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Young Women on their Search for Self
The Asian Indian American Woman Experience
by Meera Rastogi
This essay is created from ten interviews with
second-generation South Asian American young women ranging in
age from 18 to 37. The following are actual quotes from all ten
of the women participants. The essay attempts to capture the collective
experience of young South Asian American women growing up in the Midwest.
I am deeply indebted to these ten women who shared
their powerful stories with me.
I am a 19-year-old South Asian American female. I
was born and raised in a small town in Ohio, and am currently
in school at a large university in the Midwest. When my father
came to America, he had a couple of odd jobs, and lived in New
York City. He was selling newspapers at a newspaper stand and
he worked his way up until he got a scholarship and he went to
school. My father then went back to India to look for a wife.
His parents introduced him to my mom, they met, and got married
within a week or a couple of days, and my mom moved to the States
with my dad.
When I was little, I grew up in a predominantly white,
suburban neighborhood. Because I've always grown up in an area
where there are so few Indians, I didn't feel a sense of community
until I came to college. I also had a difficult time with the
people in my community because I couldn't relate to any of them.
I think that is because the majority of them were immigrants and
I was brought up in the U.S.
Everybody's families were different from mine, both
in how they looked and what they thought. I have the distinct
memory that while they were learning jazz and ballet, I was learning
Indian classical dance. Friday nights people were going to football
games, while I had to go to temple. We couldn't really celebrate
Thanksgiving with all of our family because half of them were
on the West Coast, the rest were in India. Similarly, when Indian
holidays came around, we celebrated them, but not the way they
would be in India with the whole neighborhood celebrating the
same thing.
Thinking back to my childhood friendships, I remember
wanting to be friends with who was popular because they were what
was considered pretty. They were all white girls, with long hair,
who dressed very nicely. I went to a local school so I was like
all white people and I can't think of any one person who I looked
up to. When I really think about why I never had a role model,
I realize that there wasn't anyone who was exactly in my situation.
I mean being one of the second generation kids, there are not
many Indians that are brought up here.
During recess, I used to play by myself in the back. I didn't play with other kids because I was really shy, and kids used to treat me like a freak. I remember, kids used to make fun of me, alienate me. I used to hang out with the teachers during recess. I'd get comments, like, "So do you live in a teepee?" because they'd think I was a Native American instead of Indian. There was constantly stuff about our clothes, our skin color and about us being Indian. We'd have "For Sale" signs put up in front of our house or tomatoes thrown at our house. I remember when I'd walk with my mom when she was wearing a sari, people would scream, "Go back to your own country."
I hated my name for so long because kids would also
make fun of my name at school or call me names at the bus stop.
I remember coming home from school, and I'd see my mom on the
balcony, and she would call over to me, and she would be speaking
in Hindi with me and I felt ashamed. I would ask her not speak
to me in Hindi, but to speak to me in English. I had very low
self-esteem.
There was only one place I really felt at home. When
I think about happy times, they are at the temple. My experience
at the temple greatly influenced my identity. Not only did it
give me a great appreciation for the arts, it also convinced me
that many Indians had good hearts.
In the middle of high school, I wanted to date so
I could be like everybody else. However, I was not allowed to
date. Because my parents were very strict, I wasn't allowed to
talk to boys. I didn't go anywhere unless I went with family.
When I would approach the topic of dating, I just heard, "No,
not yet." My father did say that he didn't mind me hanging
out with guy friends as long as it was a big group. But there
was no dating, that's the big thing. Also, in high school, my
mom yelled at me all of the time, "Do your homework, do your
homework." When I went to India, I talked to my aunt about
our arguments, and I asked my aunt, "What's going on with
my mom?" She explained that my mom was bringing me up in
a place where she didn't know what would happen. Because my mom
was raising me in a culture she was unfamiliar with, she was overprotective.
I noticed that my friends had a different relationship
with their parents. American kids grow up and their parents know
exactly what is going on, and their parents are like, "Yeah,
you know when I was in college, I used to drink with the best
of them." But my parent are like "You are not drinking,
you are not touching alcohol!" So, I saw how my friends'
parents were more understanding of the culture they are faced
with.
During this time, I felt that my parents were just
so different from everybody else's parents that I hardly ever
had people over because I was embarrassed. My parents could not
speak clearly and they dressed weird. I also remember our house
smelled different because we ate Indian food. My mom forced me
to learn how to cook Indian food, and although I'm glad now, she
could have done it in a nicer way so I wouldn't have resented
her so much. I now realize that this environment made me feel
extremely depressed. I coped with my depression by pleasing my
parents. I felt that pleasing them kept my whole world from falling
apart.
Things at school continued to be rough because I was the only Indian in the class. The first time I wore a skirt or shorts in front of anybody else was when I started playing basketball. My legs were really hairy, and I got called names for that. In our small town in Ohio, kids also made comments that hurt my brother. We'd be joking around, and they'd say something like, "Well, show us your green card" or "Well, why don't you just go back to where you came from?"
Since we moved, I did not have the temple anymore.
All I had was the racism outside and conflicts at home. I didn't
deal with the racism for a very long time. In order to cope with
it, I internalized it all and believed it. I tried to fight back
and stick up for myself at first, but eventually I just stopped.
I grew up wanting to get out of the house. I decided
to graduate early, and left the house at 16 because I hated it
there and would just cry my eyes out. My mom would always yell
at me and I felt so trapped because I didn't have a car and was
just stuck at home all the time. I couldn't make too many friends
at school because my friends didn't understand what was going
on at home. All of these feelings really affected me and I was
very insecure. I didn't have any self confidence, and I always
felt like I didn't fit in. So, I didn't try to fit in anymore.
I knew I couldn't.
I was finally able to tell my father that I was not
going to go into medicine. When I quit medical school, he told
me that it was the worst day of his life. He seemed to think I
had failed him. For many years I lived with the guilt that I wasn't
good enough because I had chosen to quit something that my father
thought was really good for me.
Presently, I still feel a sense of isolation when
I walk into a newsroom where everybody's a middle-class, white
male. Even though I thought I picked a good field of study, I
hate school. I feel like I am back in junior high, and I've never
had this low of a self-concept in my life. Sometimes I wonder,
if I looked different maybe they would treat me differently. I
can't tell if it's my ethnicity, and while I don't think it is
ethnically related, I have no idea what it is related to.
At work, I notice that my eating habits always seem
to be the topic of major conversation. I have also noticed that
I get asked questions about my skin color. For example, I've noticed
that whenever I'm new in a workplace and there's no one else with
dark skin, I get funny questions and comments like, "Oh your
skin color is so beautiful," or "Oh, that would only
look good on you because you have a permanent tan." Although
these comments are more like compliments, I feel isolated and
uncomfortable. It sends the message that "You're different,
you're not me, you're not like us." I don't think that's
the intention but it's very difficult not to take it that way.
When I began dating, I didn't tell my parents for
two years. When I told them about it two years later when we all
had dinner, it was okay. But before I told them about my boyfriend,
my life at college and at home was completely separate. I couldn't
even bring the two worlds together because I really wanted my
parents' approval. I thought that having a boyfriend would not
get their approval so I never had the two worlds meet. This time
in my life was very difficult because I was constantly juggling
and splitting myself into separate halves and this made me doubt
myself. I wasn't one whole identity but more like two, so I wasn't
certain myself what I was.
Even though some problems have been resolved at home,
I feel very conflicted about my relationship with my parents.
On the one hand, I want to live my own life and be glad that I'm
free but on the other hand, I feel very obligated to my parents.
Although, I argue with my parents all the time, they are still
my parents. I feel a great amount of respect for them because
they gave me a lot.
My parents have pressured me and have always questioned
my decisions and that's always resulted in a lot of self-doubt
and depression within me in the past. But I'm fortunate to have
grown up in America because I've had the option of going to therapy.
I know that had I been living in India that wouldn't have been
an option for me. From seeing therapists, I have been able do
a lot of healing. Growing up here has allowed me to feel a lot
more independent. In India, people are much more strict. Even
here, when I'm around Indians, I have to watch out what I do,
because it's like every Indian knows every other Indian. And if
you do anything, it goes right back to somebody.
Sometimes I still feel that I'm not completely comfortable
in the Indian culture, and I'm not one hundred percent comfortable
in the American culture either. I always feel like I'm in the
middle and the only way I can describe it to people is to say
that I sit on a fence. And it's like one side is America and whatever
America represents, and the other side is India and whatever India
represents. I'm the happiest in the middle and if you pushed me
over into one side I would be a fish out of water.
My relationship with my parents has improved, and
I share more with them now than I used to. In the past year, I
started some spiritual practices and things are very different.
I feel that I have a lot less self-doubt and if I do have any,
I find a way to discuss it with my parents in a way that they
will be able to help me.
In the future, I think I will live a non-traditional
life in comparison to most of my Indian friends. I'd say all of
my Indian friends will probably be married by the time they are
30. I'm very different in that way because I can see that I will
not be married and I will focus on my career and on exploring
myself. There's nothing wrong with being like that. I've been
through enough situations where I haven't been myself, and now
it is time for me to feel who I am.
Meera Rastogi, a graduate of Ohio State University, is currently an assistant professor of psychology at Edgewood College, Madison, Wisconsin. Dr. Rastogi can be contacted at: mrastogi@edgewood.edu
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