We who move to another country try to match ourselves to the locals by adapting their culture and their ways to assimilate ourselves because who wants to voluntarily be a visible minority in a crowd. For example when we go to Tim Hortons to line up for coffee we love to place our order with a smile saying, "Double, Double," which basically boils down to mean 2 sugar and 2 cream. When we look for toilet we ask for 'washroom' or 'restroom' in US, to anybody who says 'thank you' we follow it with a 'you're welcome' in a blink, same way the Australian would say 'no worries' or in India they will say 'mention not'.
And unknowingly we do the same in return. We make new friends and they adapt our culture. It is done in a very subtle manner but it is charming in its own way. There are some incidences that has prompted me to write about this aspect.
My oldest (word to be noted, in India and certain other continents we say 'eldest') sister lives in a small university town in southern Indiana. She has made friends with a lady who is from the mid-west. Theirs is a friendship which goes really deep, so deep that they consider each other as extended family, supporting and standing by each other through thick and thin, in happy times and in not-so-happy times too. The interaction between the two families is very great and very frequent.
My sister has two daughters. The younger one addresses the older one as 'didi' a word in Hindi which means older sister. My sister's friend also has two daughters and a son. When her son turned 3 years old, lo and behold he was addressing his sisters as 'didi' which he had picked from my niece and connected in his child's mind that he will call his sisters the same way. None of the adults taught him this and it came to them as a surprise.
My oldest niece was barely a year old when she started going to a day care. Her baby language skills were a mix of both English and Hindi words. She use to call milk 'du-dhoo'; this is a baby word derived from the Hindi word Dudh which means Milk. My sister explained to the lady in charge at the day care what the meaning is. My niece was not the only one using that word, but few other non-Indian kids started to use that word to refer to milk in no time.
My previous room-mate and I decided to keep a pet and decided on a cat. By the time an orange tabby was adopted one of my sister was living with us to and she came up with a name, "Jadu", that suited the cat. The name means magic in Hindi. I have since moved out but the room-mate still has the cat and still calls her Jadu. Oh, did I mention that she is from the Maritimes and is of Scottish descent. I meant the room-mate, not the cat.
One recent thing I organized at my place here in Toronto was a get together of my friends to celebrate the festival of colors - Holi. On 28th Feb I had few friends come over for lunch. These are friends who are from Canada, USA, Taiwan, Dominica, Singapore and China and of’ course, India. I wanted to share this festival with all of them. We had a scrumptious home cooked Indian lunch. And while we were enjoying the food the finals of Winter Olympics Hockey started in Vancouver. In the midst of enjoying our mango mousse and rice pudding we were cheering the Canadian team who were ahead of the Americans. I had some dry color powder to celebrate Holi. Coincidently, the color matched the color of Canada's flag - red. We gleefully applied colors on each others face and wished prosperity to each other. Few people left to head home in order to watch the closing ceremony in the evening. J actually came up with a brilliant idea; she cut out the shape of Maple Leaf on a paper and used that as a stencil to apply the flag on SA's forehead.
The rest of us continued with the match. We were united in our pitching for Canada whole-heartedly. Screaming with so much delight and fervor that it could bring the roof down, sigh in unison for a missed chance to score another goal by our strong team. The score was 2-1 when in the last 20 seconds of the game the Americans brought the game to a tie, they scored another goal. Needless to say our faces fell to the ground, we were disappointed. The tie breaker game went into another 20 min session. Our nerves were tight; we were literally sitting on the edge of our seats, figuratively too. The game had reached a nail biting crescendo. It was a do or die situation. And then our moment of victory came into realization, the gold was ours. Within the first 5 min Crosby scored the winning goal for Canada. We all screamed, jumped on our feet, I heard SA scream, "We won, we won," we hugged each other, and then we did a group hug. Our eyes were glistening with unshed tears of happiness and triumph. I must confess one rebellious drop rolled down from the corner of my right eye. It was amazing to go through this euphoria of victory. It was awesome to see how united we stood for the country. We rooted for it with our heart and soul. We stood as one in this pursuit, it was fascinating.
On one beautiful Sunday afternoon, a bunch of us came together under one roof, people who came from different parts of the world, representing all different races, learning a culture and cuisine to stand so united for a common cause for a country, Canada, where it is heart warming that this can actually happen.
Sometimes, I wonder why there is so much hostility and hatred in this world based on each others diversity. We have so much to learn from each other, so much to give to others; we don't even have enough time to do so in a lifetime. So why waste time in negativity?!! I truly believe that we live in a Global village, where each one of us is just there to contribute equally for its development and prosperity.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Winter '09
Holiday season ~ a time of the year where it’s like a mixed bag…excitement, stress, happiness, sadness etc. etc. all kinds of emotions we go through. In North America this is one time of the year where the rush of adrenalin is so high and everybody gets caught in the wave. The holiday season basically starts from December 24th evening and ends by 1st January.
For me personally, I like the spirit around me, the ambience of festivities that is created is awesome. It makes my heart warm and happy. The lights and decorations hanging outside people’s home, in the malls and the streets, the holiday music wafting from the radio and the holiday theme airing on TV, the warmth emanating from the perfumed candles that were lit in the evening, makes me want to snuggle on the couch under a warm blanket with my fingers curled around a cup of warm apple cider.
24th December ~ for me it all started by going for a pot-luck dinner at my friend’s place on Christmas Eve. We were allowed to leave work by 2:30 that day. She is from Japan and is married to a Canadian; they have 2 kids, beautiful and intelligent, always a good outcome from mixed race marriage – my personal observation. So for that night I made a Lima Beans and Corn casserole. My friend who accompanied me got a Rose Zinfandel for the soiree. It was a multi-cultural food on the table – from Sushi to General Tao’s chicken, Bagel and flavoured cream-cheese to my casserole, strawberry shortcake to green tea cake. It was a wonderful evening. Lots of conversation happened, touching various different topics, with one of our friends playing the piano, and at one point we also visited the traditional Tea Room re-created by the hostess in her house – a touch of Japan in Canada.
25th December ~ Christmas morning began with me getting out of the bed and taking a shower, getting ready and leaving my apartment to head towards a family from Dominica to spend the entire day with them, starting from breakfast. It was such an enriching day. I reached there and was greeted with a warm mug of Eggnog. My friend’s mother had also prepared Ginger beer and Sorel from scratch. They were all very refreshing drinks. After breakfast we sat around talking and laughing and then we started cooking the dinner. Jerk chicken wings and curried goat were marinating from a day before in a spice seasoning made from scratch by her mom. Ham was already cooking in the broth. Chicken wings were spread out and placed in the oven, curried goat was put on the stove top on low heat and was left to simmer. Then came the Turkey, it was a smoked one, some onions were stuffed in the cavity and it went into the oven too. I was given the task to make a tossed salad. I got down to doing my task very diligently. I set about by washing the veggies and one by one started chopping them all in a big bowl ~ cucumber, roma tomatoes, iceberg lettuce, carrot, red onion and deep red pomegranate went in. My friend’s nephew and his wife made all the vegetarian dishes – broccoli soufflé, macaroni and cheese, lasagne, eggplant and rice and peas. We were about 15 people who had a wonderful time being together and sharing such a lovely meal together. We didn’t have a white Christmas, instead we had a blue one, it was raining, all day long.
26th December ~ it’s Boxing Day in Canada where people go berserk, shopping. All Malls and bus and subway are packed with people, but I had another plan. Woke up at 8:45 to go to the loo, it was raining, crawled back into the bed but by 9:10 got a call from a friend asking if I can come over to meet with her son and daughter-in-law who were visiting from Australia and were leaving on 27th. I crawled back out of the bed and went to take my shower and got ready and left by 10. It was a very pleasant visit with them and also got to meet the baby of her youngest son who is just 7 months old and such a delight to just hold and talk to. We all sat around catching up on life and how it is in Australia and Canada, talking on various subjects. We left and I reached home around 2:30pm and was visited by a friend with whom I later headed all the way west to Mississauga to meet a couple friends for dinner at a restaurant called West 50. We all had a terrific time there. We had to commute on public transit for 2 hours each way which was a bummer but it was made easy by the interesting company of a good friend.
27th December ~ Samosas and Latkas … two ubiquitous snack delights, Samosa more so than Latkas. Samosa has been one of my favourite things ever since I was a child and nothing has replaced it so far. I have decided to give a lesson16th Jan on how to make them to few friends who enjoy this snack on but were excited to make it in their own kitchen. For that purpose I decided to do a dry run today in order to decide which filling to present on the day of the lesson. And while I was at it SA suggested why not try Potato Latkas. So we spent the day making these snacks back to back and treated them as our meal. Must say it was really a delightful treat. We were satiated beyond words with this snack therapy.
28th December ~ it’s coming close to New Year and Christmas celebrations seems like tucked away in the recess of our memory but there is one more thing we need to do to live up to the Holiday Season – Cookie Exchange. Usually done before Christmas but there is no reason not to bend certain rules to accommodate food and gatherings, it was scheduled for today as all of us were free from our holiday duties and were free. I choose to make Lemon cookies and followed a recipe that called for Lemon Cake mix. The cookies actually won the best cookie rating in the exchange and made me proud!!! pppssttt…this was my first attempt ever to make cookies, despite the fact that I love baking.
30th December ~ I went out with SA and his cousin, just to hang out and have some food and a drink at Madison Pub after work. It was a good evening. Food and drink were good and on SA ;) His cousin is an interesting person. He told me his maternal grand-father was born and raised in India in Calcutta. Even till this day he eats extra hot food and raw green chillies never fail to feature in his meal plate, even at a ripe old age of 89. He moved to Canada in his 20s.
31st December ~ New Year’s Eve…a time to reflect on the year gone by and to make new plans for the New Year. But why wait to do this on this particular day. Every single day in the year is a new day, might as well do it any of those other 364 days. Anyways, influenced by a scene from a Japanese movie “Departures” I shared an idea with SA to celebrate New Year’s Eve in the way they did in the movie. So here we are on the last day of the year, gorging on fried chicken. We got it from two different places – KFC and Popeye’s, and drinking Asti Martini. In the movie the protagonist does something similar with his boss and a colleague. They eat fried chicken, they have wine and there was a salad and cake sitting on the coffee table. They get drunk and the hero plays his Cello. We had the TV on, we ate the fried chicken with ketchup and drank sparkling wine, didn’t get drunk neither did we play the Cello or for that matter any other musical instrument. For dessert we had Lemon Tarts, filling was made at home. It was the best tasting tarts ever. We had a great time just enjoying the evening and welcoming the New Year. It was simple and no questions were asked about what New Year resolutions were being made or what were the thoughts about the year that just went by. It was an evening to just enjoy in all its simplicity, shared by two close friends. It was perfect!!!
For me personally, I like the spirit around me, the ambience of festivities that is created is awesome. It makes my heart warm and happy. The lights and decorations hanging outside people’s home, in the malls and the streets, the holiday music wafting from the radio and the holiday theme airing on TV, the warmth emanating from the perfumed candles that were lit in the evening, makes me want to snuggle on the couch under a warm blanket with my fingers curled around a cup of warm apple cider.
24th December ~ for me it all started by going for a pot-luck dinner at my friend’s place on Christmas Eve. We were allowed to leave work by 2:30 that day. She is from Japan and is married to a Canadian; they have 2 kids, beautiful and intelligent, always a good outcome from mixed race marriage – my personal observation. So for that night I made a Lima Beans and Corn casserole. My friend who accompanied me got a Rose Zinfandel for the soiree. It was a multi-cultural food on the table – from Sushi to General Tao’s chicken, Bagel and flavoured cream-cheese to my casserole, strawberry shortcake to green tea cake. It was a wonderful evening. Lots of conversation happened, touching various different topics, with one of our friends playing the piano, and at one point we also visited the traditional Tea Room re-created by the hostess in her house – a touch of Japan in Canada.
25th December ~ Christmas morning began with me getting out of the bed and taking a shower, getting ready and leaving my apartment to head towards a family from Dominica to spend the entire day with them, starting from breakfast. It was such an enriching day. I reached there and was greeted with a warm mug of Eggnog. My friend’s mother had also prepared Ginger beer and Sorel from scratch. They were all very refreshing drinks. After breakfast we sat around talking and laughing and then we started cooking the dinner. Jerk chicken wings and curried goat were marinating from a day before in a spice seasoning made from scratch by her mom. Ham was already cooking in the broth. Chicken wings were spread out and placed in the oven, curried goat was put on the stove top on low heat and was left to simmer. Then came the Turkey, it was a smoked one, some onions were stuffed in the cavity and it went into the oven too. I was given the task to make a tossed salad. I got down to doing my task very diligently. I set about by washing the veggies and one by one started chopping them all in a big bowl ~ cucumber, roma tomatoes, iceberg lettuce, carrot, red onion and deep red pomegranate went in. My friend’s nephew and his wife made all the vegetarian dishes – broccoli soufflé, macaroni and cheese, lasagne, eggplant and rice and peas. We were about 15 people who had a wonderful time being together and sharing such a lovely meal together. We didn’t have a white Christmas, instead we had a blue one, it was raining, all day long.
26th December ~ it’s Boxing Day in Canada where people go berserk, shopping. All Malls and bus and subway are packed with people, but I had another plan. Woke up at 8:45 to go to the loo, it was raining, crawled back into the bed but by 9:10 got a call from a friend asking if I can come over to meet with her son and daughter-in-law who were visiting from Australia and were leaving on 27th. I crawled back out of the bed and went to take my shower and got ready and left by 10. It was a very pleasant visit with them and also got to meet the baby of her youngest son who is just 7 months old and such a delight to just hold and talk to. We all sat around catching up on life and how it is in Australia and Canada, talking on various subjects. We left and I reached home around 2:30pm and was visited by a friend with whom I later headed all the way west to Mississauga to meet a couple friends for dinner at a restaurant called West 50. We all had a terrific time there. We had to commute on public transit for 2 hours each way which was a bummer but it was made easy by the interesting company of a good friend.
27th December ~ Samosas and Latkas … two ubiquitous snack delights, Samosa more so than Latkas. Samosa has been one of my favourite things ever since I was a child and nothing has replaced it so far. I have decided to give a lesson16th Jan on how to make them to few friends who enjoy this snack on but were excited to make it in their own kitchen. For that purpose I decided to do a dry run today in order to decide which filling to present on the day of the lesson. And while I was at it SA suggested why not try Potato Latkas. So we spent the day making these snacks back to back and treated them as our meal. Must say it was really a delightful treat. We were satiated beyond words with this snack therapy.
28th December ~ it’s coming close to New Year and Christmas celebrations seems like tucked away in the recess of our memory but there is one more thing we need to do to live up to the Holiday Season – Cookie Exchange. Usually done before Christmas but there is no reason not to bend certain rules to accommodate food and gatherings, it was scheduled for today as all of us were free from our holiday duties and were free. I choose to make Lemon cookies and followed a recipe that called for Lemon Cake mix. The cookies actually won the best cookie rating in the exchange and made me proud!!! pppssttt…this was my first attempt ever to make cookies, despite the fact that I love baking.
30th December ~ I went out with SA and his cousin, just to hang out and have some food and a drink at Madison Pub after work. It was a good evening. Food and drink were good and on SA ;) His cousin is an interesting person. He told me his maternal grand-father was born and raised in India in Calcutta. Even till this day he eats extra hot food and raw green chillies never fail to feature in his meal plate, even at a ripe old age of 89. He moved to Canada in his 20s.
31st December ~ New Year’s Eve…a time to reflect on the year gone by and to make new plans for the New Year. But why wait to do this on this particular day. Every single day in the year is a new day, might as well do it any of those other 364 days. Anyways, influenced by a scene from a Japanese movie “Departures” I shared an idea with SA to celebrate New Year’s Eve in the way they did in the movie. So here we are on the last day of the year, gorging on fried chicken. We got it from two different places – KFC and Popeye’s, and drinking Asti Martini. In the movie the protagonist does something similar with his boss and a colleague. They eat fried chicken, they have wine and there was a salad and cake sitting on the coffee table. They get drunk and the hero plays his Cello. We had the TV on, we ate the fried chicken with ketchup and drank sparkling wine, didn’t get drunk neither did we play the Cello or for that matter any other musical instrument. For dessert we had Lemon Tarts, filling was made at home. It was the best tasting tarts ever. We had a great time just enjoying the evening and welcoming the New Year. It was simple and no questions were asked about what New Year resolutions were being made or what were the thoughts about the year that just went by. It was an evening to just enjoy in all its simplicity, shared by two close friends. It was perfect!!!
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