And its here again!!! I thought in my head as I received a text message from one of my juniors in Dayton with a picture of Indian National flag wishing me "Happy Independence day" which turned out to be a precursor to several other similar texts I received later at Indian midnight time. I remembered the famous phrase "time and tides wait for none" while watching tides on a sunny day at a beach in Massachusetts, and revisited the proud moment of hoisting the Indian National flag with my other friend last year (being senior student of the community). With my eyes closed, I took a long walk down the memory lane....... Independence day..... I was born and raised in a Hindu family and my dad's side of family was highly influenced by RSS so I was admitted to a school which governed by RSS. The strict rules of school didn't let me learn any Movie songs unless they were patriotic ones. If my parents turned radio on and sang along, I would shut their mouth with my little palm saying "those are bad songs, you should only listen to news and the patriotic songs" (Not to mention, when I see Kinder Garten kids dancing on Munni/Sheila and Fevicol; I don't appreciate it a whole lot and I feel the tremendous changes in the time, generation and thought processes in education system). So, until third grade I studied in that school where my roots were actually made fastidious for patriotism. The only minus of the school was Hindusim was taught to the core which was good and bad from different perspectives. Anyways! my schooling is not the focus of this blog, I wanted all of us to visit our memories and FEEL and virtually REVISIT the independence day again in older times. Since now a days in India also its not more than a holiday and people look forward to it as a holiday but not "celebrate" it. Yeah so let us go back and feel the chaos and fuss we used to make when our white uniforms weren't whitest and toughest if not starched and ironed well, black shoes weren't polished a day or two in advance! I can totally visualize the thrill of parade at school, still hear the three beats of drums, salutes and attention (by so called head boy of school). I remember the Anthem where we sung Victories from all different directions; I remember the national song where we sung glories to India as the whole. The only boring part to the whole program was speech by the chief guest since it was all same except "nth" number of years to Indian independence .....but, all of this from 7 AM until 1 PM. Followed by lunch served at school, not to forget that special packet containing two motichoor laddoos and bye bye!! Since until much later after my high school graduation, we didn't have luxury of satellite TV channels, me n entire family was found watching oldest patriotic Hindi movie broadcast on Doordarshan; DD metro also came much later. School days were soon over and in college, I used to crave to attend the 15th August programs. For a few years until we knew the teachers and management in school, we continued visiting but in few years I understood we were unwanted there, so stopped going. Last year on my constant pestering, president of Indian Students Association at my university agreed to hoist the flag and I am so much thankful to him for helping me revive my memories. I won't discuss what they do in India these days for Independence day since that is so painful to hear, watch and discuss for those who belong to my era.
I know most of my friends have growing kids and I want to request them, to sit, explain and re-live those moments with kids on Independence day, August 15th. The day which still makes me smile, tells me, "realize who you are, and be responsible everywhere you go", since when you do anything people don't see you as you, they see you as a citizen of India, which is far more deeper than spicy Indian curries, snake charming, Basmati rice and hot yoga! And with all of this I come to an open ended question, are we doing justice with our freedom? Are we really independent? Having witnessed the madness for McDonalds, craziness for American Corn, and growing awareness about brand names among youngest members of my own family, a negative answer comes to my mind. I know not being in India doesn't allow me to ask this question or even comment anything ; However I know for sure, those living there, aren't doing anything about it! I wish all of us Happy Independence Day! ~Peace
I know most of my friends have growing kids and I want to request them, to sit, explain and re-live those moments with kids on Independence day, August 15th. The day which still makes me smile, tells me, "realize who you are, and be responsible everywhere you go", since when you do anything people don't see you as you, they see you as a citizen of India, which is far more deeper than spicy Indian curries, snake charming, Basmati rice and hot yoga! And with all of this I come to an open ended question, are we doing justice with our freedom? Are we really independent? Having witnessed the madness for McDonalds, craziness for American Corn, and growing awareness about brand names among youngest members of my own family, a negative answer comes to my mind. I know not being in India doesn't allow me to ask this question or even comment anything ; However I know for sure, those living there, aren't doing anything about it! I wish all of us Happy Independence Day! ~Peace
