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Friday, July 9, 2010

Joel Stein's "My Own Private India"

Well Well Well!!! This aint a book publishers forum or some other gala opening. This article by Joel Stein in Time My Own Private India caught my eye and i want my friends to knwo about it through ME. Now this article is sarcastically at its best and might be a bit too detailingly poking at the Indian Population. Joe here takes a dig at the huge Indian Population in the city of Edison in NewJersey.Read it for yourself you will like/dislike it more and more you read it such is the literature and knowledge (sarcastically). Cherry on the cake is the apology by Joe himself, its like if you want it to be an apology so be it 'I dont care'. Joe the master here. But i think Joe is lost a bit in time here too, he misses the whole point of Immigration and the added value we the so called outsider or minority provide to you all. Hell, we gave you your 44th President (lol). Though he ain't giving nothing back to us, thats a whole different story.

But to tell you the truth, personally i went to Edison last year to visit my family friend (ya ya) over there. I was like "What the #^*%??" I can understand seeing a few Indians here and there but to see a flock of them chewing tobacco on the railway station. In the rainy spring's i saw an uncle with his 'lungi' and white shouldered banian (innerwear) under a banana leaf(now thats my masala) walking the length and breadth of the footpath. Its like your whole past shown in a quick flashback. Its not that i dont want her but i didnt miss her for so long to be reminded who we really are. And in a way it made me kinda ego-proud as well, atlast we Indians are making a mark in Land of Opportunities. But that ego crashed when i went into a Gujju Sweet Shop near Edison. They guy at the shop in his mid 40's spoke nothing but Gujarati. Language of signs and symbols helped us both me and him get out of this mess. Ohh so for the first time i realised, you really dont need know 'angrezi' to survive here. NewJersey is not far away from "Little Italy" or "ChinaTown" and it will take some time for Edison to become "IndiaLand" or "IndiaPradhesh" or some other crap name like who thought of "BollyWood". But i must tell you we are huge there.

Ain't that the beauty of this country. USA, first it belonged to a few forest thriving nomads of indigenious people. Europeans came here to swipe them off to start their own communities and flourish. Then gradually world participitated to fill in the gaps in population. Italians, Irish, Hispanics,Chineese all are here aplenty and more than us. Even the Russians (what the eff is Cold War?) and Japaneese too(Hiroshima/Nagasaki/Pearl Harbor..hello???). But the moment an Indian sets his foot here lots of questions arise. Will they outsource whatever is left? Will they do that, do this? Its not our fault we produce more Engineers(who work for other countries) when you produce Soldiers(who fight for other countries). Its not our fault Christopher Columbus set out to meet us, we are infact making his bucket list fullfilled by coming here. To tell you the truth, we are the actual Indians !!

I totally understand Joe's personal views, no man how large hearted he is can accept his backyard to be taken over by some one. Politicians in my country are making sure jobs are given to local people either by law or force or just killing the rest of them. America must be proud in itself when a South Indian like me feels more safer here than in streets of Mumbai. I have seen Non-Tamilians humiliated in Chennai and Tamilians kicked in Bangalore. When i have seen all this before, i dont really care about a sarcastical diatribe on my community by Joe, Jack or who ever. We dont jump fences and illegally immigrate ourselves, We dont explode ourselves with fertilizers, We dont start up Mafias. But...We do pay taxes, We do cheer US soccer team (which you dont), We do make sure your corporations get richer every year, We do make you lazier day by day. And these days We do create jobs for you here. What more do you want?? C'mon this is an offer you cant resist (Brando'ishh i must say)

3 comments:

Me said...

This is hillariously funny. the best piece ever...

Sreejit said...

Very nicely put it man.. Symbiotic situation, but I dont blame them too...

jojyva said...

Well written, but could have been better.

Love to hear what you think!
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