The beauty of being yourself

It's been such a long time since I last blogged. I'd promised myself that I'd make sure never to take such a long break but school work always gets in the way of my promises. So anyways, I'm back to blogging! I'd watched a video a month ago. It was a short film that spoke about how Tamils living both in India and abroad do not encourage their children to speak in Tamil, as a consequence of which the language would disappear in a few years. As someone who strongly believes in maintaining one's identity and regularly speaking in one's native language, this film touched me and haunted me for days to come. Then I decided that I'd blog about it.

A few years ago, when I was in high school, I was asked to write a short essay on my thoughts on "What should one do on moving to a new country? Should they change to suit their surroundings or else strictly stick to their identity?" I didn't need time to think. I straightaway went on to write that no matter what, there is nothing that stops you from maintaining your own identity. Looking back, I realize that at that point of time, life was all black and white. Now, I can see the grey areas as well. But, that hasn't changed my opinion on the matter one bit. I still believe that no matter where you live or who you live with, you can keep your identity and always be proud of your culture and heritage. I'm not sure where or how I picked up that stand but I've had it for as long as I can remember. Though I'm Indian, I've spent most of my life in Saudi Arabia and a few years in the United States. For the last 13 years or so that I've spent outside India, every time someone asked me who I was, I would proudly say "I'm Indian, from the southern state of Tamil Nadu." I'm asked that question almost on a daily basis and my answer remains the same.

I've always taken pride in my mother tongue Tamil, in it being one of the classical Indian languages, in its centuries old heritage, in how beautiful it sounds, in coming from a country with such a rich cultural background, in our languages, our colors, our clothes, our cuisines. Having lived in three countries, each one as different from the other as possible, I only added on to myself what i liked about the people there. Those additions never took away from me what I already was. This might have been because of my confidence in who I am or else the fear of losing myself in the crowd. I strongly believe that taking pride in your culture and individuality brings you more respect in the new place than if you'd tried to blend in. Now let me add the grey to that high school essay. Blending in is necessary. But, blending in to such an extent that you might lose your identity is dangerous. I've always felt that when I look back at life, i want to be all that I was a few years ago. I don't want to lose myself anywhere along the way.

We can find something beautiful about every culture, every country. There is only the issue of identifying the beautiful things about your background and beginning to love them. On moving to any country, you can still be yourself. It is all about being yourself. You've got no one to impress and forgetting your identity is certainly not going to impress anyone. If you come to think of it, certain countries are well known for their multicultural population. What would happen if we erased those cultural differences? Would the earth be the same if we all began to look and act the same? There is nothing more beautiful than people maintaining their individual identities and still living together in harmony. The identity of our planet is in all those different cultures. Remember that. Spend some time every now and then, reminding yourself of who you are. I do that too. I tell myself that I'm an Indian Tamil Muslim and I couldn't be any prouder. 

One word for women. One voice for India.

 The Indian woman has been in the news a lot over the past 6 months or so. Unfortunately, it hasn't been for good reasons. Those news reports have only further reiterated the fact that the Indian woman will never be treated anything but inferior to men. No matter what she achieves, or what she has in her to achieve, she will never be considered equal to men. Yes this post has been triggered by the gender-based attacks against women in India and the insensitive stuff people post on social media in response to those attacks, but the thoughts I am going to put in here have originated much, much before these attacks ever came into limelight. I am just bringing together thoughts gathered since childhood.

I've never experienced any sort of discrimination at my home. I've been given all that freedom and privileges that were given to my brother. Yet, I've experienced and seen this kind of a discrimination at many a places. In our country, any wrong that happens with a woman is her fault. They say, "It happens because of the clothes she wears, the cellphone she carries, her dancing at weddings, her going out to school/work, her breathing, her existing. Women are harrassed because of their inappropriate clothing." Really? And a woman's clothing is the license for a man to do anything he wishes? "A man never goes wrong. We will blame our daughters but never our sons. We will constrict our daughters every way possible but never say no to our sons." What is even more disheartening to see is that not only men but women also have similar ideologies. They say that it is a dangerous world for women out there. Yes it is. But why is it so? Have we ever asked ourselves that question? We teach our daughters to be alert and guarded, but never teach our sons to respect women.

Most people still consider a girl child to be a burden and their son's bride as their money tree. We take pride in being a fast developing country. We take pride in our culture and how we are able to balance between our values and western influence. Yet, our newspapers are filled with these stories. I recently watched an episode of a television show that talks about social issues about a man who abandoned his wife and three daughters only because they were women and he considered them to be a burden on him. Opening the news app on my phone has become a painful thing. You never know what you might see there that might make you lose your peace of mind. You never know what city in India has now been deemed unsafe for women. I was so disturbed at these stories and annoyed at those comments that only talked about staying away from trouble that I started thinking about how to put a complete stop to all these crimes. It took a lot of thinking but I could finally see what we must do. 

Parents are capable of way more than what they realize. It is those little things that our parents teach us at young ages that stay with us and guide us lifelong. We are of course exposed to influences outside home. But at the end of the day when you come back home, it is in your parents' hands to get rid of all those unwanted influences. I have heard really young boys say that girls should stay home and play with their dolls and that is all they must do. What is it that contaminates these young minds at such a tender age? Shouldn't we set examples at home for the child to follow? If a young boy never saw his father mistreating his mother, where will he learn to do that from? If a boy never got any more love, respect, freedom or privileges than his sister did, from where will he learn that women are inferior to men? If his parents never considered his sister to be a burden on them, why would he ever think that about his daughter? I am not saying that if we implement the above, everything will be perfect. All I am saying is that doing these will take us a step closer to ensuring that our women have a better, safer life. But, these are some questions to ponder upon. It is about time that parents realize their mistake and correct themselves even if they don't want to. They wouldn't be doing it for their sons but for the entire country.