Nations. However, the U.S. was one of the few nations that refused to take this treaty seriously. For example, during the 1998 Nagano Olympics held in Japan, U.S.-Iran relations were tense and former President Bill Clinton stated that he was ready to take military action against Iran despite the Olympics. With much persuasion by the International Olympic Committee President Samaranch and Japan, the U.S. finally agreed to a truce. Despite this, the U.S. launched the Iraq War in 2004 during the Athens Olympics. The Institute goes on to elaborate on the importance of the Olympics and how it also symbolizes human pursuit and promotion of “peace, friendship, solidarity, and fair competition.” They criticize the U.S. for politicizing sports, and by declaring a boycott, advertise the Olympic games as a “gimmick” as the U.S. reaps the benefits of sending athletes while withholding their diplomats. China warns the U.S. and their allies that these boycotts that are based on “ideological prejudice and blatant lies” will be “rejected by the people, and will eventually be a laughing stock in the history of the Olympic Games.” The China Institute of International Studies begins to close their statement by reinforcing the idea that they do not condone using the Olympic games as a way to incite Sino-American relations and political confrontation. The Institute further emphasizes that the games are going to be held successfully, just like the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

“Oh, you mean China?” A supposedly witty response that I have heard an innumerable amount of times to the fact that my mother was born on the island of Taiwan. The statement, a cliché attempt of alluding to the widespread belief in the United States that Taiwan will inevitably be destroyed by an invasion from mainland China within the next year or decade, is nothing new to me. While the ignorance of the statement cannot be understated, it is ironically a statement that unintentionally questions my ancestral connections. One of the first stories that I was told by my mother was how my grandparents narrowly escaped death in their youth. In 1949, my grandparents, who had just married, decided to honeymoon on the island of Taiwan. This was a crucial decision that was motivated by the circumstances in the country at the time. The Second World War had just ended in 1945 with the surrender of the empire of Japan, but peace would not come to China. Nearly immediately after WWII ended, civil war between the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese Nationalist Party re-erupted, and while the Chinese Nationalist Party began the war with strong advantages, the war quickly turned against their favor. By 1949, Beijing had fallen, and Chiang Kai-Shek, the leader of the Chinese Nationalist Party, realizing his party would lose, decided to relocate his government to the island of Taiwan. My grandparents, supporters of the Chinese Nationalist Party, used their honeymoon as a cover to visit Taiwan. Shortly afterward the Chinese Nationalist Party formed a dictatorship over Taiwan as the People’s Republic of China was proclaimed. My grandparents, without any way of returning to their home in the mainland became two of two million “外省人” (wai4 sheng3 ren2) — translating to “those born outside of the province” — who settled amongst the eight million “本省人” (ben2 sheng3 ren2), those born on the island. My mother was born in the following decade, a time period where the Nationalist dictatorship in Taiwan was treated by the international community as the legitimate government of all of China. In this era of martial law, those of her generation were told that their lives in Taiwan were temporary and that eventually the Nationalist government would reclaim the mainland. That never happened, and in the 1980s my mother immigrated to the United States with my grandparents following her shortly afterwards. Ultimately, the amalgamation of these inherited circumstances made the idea of national identity quite complicated for me. Even though I was born in the United States, I was born with ties abroad, and discerning which of these ties I identified with most strongly became a source of contention to me. To begin, the way that my family and our history almost gave me the impression that despite our relatively comfortable lives in the United States, we were somehow political refugees. While my family no longer really held any belief that they would return to mainland China, my mother would often still claim our homeland to be in the mainland, never strongly identifying with the label of “Taiwanese.” Yet, growing up I could not understand why this was the case. Simply put, my family did not have any ties to mainland China that existed outside of their national identifications. We no longer have family in mainland China and Taiwan is the land that now two generations of my family have lived and continue to live on. The term Chinese ties us to our ancestral homeland in the mainland; it similarly ties us to a government which no one in my family has lived under for two generations. At the same time, the term Taiwanese is not perfect either. Despite my family’s geographic connections to the island, we are still ethnically “Chinese,” and using the term Taiwanese to describe my ethnically Chinese heritage could be considered a form of colonial erasure. Taiwan has a population of indigenous people who have lived in Taiwan for thousands of years. In calling myself Taiwanese, I often find myself feeling as if I am making a claim to a land that ultimately belongs to others. Along with this, I often feel like it is not enough to capture my family’s complicated relationship to the island as the geographical identity obscures my grandparents’ place of origin. It is for this reason that both the labels of “Chinese” and “Taiwanese” are often inadequate. On one hand, while the term Chinese may capture my ethnicity and the culture that I grew up in, it also ties me with a government and a land that I have very little connection to. On the other hand, it is hard to tell if the term Taiwanese is fully descriptive either. While it is correct that my family currently lives on the island of Taiwan and the term Taiwanese captures the politics and history of my family, the term also in a way erases the existence of the indigenous Taiwanese who are not ethnically Chinese. In all, my personal experiences highlight the influence of place within the formation of identity and how national identity is often insufficient in describing one’s culture or history. The complicated nature of the terms Taiwanese and Chinese highlights how attributing cultural identities to nation states is ultimately problematic. Nationhood is not equal to culture or ethnicity, and a person’s unique identities exist outside of the states that they are bound to. Altogether, what we consider to be national identities or citizenships are instead ideological and human creations. Culture is something that exists outside of land or borders, with adherents of cultures often finding themselves far from what may be considered their homelands.

My brother and I cross our legs as we sit facing our grandparents, a plush blanket folded up into a square bridging the gap between our pairs. Bearing a plate of freshly cut Korean pears, my mother settles next to my father — adjacent to my seating. I wave away the bounty of fruit; the bowl of ddeokguk, a rice cake soup traditionally eaten on New Year’s, still weighs heavy in my stomach. With a glowing smile, my grandmother spills four yut sticks from a bag onto the blanket. My grandfather reaches backwards to grasp a rather large poster with small circles arranged into a box with an “X” shape connecting the corners, and my brother and I begin to sort through our piggy banks in an almost desperate fervor. Four pennies, four dimes, four quarters. Even with my mental chant accelerating the speed that I sort at, my brother snickers victoriously as the three groups of coins trickle through his fingers as a measly two quarters perch, rejected, on my knee. My grandmother throws the sticks first, cackling when she sees three land face up. She eyes each of us leerily, her fiendish smile daring us to score higher — we do not. She guffaws and throws the sticks once again, delighted to see three face her once again. “Geol!” Her cry lands on uncomprehending, un-Korean-speaking ears, but still, she places their quarter three spots from the starting circle. My grandparents immigrated to the United States in 1971. Drawn by the “land of opportunity” and their trust in the power of hard work, they sacrificed their life in South Korea to start anew in a foreign land. They said they did it for family. For family. The all-excusing, all-confusing concept that caused my grandparents to uproot their lives to sail across the world. In Korea, my grandparents lived out in the country, constantly moving around to accommodate my grandfather’s field job; it was no place to raise a family, no place for a child to receive education. When my grandmother gave birth to my mother, they knew that their limited time had expired– it was time to move to America. However, upon arrival, they struggled to find work; my grandfather’s previous work in engineering became obsolete when faced with American companies insisting his Korean degree to be void. So instead, my grandfather — my hardworking, brilliant grandfather — peddled wigs on the street. Their lack of knowledge in conversational English also proved to be no small obstacle, as the molehill of simple communication grew into a mountain. My grandparents cycled through many jobs: nursing homes, pastry shops, even more field work. It wasn’t until they opened a dry cleaners in 1984 that they could finally settle down, finally stop looking over their shoulder to see if poverty had caught up to them. My mother rolls her eyes at my grandmother’s outburst, though clearly smothering an amused smile. Though her hand closes first around the sticks, my father’s immediate (and loud) complaints bring them reluctantly into his lap. He tosses them onto the blanket with a smug expression, almost certain that his luck would ensure a high roll. I cover my mouth to stifle a snort when only one stick lands facing up, and my mother retaliates by slapping him playfully on the back. “Do!” My grandmother doesn’t hesitate to call out the roll, and my mother drops their dime one place from the start. My parents arrived in the United States during the same year: 1974. Even so, their childhood experiences could not be more different. For the first few years of my father’s life in America, the transition was rough. Unable to communicate due to a complete inability to speak English and a lack of ESL classes to help him assimilate, he often grew frustrated at the absence of comprehension with his peers. Working multiple jobs, his father had no time to pass on the minimal English that he possessed. Rather, he decided — with the advice of my father’s teachers — that no one should speak Korean to my father. Until he reached eighteen, my father was not exposed to a lick of Korean. The “quick fix” worked, but it worked too well; having lost his only lingual connection to his home, my father in turn lost his proficiency in Korean. With no ties to South Korea, my father excelled on the social scene, making friends with ease and blending in with the other Americans at his school. My mother, on the other hand, straddled the two cultures precariously in her younger years. Though difficult, her parents raised her with the “best of both worlds,” keeping the traditions that they knew while still encouraging her to adapt to American culture. With this softer approach, my mother learned the duties of being an American while still keeping a firm grasp on her mother tongue. However, with this determination to hold tight to her Korean identity came a host of new problems in the form of xenophobic peers and casual racism. The close-mindedness of her surroundings didn’t dissipate until college, when she found people more like her, more like home. My parents met there, with my father attending NYU graduate school and my mother studying at NYU Stern. Without the cushion of parental guidance or funds throughout the college process, they both had to work their own way, pay their own way, and pave their own way through university. And even with these handicaps, my parents still succeeded; they rose above their past, their beginnings. I snatch the sticks from the blanket gleefully, ignoring my brother’s sigh of exasperation. I launch the sticks at the blanket, eyes wide in anticipation. My grandmother inhales deeply as four sticks land facing down, and her voice sounds almost resigned as she states, “Yut.” Yut! That means we can roll again! My brother grabs the sticks before I can and rolls three: Geol. We choose to move one penny four places forward, and then we move another one three spots; our second displaces my grandparents’ quarter, and we knock it off the board victoriously. Unlike the generations preceding us, my brother and I were born in the United States. We spoke the default language of the United States and acclimated effortlessly to the culture that was all that we knew. We did not need to worry about preserving the culture of our home because America was our home; Korean was our secondary. How much can be said for a culture that I never experienced? How much can I learn about a country that I had never been to? Later in life, however, I learned of the sacrifices that my own parents had made to ensure that my brother and I escape the intolerant bullying and impoverished nights they were made to endure. My mother quit her job to care for our infant selves, and my father worked tirelessly so that we would not have to wonder where the next meal would come from, or whether we could attend college at all. My grandmother’s words ring true for their choices: “for family.” The game continues. My brother and I shove, drop, and fight all four of our pennies to the end of the board, just beating out my grandparents, who come in second. Though my hard-faced grandfather would never admit it, he had strategically moved his quarters so that we could take them out easily. Unfortunately for my parents, he did not spare them the same sympathy, knocking them off the board at every chance he could get. When our pennies finally reached the end, he made a big show out of grudgingly handing over the ten dollars that we had all bet at the start of the game as my mother accused him of letting us win. My grandfather assured him that he would do no such thing, before winking as he passed me my share. As my thumb runs along the delicate edge of the ten dollar bill, my mind begins to wander. Our family history cannot be told in a chapter, in a book, or even in a series; it cannot be bound to words and phrases, sentences and fragments. It cannot be contained to a gameboard, or even to a novel with page numbers exceeding the world population. Even so, I want to share the humble beginnings of the lives of my parents and grandparents in America. Though our history may be incomplete, I want to tell our story in the game that I grew up loving: Yut-Nori. I may not yet be a mother, or an aunt, or even an older sibling. I may still be in college, working to find out who I am. However, in my identity, I know what will always be true; I know what my parents have taught me, what my grandparents have taught me. I know that I will always make choices for my family. How to Play Yut-Nori: To set up, you need four yut sticks, a game board, and four pieces per team. In my family, we used different sets of coins. To decide who rolls first, every team throws the sticks once to see who has the highest roll. The highest roller gets to start. There are six different ways to move. Do: Move one forward when one stick lands face up. Gae: Move two forward when two land face up. Geol: Move three forward at three. Yut: Surprise! You move four forward when four land facing down, and you also receive an extra turn. Mo: Move five forward when all land facing up, and you gain an extra turn. Backdo: Three are face down, with the other stick facing up with an X. Move backwards once. If you land on another team’s piece, you get to knock your opponent off the board and you gain an extra turn. Landing on corners means that you can take a shortcut and cross the diagonal bridge to the opposing side. Every new roll means that you can consider moving an existing piece across the board, or place another of your four pieces at the start. You win by getting all four of your pieces to the end of the board. Good luck!

For at least two centuries, India was considered to be the “Jewel in the Crown” of the expansive British Empire. But speaking literally? One of India’s own jewels — the 105.6 carat Kohinoor diamond — remains stolen by the British, long after the empire fell. India and its Kohinoor diamond are not alone; in fact, they are far from it. Many non-western nations find themselves in the same situation: large portions of their archeological treasures are housed and owned by another country, specifically a Western country that acquired these artifacts unfairly during their colonial reign. Notoriously, the list of stolen artifacts present in the British Museum appears to be never-ending. Egypt wants its Rosetta Stone to be returned; Easter Island wants its Moai head statue back. Greece wants its “Elgin Marbles,” a collection of Parthenon sculptures named after the Scottish nobleman who stole and sold them to the British. And importantly, it’s not just the U.K. that is “home” to these stolen treasures. For example, the British stole over 4,000 sculptures — known as the Benin Bronzes — from the Kingdom of Benin (now southwestern Nigeria) and outsourced them. Now, most sculptures remain on display in museums across the U.S. and Europe. None remain in their country of origin, Nigeria. I love museums. They play an important role, not only in preserving histories and cultures but also by cultivating an understanding and appreciation of histories and cultures that are not always our own. While many of us seem to recognize the great importance museums play, not enough recognize the harm they can also cause; museums are not neutral. Museums are not neutral. They have never been neutral. People of color have long been erased from their galleries, but more significantly they were never really present in them to begin with. Now, some museums are attempting to fix their troubled pasts by coming to terms with the racism that is present in the industry. For example, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has implemented a series of commitments to create “a more open, welcoming, and equitable institution.” Requiring anti-racism training for all staff, volunteers, and trustees, hiring a Chief Diversity Officer, and hiring more BIPOC candidates for leadership positions are a few of the Met’s commitments. While a relatively small number of museums are beginning to address issues of racism, not enough are addressing their ties to colonialism. Museums perpetuate colonialism. Specifically, Western museums perpetuate colonialism because they hold on to and display artifacts that are not culturally or historically theirs. These artifacts serve as a cruel and constant reminder of colonial times. And yet these Western museums display them with pride, completely lacking any remorse for past forms of colonialism or the modern forms of colonialism that museums prolong. Many formerly colonized countries, typically in Asia and Africa, have asked for their artifacts to be returned. However, the majority of these claims have been denied. During the two centuries the British spent looting India, the sum of what was stolen amounts to around 45 trillion dollars. There are a great number of individuals who think that Britain should pay India reparations for the damage it did, specifically regarding the theft of resources and the loss of culture and history that accompanied the loss of many lives. But while discussions regarding reparations are controversial — opponents tend to believe that British colonialism did more good to India than harm — the least Britain can do is to return the artifacts that they stole from India. Items like the Sultanganj Buddha, the Amaravati Marbles, and Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s throne, along with thousands of other artifacts, remain in the U.K, thousands of miles away from their home country. When former British Prime Minister David Cameron visited India back in 2013, he stated that he did not believe in “returnism.” He suggested that “the right answer is for the British Museum and other cultural institutions to do exactly what they do, which is to link up with other institutions around the world to make sure that the things which we have and look after so well are properly shared with people around the world.” Of course, there are many falsehoods in Cameron’s statement and the many people (and museums) who agree with him. First of all, apparently, because these artifacts are located in the U.K., people all over the world can come, see, and learn about them. From this perspective, Europe becomes the center of India’s history. A child in India must travel to another country to learn about their own culture. This is wrong and unfair. The culture and history of India and her people belong in India, not in the Western world. Imperialism, motivated by racism, has made Britain the cultural capital of the world — or what I prefer to call “the capital of colonial loot.” Indian art, Indian sculptures, Indian artifacts should be seen in India. Moreover, the U.K. and other Western countries imply that their museums have the best knowledge and facilities to keep these artifacts preserved. This implication is just as insulting and happens to be the same British (or Western) imperialist thinking that led to the theft of these artifacts in the first place. Implicit is the belief that India is a poorer country, and therefore incapable of looking after the very artifacts that were stolen from it — a classic argument that is racist and imperialist. Artifacts belong to and in their countries of origin. Artifacts belong to the people and places where they can be appreciated by those who value them the most. When Western museums market these artifacts and charge entrance fees to see them, the museums themselves benefit from colonialism and perpetuate a form of modern colonialism. Even though colonial empires have fallen, colonialism remains healthily alive, and the wrongs and injustices committed remain validated. Here’s the thing: museums are respected and loved. More importantly, museums are trusted. They are one of — perhaps the most — respected and trusted source for historical and cultural information. Decolonizing museums will help us to start decolonizing our minds and the world around us. Because of the respect and trust we place in them, museums can be our greatest ally in understanding racism and colonialism, and more significantly the liberation struggles that occurred as a result. Museums have the space, means, respect, and trust to fight against the pervasion of colonialism in our society. Yet, they remain silent in a world that needs to be decolonized. With time and research, museums could be liberatory spaces, once they truly recognize and address the colonialism that they perpetuate. History and culture belong to geography; they are all intrinsically connected. India’s stolen heritage should be brought back home. Imperial Britain took lives. Imperial Britain took resources. Imperial Britain took art, took sculptures, took monuments; Imperial Britain took India’s history, culture, and heritage and continues to refuse in giving it back. India will remain Britain’s “Jewel in the Crown” until what belonged to her before imperialism returns to her now.

Introduction All is well. Or, more accurately, “aal izz well.” These three words encapsulate the message of 3 Idiots, a Bollywood movie about the lives of three engineering undergraduate students in India struggling to navigate a hostile educational system. I first discovered 3 Idiots as a high school senior. COVID-19 robbed my class and me of the most exciting parts of senior year, and I became stressed over many things — impending AP exams, leaving the familiarity of high school, and proving that I was worthy of my Georgetown acceptance letter. But watching 3 Idiots during this time served as a reminder that there is more to life than just material success. Released in 2009, Rajkumar Hirani’s 3 Idiots was a huge financial success, shattering records of previous top-grossing Bollywood films and performing exceptionally well in American markets. After viewing the film, I could absolutely understand why. From a technical perspective, 3 Idiots is an excellent film. It has likable characters in the form of college students — Farhan, who wants to pursue his passion for wildlife photography rather than the more ‘respected’ field of engineering, Raju, who struggles to overcome his fear of failure, and Rancho, the carefree eternal idealist. Altogether, they make up our titular three “idiots.” It has catchy music numbers and a score that fits the tone of the film. The movie perfectly mixes tones throughout its progression: moments of hilarity combine with moments of tension and blend together in a way which makes the film enjoyable. Perhaps most importantly, 3 Idiots embodies simple yet powerful messages: do not be afraid of failure, focus on excellence over success, and do what brings you happiness. These messages might not seem very novel, and indeed, they are not. Yet, too often, society pressures us to disregard these messages. Understanding the true power of 3 Idiots requires examining the context in which the film was made: the Indian education system. A Closer Analysis TW: This section contains mentions of suic*de. The Indian education system has been relayed to me through horror stories from my parents and my classmates. It places unrealistic pressures on students andstories of students committing suicide from depression over grades or from academic stress are not uncommon. There are several elements which make this system toxic, many of which 3 Idiots critiques. The first of these is the struggle between memorization and learning. In the film, the regurgitation of facts and definitions is presented as the norm which, as Rancho demonstrates in one of the most infamous scenes of the film, is useless if a person does not understand what they are memorizing. This introduces a second dichotomy of studying for excellence versus studying for success. Within the Indian education system, where memorization is the means of learning, pursuing excellence is difficult. However, 3 Idiots explains that pursuing excellence is not only followed naturally by success, but also restores the joy and excitement which should be present in learning. The film also tackles the tension between good grades and good ideas as the former are prioritized at the expense of the latter. This occurs both in real life, as seen by the immense weight test scores have on determining a student’s future, and in the film, and seen through the actions of the film’s antagonist, university dean Dr. Virus, who impresses upon all of his students that they are irrelevant unless they have the highest grades, discouraging creative pursuits even when they lead to new discoveries. This feeds into the third dichotomy the film exposes: being respectable versus enjoyable endeavors. One of Farhan’s main struggles throughout the film revolves around his reluctance to pursue engineering, a subject he despises. However, he knows it will earn him respect, while his dream of being a wildlife photographer is frowned upon for its comparatively lower salary. Aal Izz Well 3 Idiots not only names these dichotomies but offers an ideology to combat them — “all is well,” exaggerated to be pronounced “aal izz well.” This simple phrase, as explained by Rancho, involves tricking yourself in the face of adversity into thinking that all is, in fact, well. As the film makes clear with the struggles its characters must overcome, this phrase, while simple, is often difficult to realize but rewarding. Now, this phrase is not true in a literal sense, and the film does a good job of addressing this. For instance, Raju’s family is impoverished, while Rancho comes from a very wealthy background. Raju does not have the same luxury and must pursue success to get a good job. Furthermore, Farhan must decide if he will pursue his dream career as doing so would upset his family and potentially lessen his earnings. But the idea of “all is well” is not about tricking yourself into blissful ignorance, but rather giving yourself the courage to tackle your problems. Whether that be an external problem, such as Raju’s need for a well-paying job, or an internal one, such as Farhan’s battle to choose what he wants over what society wants for him, finding a sense of inner peace without a concern for the demands of the world provides needed clarity. Hustle Culture Since entering college and being exposed to hustle culture, I have come to appreciate 3 Idiots even more. At Georgetown, where the achievements of alumni are lauded, where it feels like everyone is always doing something impressive, and where 7,000 undergraduates, most of whom were in the top 10 of their class in high school, are all trying to earn top grades in classes where sometimes only 40% of the class can get an A- or A, it can be extremely easy to become overwhelmed with stress. On the national level, falling victim to college hustle culture is unfortunately also easy. If every college student were to watch 3 Idiots, they would find not only an engaging, funny, and dramatic film, but also a film that reminds them that they can take a step back and realize that we are not defined by accolades, that we should pursue our passions over what looks the most impressive, and that we can overcome the challenges that we are faced with, and that all will, in fact, be well. Sources “2 Teens Commit Suicide over Exam Stress in MP.” Hindustan Times, March 3, 2016. https://www.hindustantimes.com/education/2-teens-commit-suicide-over-exam-stress-in-mp/story-sQ8sAsqT02DXJPNLbvgOWO.html. 3 Idiots. Reliance BIG Pictures, 2009. Ebenezer, Jessenth. “Why the Indian Education System Sucks the MOST out of the Lot.” Medium, January 19, 2018. https://medium.com/@jessenthebenezer/why-the-indian-education-system-sucks-the-most-out-of-the-lot-71d16bedc7ea. May 4, Vinamrata Borwankar / TNN / Updated:, 2015, and 03:20 Ist. “‘Depressed’ over Poor Grades, IIT Bombay Student Kills Self | Mumbai News - Times of India.” The Times of India, May 4, 2015. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/Depressed-over-poor-grades-IIT-Bombay-student-kills-self/articleshow/47142480.cms. Rayapati, Nitya. “3 Idiots: Or, on Abundance.” Bright Wall/Dark Room, June 28, 2020. https://www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2020/06/28/3-idiots-on-abundance/. Sinha, Aminah Sheikh & Ashish. “3 Idiots Makes B’wood History.” Business Standard India, January 5, 2010. https://www.business-standard.com/article/companies/3-idiots-makes-b-wood-history-110010500087_1.html. Tyler, Madison. “More College Students Are Saying No to Hustle Culture, Because Our Mental Health Depends on It.” POPSUGAR Smart Living, March 12, 2021. https://www.popsugar.com/smart-living/why-hustle-culture-is-toxic-48208183. ‌

As a child, I always dreaded Sundays. Sundays smelled like pungent dry erase markers, dilapidated church basements, and powdery old lady perfume. Sunday mornings were full of frantic page flipping and scrawling, and a stomach full of butterflies in anticipation of the afternoon. Sundays were for 中文学校. Zhong wen xue xiao. Chinese school. I’m sure those four words unearth deep-seated, and perhaps slightly traumatic, memories in the hearts of many Chinese Americans. Every Sunday, the local church parking lot flooded with cars as hordes of Chinese parents dropped off their kids. We’d trudge up the front steps to the sound of a furiously ringing handheld bell indicating the start of class and peel off to our individual classrooms, where the teacher — usually some stern-faced Chinese mother — would pace around the room and check our homework. Thus commenced two hours of vocabulary quizzes, textbook reading, grammar drills, and, if we were unlucky, a test. The misery didn’t stop outside of the classroom, either–we were assigned copious amounts of homework every week. Vocabulary lists to memorize and copy, grammar structures to learn and use, paragraphs to read and comprehend. My mother would spend hours grilling me on vocabulary and checking over my homework. Now, armed with the wisdom of age and hindsight, I realize that I did not appreciate the unlikely existence of such organizations, and the horrors of Chinese school are probably somewhat exaggerated in my memory. The fact that so many Chinese immigrants had taken a leap of faith, uprooted themselves to find a better life in America, and managed to build community hubs to preserve their culture in a strange new world is a commendable feat of resilience. Of course, I failed to consider any of this as a young child. All I knew was that Chinese school was an imposing force in my life, a source of drudergy and pain. I despised those Sunday afternoons and how they bled into my week and how my mother yelled at me whenever I wrote a character wrong or scored poorly on a test. Chinese school elicited feelings of resentment and envy within me. I was sure that Lauren from my third grade homeroom did not spend her weekends in such dreadful ways. Her peppy PTA mother would never yell at her over the kitchen table and monitor her nonexistent extracurricular homework. I imagined that she and the other popular girls in my class would have fun weekend playdates and trips to the mall instead. Every Friday, my insides twisted as I saw the anticipation for the weekend on my classmates’ faces, burning with the knowledge that I did not share in their delight. I grudgingly remained enrolled in Chinese school for many years at my parents’ behest, but I made sure to obnoxiously bemoan my suffering every single chance I had. By middle school my parents grew sick of paying tuition just to hear me complain, and so they struck a deal with me: I no longer had to go to Chinese school, but they would tutor me at home. This arrangement persisted shakily for a few years. The grammar and vocabulary drills continued, supplemented by mandatory viewings of Chinese TV shows to help hone my listening comprehension. My father made me memorize Tang Dynasty poems, which I did poorly, immediately forgetting them the moment after he quizzed me. My mother gave me the assignment of keeping a daily diary in Chinese for the purpose of practicing my writing skills. This, I shirked whenever possible. By the time I entered high school, both my parents and I had tired of pushing the massive boulder of learning Chinese uphill. Entering high school meant I became much busier and had even less time to dedicate to the endeavor. Gradually, we stopped resisting. How easy it was to let go, to watch the last several years of painful effort and pathetically low return roll away and fade into nothing. Or so I thought. After many years of allowing my Chinese skills to sit on an abandoned shelf in the back of my brain collecting dust, starting college sparked an unexpected desire to relearn Chinese. Upon coming to Georgetown, I met and befriended numerous students studying Chinese, most of whom were not from traditional Chinese backgrounds. I was simultaneously in awe and a bit jealous. Having studied it before, I knew it was no easy task even for someone who grew up in a household that spoke Chinese, so I greatly admired the dedication of my fellow students tackling the language with absolutely no previous experience. I was terribly curious about what their curriculum entailed and would look over their shoulders while they did their homework, stealing glances at the textbook and homework problems. I could not help but be filled with a creeping sense of inadequacy whenever I stumbled upon characters I did not recognize or phrases that I could not properly translate. Seeing others diligently studying Chinese made me feel saddened that I had not properly learned it when I had the opportunity. Now, Chinese phrases rolled awkwardly off of my tongue, words sticking like peanut butter to the roof of my mouth as I struggled to string together coherent phrases. I longed to dip my toes back into the language in an academic setting, but I felt paralyzed. It had been so long since I had last studied it; would I remember anything? What if I failed the placement test and had to start from scratch? Did I even have enough time or credits to dedicate to Chinese and study it meaningfully? After two years of light deliberation, I finally decided to take the leap and sign up for Chinese classes again my junior fall. When I informed my parents of my decision, they looked at me with mild shock. My father laughed, not in a malicious way but in an ironic way: I had been given the opportunity when I was younger and I had clearly rejected it, so why was I so determined now? I could not quite vocalize exactly why, but I felt an overwhelming force inside of me compelling me to do so. When else in my life would I have the ability to carve out a structured time dedicated to studying Chinese and have the opportunity to engage with other students? I felt a sense of ticking urgency to hold on to what I had not yet lost and scramble to recollect what had been swept away. My story sounds terribly cliché: A Chinese American girl grows up rejecting aspects of her culture and family, only to come to the realization that she was denying an important part of her identity. And then everyone lives happily ever after. That isn’t quite the case though, although I wish it was. I would be lying if I said it was all smooth sailing after I enrolled in Chinese class. There are many days where I go to class and feel utterly overwhelmed by the content. Spontaneous conversations in my Chinese recitations trigger my fight or flight instinct. I often feel like a deer in headlights when I am cold called upon to speak about foreign relations, family structure, and economic reform–topics that I barely grasp in English, let alone Chinese. Some days I feel a crippling sense of imposter syndrome because it seems like my Chinese is worse in some aspects compared to students who have only studied the language for a handful of years, especially when I choke out crude sentences that are jagged and unfinished. I would also be lying if I said that I looked forward to every Chinese class and Chinese assignment. Some days I want nothing more than to bullshit my homework assignments and procrastinate on studying for exams. We like to romanticize life, give our experiences a narrative and purpose, but reality often does not line up. I am not sure if I will ever be fluent in Chinese. Perhaps the classes I am taking now will simply be a repeat of the Chinese school of my youth, and maybe the instant I graduate everything I learn will dissipate into thin air. Even if I grasp on to some mastery of the language, how long could I maintain it for? Would I be able to pass it along to my future children, and them theirs? It seems a bit Sisyphean to resist what seems to be the overpowering natural course of things. I wonder if my parents quietly grieved about this when they moved here, knowing that their children would grow up disconnected and distinctly separate from their culture and people. They tried very hard, as evidenced by what my younger self perceived as tortuous tutoring lessons and homework review sessions. Whenever I dig through desk drawers at home, I can find the ghosts of their efforts in the occasional handmade vocabulary flashcard, neatly penned in in my father’s handwriting. All of those thoughts are winding and unhelpful and completely out of my control. What I can control is my actions in the present. I remind myself every day to be grateful for the opportunities I have, even when I have piles of homework in front of me or a midterm oral presentation to prepare for, like I do now. I do not want to look back to this part of my life and rue my mindset and actions like I do when I look back at Chinese classes the first time around. I try my best to talk to my parents in Chinese whenever they call, and I actively volunteer to exchange a few sentences with my grandmother whenever she is on the phone. I watch my weekly episode of the Chinese rom coms that my mother recommends to me (side note:《二十不惑》, or Twenty Your Life On, is a pretty good show). I do all of this in the hope that if I repeat them enough, they will stick around and become permanent habits. Learning Chinese is hard. Life is hard. All we can do is try.

I You sit down by yourself on the corner of a table. The buzz of the lunch period simmers away as you pull out your lunch box and set out a tin of rice and a few side dishes. Someone looks over, laughs, and whispers something to a friend. You hear the snickers. You feel the heat rushing to your cheeks already, but there is nothing you can do to stop the storm. They move closer and sit by you. You look down and wince. What you got there, dog? You ignore them but you can still hear the laughter. That looks so weird. Are you really going to eat that? You take out your chopsticks and start eating. You can feel their eyes on you. You are different, everyone knows it, and there is nowhere to hide. At a deli, you’re asked your name by the cashier. You speak it to him. He stands there momentarily before handing you the piece of paper and a pen to write it yourself. Later, when your order is ready, another man takes a glance at the paper with your name on it. I’m not gonna even try to fuckin’ pronounce this, he mutters. Who ordered the Italian on wheat? II Test results got posted today, top of the class again. Your mum smiles at you. She pastes the certificate on the kitchen wall. You’re sitting in the front of the accelerated math class. Homework is being passed back. You feel a sense of relief. 100. You live another day. You hear the whispers from behind you. Of course he got an A, he’s Asian. You don’t know how to feel. It’s a compliment but something doesn’t sit quite right. You stay silent as always. Later that week, you receive a message asking for pictures of the homework. It’s from the guy on the baseball team. He’s been nice to you, right? You want to be his friend, so you send it to him. He says hi to you the next day and lets you sit by him at lunch. You meet his friends. They don’t know your name but they have the picture. Like clockwork, you get his text next week, and the next. They still don’t know your name. You are standing outside your old middle school, thoughts racing, clutching a piece of paper tightly to your chest. The bus comes around the loop as usual, but the familiar feeling of dread creeps in. You look around, it’s smiles all around, it's always smiles all around. You know what will happen when you get off the bus: the minutes will drag on by but march ever constantly towards the inevitable. You open the front door, greeted by the smell of old newspaper and jasmine rice. You hear your father call to you. You know what’s coming. You want to fade away. You stand still hoping to turn invisible on the spot. You put the piece of paper down on the table and quickly retreat to your bed. You hear his footsteps coming up the stairs. The world starts getting blurry. All you can say is you tried your best, but it wasn’t enough, it never was. Everything fades to black as the pain soothes you to sleep. Tomorrow will be different you say, next time it will be better, he nods, but who are you trying to convince? A bowl of cut fruit and a mug of jasmine tea, warm and fragrant, set carefully on your desk. It was unspoken, but you understood every silent word. $100 From mom. On the kitchen counter. Club fees. The next day, from you, on the kitchen counter, an A on your Calculus exam. Years of habit have constrained the way you convey appreciation to the sole letter A and the numbers 90-100. For her: cubically cut honeydews and apples, along with the financial means for you to chase your wildest dreams. A silent exchange of love. You open another email and a video pops up. Finally, you see the word “Congratulations!” fill your screen, so you rush downstairs and scream out the news. This is the American Dream. Everyone is smiling, everything is perfect. You’re sitting in the only terminal of your hometown airport as your family waves through the glass. You smile back and give them one final wave before stepping into the gate. Can you outgrow family? You step into the unknown, yet something holds you back. Trapped on the other side of the looking glass is all that you have known, people you have loved. A crowd forms. You see familiar faces, you hear your grandma’s voice speak out - it’s muffled by the glass. Why can’t they come along? But you know you are the only one who can step through, so you do. It’s the right thing to do, right? III Long, long ago, you used to dream about being an actor. Every time you watched movies you would pay special attention to the actors that looked like you. But over time, you were disappointed. Because you would always be: Nerdy Unattractive Nonconfrontational Weak Emasculated Submissive Apologetic Unassertive … Steady beeping ticks melt the minutes away. The sterile scent of cleaning solution is pungent, repulsive, and calming all at once. White coats rush back and forth, paying no mind to you. Someone calls your name and you follow them to a small room. She goes on about the usual checkup procedure, rushing through taking your vitals. What brings you in today? Lightheadedness, nausea, and fainting spells you tell her. All symptoms of heart failure. She quickly takes a glance at a clipboard. You’re fine. She sends you home with a bottle of Tylenol. Time passes, it eats at you. One night, you wake up clutching your chest, the world is fading and your heart is stopping. It feels good. You feel yourself thinking it shouldn’t be like this. You smell the familiar scent of sterilizing agent again. Who could have seen this coming? You find yourself in a crowded college pregame before setting out a party. The air is dense, filled with the heat of numerous bodies packed in a cramped townhouse living room and the smell of cheap, pungent alcohol. You end up in the kitchen. There you find another man, apparently seeking a quieter environment too. He immediately approaches you and comments on the ethnicity that you both share. He says your face seems quite familiar. He asks if you’re a part of the Asian American student club on campus. No, not yet, you say. You should, he replies. Are you worried about it being too Asian? Puzzled, you say no. You had never pondered such a question before, nor expected it. Don’t worry, he says. The club’s more American than Asian, so you should fit right in. Suddenly, you feel as if the two sides of your Asian Americanness are at war. You’re too American. You’re not Asian enough.

The worst conflict I’ve ever had with my grandmother happened about five years ago. During my first visit to South Korea, I traveled with my grandmother and stayed with distant relatives up in the countryside. Their home was traditional and modest, with cushions on the ground instead of chairs, and wooden, mattress-less beds accompanied by dense buckwheat pillows. However, the most noticeable feature of the house was the lack of air conditioning. My stay took place in the heat of August, when the Korean summer was in full force, boasting temperatures in the 90s and 100s. In an attempt to overcome the jetlag and deal with pre-existing difficulties when it came to sleep, I found a small electric fan, which I plugged into the wall and aimed at my bed in order to circulate the air as I slept. I managed to fall asleep that night despite the uncomfortable wooden bed and pool of sweat that had formed around me, due to my glorious discovery of the fan. However, about an hour later, I woke up to my grandmother vigorously shaking me by the shoulders with a terrified look on her face. She proceeded to tell me I could not fall asleep with the fan on. Curious, I asked her why. She told me that I could die. I refused to listen, attributing her belief to her old age and deteriorating brain, and so every night became a passive war between me and my grandmother, where I would turn on the fan, sleep, wake up feeling unfathomably hot to discover she had turned it off, turn it back on, rinse and repeat. I had forgotten about this until very recently. My mother visited my dorm room in Copley, which was not well air-conditioned, so I had a standing fan set up next to my bed which circulated air at all hours of the day. Even my mother, who was born and raised in America and has worked in healthcare all her life, warned me against sleeping with the fan on! When I asked why, she just said it was bad for your health. At this point, I decided to do some research to test this theory. With just a single Google search, I found a surprising volume of results. It seems the origin of this myth can be traced back to July 1927, when an article titled “Strange Harm from Electric Fans” was published in the Dong-a Ilbo, a prominent South Korean newspaper. The article argued that the spinning of the electric fans creates a vacuum, which can cause difficulty in breathing as a result of a lack of oxygen, suggesting asphyxiation. The article even goes as far to say that this can cause headaches and even facial nerve palsy. More articles on the topic were published in Korean newspapers in the following decade. Some suggested that using the fans in the heat drives the heat into the person, causing harm. Others suggested that the wind generated by an electric fan is something similar to that of a storm, and that when this wind comes into contact with the skin, it causes the dissipation of body heat and abnormal blood circulation and therefore chills and bad mood. Eventually, the sleeping component of this superstition was introduced through the suggestion that prolonged exposure to the “wind” can cause sagging of the skin. Articles started to warn parents against allowing their children to sleep with a fan in the room. The first recorded case of a “fan death” was published on July 1, 1932 with a simple title translating to “He Died From a Fan,” which described a man who was found dead in the same room as a running fan. This theory about the dangers of electric fans has managed to work its way into the South Korean ethos in a significant way, with 20 deaths from 2003 to 2005 cited that involved asphyxiations caused by leaving electric fans on while sleeping and the state-funded Korean Consumer Protection Board listing “asphyxiation from electric fans and air-conditioners” as a top five recurring summer accident in 2006. On top of this, deaths with electric fans as the main causal factor were reported by mainstream South Korean news as recently as 2011. So is there any actual scientific basis to support the idea that electric fans can cause detriment to one’s health or even death? It turns out, yes and no. Two of the three main proposed causes of fan deaths––hypothermia and asphyxiation––have little to no evidence to support them. Asphyxiation is caused by oxygen displacement and carbon dioxide intoxication and is colloquially known as suffocation. Of course, with absolutely zero ventilation, the amount of oxygen would slowly decrease, and the amount of carbon dioxide would slowly increase, eventually becoming unsustainable for human life. However, this applies to any unventilated space, regardless of if a running fan is present or not. Hypothermia is the state of having an abnormally low body temperature. While it is true that metabolism slows at night, causing people to be more sensitive to temperature — and therefore more susceptible to hypothermia — this increase in susceptibility is to a minor, almost negligible degree. Investigative autopsies of 10 alleged fan death victims revealed that pre-existing heart problems and alcoholism may have been the culprit for increasing susceptibility to hypothermia. However, there is also empirical evidence in support of the reasoning, generated by a study with no relation to the South Korean fan deaths. Following several heat waves throughout Europe during the 1980s and 1990s, cities attempted to reduce and prevent heat-related deaths by distributing electric fans in low-income areas. However, when the fans were used in enclosed spaces it seemed to be doing more harm than good, leading the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to release a statement discouraging people from using fans in a closed room without ventilation when the heat index rises above 90 degrees fahrenheit. Dr. Laurence Kalkstein of the University of Miami, who helped write the EPA’s heat guidelines, stated that fans can create a convection effect when used in temperatures exceeding 90 degrees, as it only blows around hot air, creating opportunity for evaporation in which moisture from the body dissipates at a higher rate, so failure to hydrate can create heat-stress, and in extreme cases, death. The moral of this story is: 1) There is some basis for electric fan concerns at high temperatures and in closed-off spaces, but not really in any other scenario; and 2) I need to apologize to my grandmother.

Social media is a breeding ground for unnecessary, harmful, and, oftentimes, flat-out detestable speech. From debates about the true color of a striped dress to fiery political discourse, every topic discussed on the Internet brings out trolls. There is a major difference, however, between your typical Internet troll — and their pestering comments which seek to incite trouble — and those who leave comments with harmful racial implications. One of my close relatives posted a TikTok of himself singing a song and was overwhelmed with joy when it went viral. My sweet, kind-hearted eleven-year-old cousin proudly displayed his 700k likes to his classmates. After a brief survey of the comments, however, I was crushed when he called me crying. “Baljeet has pipes,” one user said. Another commented, “Young Ravi ‘bout to pull all the ladies.” Baljeet, a stereotypical Indian character from the Disney show Phineas and Ferb, bears absolutely no resemblance to my cousin save for his race. The same can be said of Ravi, another stereotypical Indian character from the Disney Channel. Even at age eleven, my cousin could tell that these comments were not just playful references. The root problem here could very well be the lack of representation of Indian Americans in TV and movies. Still, in the case of my cousin’s video, what appalls me most is the strange way in which some define racism. TikTok commentators, Twitter users, and a myriad of other social media frequenters will casually call Indian people “curry munchers.” Indian people seem to be the punching bag on the Internet. In fact, the casual racism towards Indian people drove me, a half-Indian girl, off TikTok only a month after creating my account. It felt as if there was no way to be Indian and on TikTok without being the brunt of someone’s joke. A recent example of Indian people being the laughing stock of social media can also be seen in the infamous Pewdiepie vs T-Series battle. In 2017, Swedish YouTube star Felix Kjellberg, aka “Pewdiepie,” launched a war on a YouTube channel named T-Series, which threatened his number one spot as the most-subscribed channel. While it was nothing but a lighthearted struggle for dominance at first, it did not take long for Pewdipie’s then 57 million subscribers to turn the struggle into an excuse to poke fun at well-meaning Indians. As a channel that posts clips from Bollywood movies and Indian television programs, T-Series fans are mostly Indian people in search of music and TV. The most extreme example of Pewdiepie fans using this fight for YouTube power as a means of conveying racist sentiments is exemplified in the tragic 2017 New Zealand shooting. While broadcasting his attack on a mosque, the gunman urged viewers to “subscribe to Pewdiepie” (Chokshi 1). Despite the fact that many of Pewdiepie’s young, impressionable subscribers were merely throwing light barbs to T-Series’s way, it is clear that the Internet’s tendency to use Indians as a punchline emboldened many racist social media users to bring the Pewdiepie vs T-Series war to an entirely new, disturbing level. Unfortunately, the list of Internet trends with anti-Indian sentiments ranging from underlying to obnoxiously hurtful extends far beyond Pewdiepie’s war on a Bollywood YouTube channel. In August of last year, a fleeting TikTok trend swept the app, as they often do, in which users mouthed along to a classical Indian song while using a face-stretching filter. With clear mocking intent, many influencers, including famous makeup artist James Charles, hopped on this trend quickly. While they all faced backlash from Indian TikTok users, non-Indian social media users were quick to drown out their comments with retorts that they were acting like “snowflakes” and needed to “calm down.” The implications of these trends are endless. And while social media isn’t really a safe space for most people, there is no denying the specific targeting of Indian people on web platforms such as TikTok and YouTube. There are still many examples, however, of celebrations of culture on the aforementioned apps, such as a trend where Indian women donned saris and other traditional apparel while posing to a Doja Cat song. Nonetheless, I urge all other Indian social media-goers to beware of the minefields that exist on these apps. And, for non-Indian Internet frequenters, consider raising your own voice against these comments. Even if they might seem harmless, the underlying implications are more harmful than even the commenters themselves might realize. Bibliography Chokshi, Niraj. “PewDiePie Put in Spotlight after New Zealand Shooting.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 15 Mar. 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/15/technology/pewdiepie-new-zealand-shooti g.html.

This piece is a part of a series of reviews and reflections on Asian literature. An Asian American woman must live through a series of dichotomies: sometimes the dragon lady, other times the china doll, seductive yet obedient, hypersexualized but innocent. She oscillates between visibility and invisibility: silenced when she wants to speak out and spectacularized when she wants to blend in. Hardly ever do people stop and ask — what is it like navigating a world that forces her into predefined boxes? I had the delight of reading Oriental Girls Desire Romance by Catherine Liu for the Asian Americans in the Public Sphere course this semester. This novel explores the societal factors that set conflicting expectations for how Asian American women should behave and how these expectations make it difficult for them to identify where they fit in American society. Through a stream of consciousness narrative, the unnamed young Chinese American narrator immerses us in her struggle to find her place in the money-obsessed New York City of the 1980s. Liu’s unnamed narrator can be frustrating at times due to her negative character arc. She begins as a radical, anti-capitalist, feminist intellectual and aspiring writer, yet throughout the novel she becomes increasingly drawn to surface-level, material values such as beauty and wealth. By the end, she fails to publish any of her work and turns to go-go dancing for money. At first I attributed the narrator’s dissatisfying character development to her individual psychological flaws. However, after examining the myriad external forces she faces, such as her conservative Chinese family upbringing, sexist encounters in college, and stereotypes of Asian women, it becomes apparent that she turns to go-go dancing as a pragmatic last resort. Unfortunately, the narrator’s inability to publish any of her writing reflects the disappointing reality for many Asian American women, whose dreams are often just out of reach. The novel encouraged me to re-examine the external forces in my own life and trace their influence in my present goals. Ever since I can remember, my mother told me that my introverted personality made me well-suited to be a doctor. I took high school biology courses and joined the math club to prepare myself for a future in STEM. Yet my passion projects were always creative — meticulous bullet journaling, drawing, writing, and video editing. Even now, my ideal career lies in video content creation, but I spend my time poring over academic journals and economics problem sets as I gear up for law school (for the stereotypical Asian child, a future in law is the creative alternative to medicine or computer science). Likewise, my circle of closest Asian American female friends, who embody a diverse array of personalities and interests, have all gravitated toward the same trajectory in finance and consulting. Even Asian American artists who are zealous enough to pursue the creative fields must find the balance between authenticity and recognition. The latter is often achieved through financial capital, and that means appealing to the mainstream — namely, Hollywood executives and liberal white Americans who want to “diversify their perspectives.” Just take a look at the film Crazy Rich Asians. Certainly, the all-Asian cast is a rare, landmark moment for Hollywood worth celebrating. But the Crazy Rich Asians narrative itself is not too difficult to sell; who does not want to see a cinematic romantic comedy about extremely wealthy people with a feel-good ending? Likewise, readers of Oriental Girls Desire Romance may want a conventional ending in which the narrator achieves the glamorous American lifestyle. However, the disappointing ending highlights the harsh reality: that the American dream trope is often a fantasy that erases the structural barriers Asian American women face in fitting into American society.

I came to America at a young age, and it’s where I was raised. The rolling hills of the Great Plains are where I called home. Home is dancing through golden fields of wheat and running along lovely little streams and creeks. It’s a walk by the river and driving up and down the long straight roads that cut through the vast prairies like lines on a chessboard. But when I walk through the streets of New York City’s Chinatown and Flushing neighborhoods, seeing the roasted ducks hanging in the windows and hearing the chatter of Mandarin all around tugs at something within me. I made a special effort to get a haircut in Chinatown this summer. Walking the crowded streets on the way to the barbershop evoked feelings of nostalgia and homesickness like no other. Reading posters and signs in Mandarin, seeing laundry hanging out of windows and making conversation with the aunties and the hawkers, I couldn’t help but feel something stirring within my bones. My parents grew up in China: my father in the bustling city of Shanghai and my mother in the countryside. I was born in Shanghai, but I have only seen it a few times on family vacations. Whenever I visited, it felt foreign, like any other vacation destination. It didn’t feel like home. I understood Mandarin and even the Shanghai dialect. I looked the part and acted it too, but I never felt that natal attraction I expected to feel. How could the hustle and bustle of a metropolitan supercity in China be my home, when all I had known were the rural farmlands of America? My father would tell stories of times past. He would take the ferry and walk the noisy bustling streets of Pudong, Shanghai, on his way to school. On the road home, he would buy a snack from the same food cart every day. He spoke of playing games like jianzi in the schoolyard with friends and sauntering around the Waitan, a waterfront district, at night. As he spoke, I would listen intently, nodding along, yearning to understand his experience. His face would glow and his eyes would gaze off into the distance as his mind brought him back to a different realm. Charmed by memories of a different time, he seemed so far away, in a world that I had never known. I experience Shanghai through memories, pictures, videos and FaceTimes with my grandma. The buildings scrape the floors of heaven and the crowds flow like waves in the ocean. The bustle of passersby talking and walking and vehicles honking and crawling along consume my senses. Aromas and flavors of street food float through the air and draw your attention. The resplendent displays and neon lights that light up busy avenues entice you in, begging you to join the crowds. What home means to me has shifted; home is not only an address or a building. Home is a feeling, a comforting touch and a familiar scent. The sense of peace and belonging at home rests deeper in the soul than any other emotion. I feel at home when I am connecting with my past and my people. I am at home when I share in the collective experiences of millions just like me. I still FaceTime my grandma sometimes. My grandma has spent her whole life in Shanghai. She almost exclusively speaks the Shanghai dialect, a dialect so different from Mandarin that it sounds like a different language. I can understand her but can only respond with broken sentences. Now I am learning to speak the dialect to communicate with her in our native tongue. Through learning this language, I am piecing together the fragments of a different life, one of a seamstress’s grandson who walked home to Pudong every day — one of someone I could have been. There is a city in my bones, a culture that I belong to that I am just now embracing. It feels like home.

My Perceptions: Growing up with a North Indian father and South Indian mother, my experience as a second-generation Indian American has highlighted the diversity of Indian culture. I grew up surrounded by multiple Indian languages, namely Tamil and Hindi. I ate North Indian foods such as naan, as well as specialties from South India, such as dosa and idli. I was raised Hindu, but my parents freely shared stories about their friends from various religious traditions. Throughout my childhood, I came to view my personal experiences as merely a fraction of a bigger and richer culture. I was then taken aback when only certain parts of this rich and diverse culture were viewed as the representation of all Indian culture. For most people I encountered, if they did not think that “Indian” was a language, they had only heard of Hindi and were oblivious to other Indian languages. When discussing Indian food, only North Indian dishes made the cut for conversation. In fact, through my own experience of eating at Indian restaurants, I have encountered an overrepresentation of North Indian food and have had to search at length to find South Indian restaurants, or even restaurants with cuisines from other parts of India. This one-track view of Indian culture troubles me as it hides the diversity of food, language, religion, and many other cultural aspects of India. This is not only inaccurate but also harmful — it sets a narrow and unrealistic definition of what being Indian or Indian-American means. In this piece I will highlight some of the areas of diversity in Indian culture with the hope of broadening the narrow scope that has persisted thus far. Before I begin, I wish to stress that this article is by no means a complete account of Indian culture, but rather it is intended as a stepping stone to pique the reader’s curiosity. I further wish to clarify that I can only offer my perspective on this topic and encourage the reader to listen to perspectives from other members of the Indian-American community to better understand Indian-American culture. Some Background: India itself is made up of 28 different states and 8 territories, each with its own culture. When researchers surveyed Indian-Americans in 2020, they found that respondents identified with a wide variety of states across India. Figure 1: A chart from the Carnegie Endowment for Peace’s 2020 survey of Social Realities for Indian Americans, which shows the geographic spread of where Indian-Americans trace their roots. According to their survey, 14% of respondents picked Gujarat as their state of origin, 12% Maharashtra, 10% Andhra Pradesh, 9% Tamil Nadu, 9% Delhi, 8% Punjab, and 7% Kerala, with the rest choosing either another region altogether, or even multiple regions. While this data shows that there are certainly parts of India that are more widely represented in the Indian-American community, it also shows that there is indeed a great diversity of identities within the community. In the rest of this article, I will discuss some of the ways that this diversity manifests itself. Language Figure 2: A graph from the Carnegie Endowment for Peace’s 2020 survey of Social Realities for Indian Americans, which displays the distribution of languages spoken by Indian-Americans. As I mentioned earlier, most people I encounter associate Hindi with Indian languages. However, Hindi is only one language among many spoken in India. A 2011 study found that only 41% of Indians spoke Hindi as their first language. As shown by the table above, not even 1 out of 5 Indian Americans consider Hindi to be their first language. For readers who have only heard of Hindi before, these numbers might be surprising to you, as they demonstrate that the most well-known Indian language is not spoken by a majority of Indians and Indian-Americans. This begs the question — where does this linguistic diversity come from? The answer lies in India’s regions. Each region of India has its own local language, and while Hindi has been adopted as the national lingua franca, it originated from the north of India, near Delhi. Towards the east of India, one will hear Bengali more often which, as the name suggests, is spoken primarily in Bengal. To the south, predominant languages include Telugu and Tamil. Unlike Hindi, which belongs to the Indo-Aryan language group, Tamil and Telugu are both Dravidian languages, further highlighting the linguistic diversity of India. In the western part of the country, Marathi, originating from the state of Maharashtra, is the major language. This small list of languages is just the beginning and shows that many languages are represented amongst the Indian-American community. Linguistically, Indian culture is not monolithic. Religion Figure 3: A graph from the Carnegie Endowment for Peace’s 2020 survey of Social Realities for Indian Americans, which displays the spread of religion amongst Indian-Americans. When it comes to religion, most non-Indians that I have encountered tend to associate Hinduism with India. While it is certainly true that Hinduism is widespread within Indian and Indian American communities, with 78.9% and 54% of each group respectively identifying as Hindu, there are several religious traditions that originated in India. For instance, Sikhism, the fifth most popular religion in the world, originated in Punjab. Jainism, one of the world’s oldest religions, originated during the time of the Indus Valley civilization, which existed from 2500 - 1700 BCE. Furthermore, Buddhism was founded almost 2500 years ago by Siddhartha Gautama in India. In addition to these religions, many in India are Muslim or Christian, India’s second and third most popular religions respectively. As seen in the graph above, these religions, and more, are represented throughout the Indian American community. Highlighting this diversity is especially important today as there has been a concerted effort by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India to limit the religious definition of what it means to be Indian. This has included an onslaught of Islamophobic rhetoric as well as the false notion that Hinduism is the only religion an Indian can have. When it comes to religious intolerance within the Indian-American community, a significant number (19%) of Indian Americans say that their experiences of religious discrimination have come from other Indian Americans, suggesting that harmful BJP rhetoric has immediate consequences in America as well as in India. It is therefore becoming increasingly important that religious diversity within the Indian American community is recognized in order to reject bigotry and accept all members of the community, regardless of their faith. Food Truth be told, countless books could be written on the variety of Indian dishes, but I will discuss a small sampling of this diversity to provide, in a sense, the appetizer for the main course. Each of the different regions in India has different dishes based on which ingredients grow in the area. For the sake of brevity, I will look at some of the culinary highlights from the four quadrants of India. Figure 4: Typical North Indian curry (Source: FranchiseIndia) Let’s start with North India. North India consists of several states and territories, such as Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Punjab. Some of the cuisine highlights include thick and creamy curries and flatbreads such as roti and naan. In my experience, North Indian food is the subset of Indian cuisine that most non-Indians are familiar with, yet it is only the tip of the iceberg. Figure 5: Some traditional South Indian dishes, including dosa and idli. (Source: The Vegan Review). When looking to South India in regions such as Tamil Nadu and Kerala, one will find the extensive use of lentils and rice in cooking. Some examples include idli, a steamed white rice cake, or dosa, a thin savory pancake whose batter is made from cream of rice and lentils, both of which are pictured above. Another commonly used ingredient is coconut, often found in chutneys. Figure 6: Rasgulla, an East Indian dessert (Source: AwesomeCuisine) In East India, a region which consists of states such as Odisha and West Bengal, one will find an eclectic mix of food. Fish figures into a lot of East Indian dishes due to the region’s proximity to the coast. Additionally, East Indian cuisine draws influence from China and Mongolia, with whom East India has had numerous cultural interactions over the centuries. One will also find a lot of sweets in East Indian cooking, including rasgulla, pictured above. Figure 7: West Indian thaali (Source: istockphoto.com/mukesh-kumar) Finally, there is West India, which consists of several states including Gujarat and Rajasthan. This is yet another region of the country that uses a lot of fish in its food. Some West Indian dishes, including vindaloo, have Portuguese influence. One staple of West India, specifically of Gujarat, is the thaali pictured above. This is a large dish made up of several smaller portions which include curries and sweets. Conclusion As you can see, there is much more to Indian culture than initially perceived, and my article is just the beginning. There are many more areas to be discussed and much more elaboration to come on the presented topics. At the very least I hope this article, in addition to inspiring curiosity about Indian culture, will make it clear that Indian culture is not monolithic. Moreover, I hope it will drive home the point that it is important to recognize the diversity within cultures. Not only is something diverse much more exciting than a monolith, but it also serves an important purpose in increasing inclusivity. When a culture is reduced to a monolith, those within that culture who do not conform to said monolith can feel isolated. Only by dismantling such a monolith can we help create a more inclusive world. Bibliography “Hindi Language | History, Varieties, Grammar, & Facts | Britannica.” In Encyclopædia Britannica, 2019. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Hindi-language. IndiaNutrition, Team. “Diversity of Indian Food Culture May Surprise You.” IndiaNutrition, February 25, 2020. https://indianutrition.com/diversity-of-indian-food-culture-may-surprise-you/. Parlia. “The BJP Is Islamophobic - Parlia.” www.parlia.com. Accessed November 18, 2021. https://www.parlia.com/a/bjp-islamophobic. ‌“States Uts - Know India: National Portal of India.” knowindia.india.gov.in, n.d. https://knowindia.india.gov.in/states-uts/. Shaikh, Habshan. “Your Guide to Understanding the Diversity of Indian Food.” Patel Brothers, November 27, 2017. https://www.patelbros.com/blog/your-guide-to-understanding-the-diversity-of-indian-food-html. The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica. “Indus Civilization | History, Location, Map, Art, & Facts.” In Encyclopædia Britannica, July 5, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Indus-civilization. Vaishnav, Sumitra Badrinathan, Devesh Kapur, Jonathan Kay, Milan, and Sumitra Badrinathan Vaishnav Devesh Kapur, Jonathan Kay, Milan. “Social Realities of Indian Americans: Results from the 2020 Indian American Attitudes Survey.” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 9, 2021. https://carnegieendowment.org/2021/06/09/social-realities-of-indian-americans-results-from-2020-indian-american-attitudes-survey-pub-84667. WorldAtlas. “The Major Religions in India.” WorldAtlas, July 19, 2016. https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/major-religions-in-modern-india.html. WorldAtlas. “What Language Is Spoken in India?” WorldAtlas, September 2, 2016. https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-most-widely-spoken-languages-in-india.html.