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In Reply to Farzana Versey article

How is life Abroad and what we learn

'How Does It Feel To Have Lived Abroad?' or 'The American University Experience'.
Well, I am not exactly in USA. I am in Japan. I think it is nice that we I got the chance to come out of India and see the world. It is not exactly coming abroad that benifits directly. Talking in simple words, it is a question of limits. When for the first time you leave your village or city, your experience is enriched. When you first time meet people who have different values of life, different ways of thinking, you ways of thinking is enriched. Not that it happens to everyone, not that everyone has similar experience and grasp, but surely it enriches your out look.

In many cases the input may be partial and look harmful and unwanted, however it s these reactions to positives and negetives that enriches a society. Though at this stage I am talking generally, I will give specific examples, I hope.

You very well said that it is the experience makes you, not education. And this is what you cannot get without getting chance to mix with people with other ways of life. Even mixing with people of Different parts of India would provide that opurtunity. One may become a great success without this experience too, but to have a broader outlook, you need the exposure. Hence it is very true when you say that the world view will ultimately depend on whether you are looking down from a skyscraper in Manhattan or a low-lying house overlooking a field in Madurai - both will relate to Subramaniam Bharati and Stephen Spender differently.

You said that Indians do well abroad. But you haven't defined what doing well mean. That is why you have the feeling that it is the professionals - the rest become cab drivers, waiters and vendors while, there in their hometowns, they could have been farmers, clerks or even small-scale entrepreneurs.

This is exactly this feeling of people like you, or let me recitify, of people in general of India, where there is no respect of all the professions. That is why we suffocate for to achieve success in a few fields. Here I will give you many many explicit examples.

In abroad, if a person become a cab driver, it is not considered a bad job. But In India we donot respect a person who is driving a cab of doing fish buisness. We would prefer a bank clark then a fisherman as the so-in-law. May be the fisher-man will be earning more money then the Bank-clark.

I Japa, a cook is a very very respected job. Many many TV shows are made out of cooking. I am not joking. Each cities make there own shows, where they show the tasty food that the particular resturants make. Often compitions are held. Some cooks who win in national compitions become very popular. This programs on one hand become a widely watched TV programe, often part of New Year programs too. On the other hand, it becomes a commercial for the Resturant too.

Do you believe this happening in India? This is true for many other buisness. The son or daughter of a Taxi- Driver will have no disadventage as long as she has the skill. But in India this is different.

Now you can ask, if you have so many idea's why don't you come back and implement them. This is where the problem starts. Yes, we are trying. Even where in Abraod, we are trying. I am from Assam, and a member of Assam International network, and we are trying various programs to help the North-East. Our group is a email based group. Hence only people connected through Net are part of the group.

Hence there are students of Various institutions and few Goverment members in North-east, who has got the email connections. Changing the inertia of India in not easy. It changes slowly. It changes by every small push of people like Rajiv Gandhi. May be our final fate is getting crushed under the wheel. may be many runs away. May be many people try to change by pushing from far. But we all are trying. Trying to potray people abroad as a waste is meaningless.

You asked us to ask ourself as for why we do better here. One simple answer is, we profesionals have lot more chance here then there. Getting a similar job is more difficult in India as there is lot more compition. No, the system there in India is not rotten. It is very true when you say that the Indians want to be accepted, so they themselves put in great effort,they accept the rules, they toe the line. Because they know they have to. But more to it, because there is a chance. This doesnot exist in India. I am not blaming you or people in India for this situation. I share with you the responsibility in this. And we are sincerely trying. But may be we are not fully succesful here.

True that some of us, whatever be their position, will behave like feudal lords in India. But sometime, you feel as if we do like this. Actually it is quite different. Like take for eaxmple the banking industry. In Abraod service is considered part of the deal. The Customers are treated well. But In India, because there is no insentive, they don't treat you well because the system in India is like that. Since we had got used to a better system, we often have problem getting used to the situation in India. As more and more compitition creeps in Indian banking system, you will see this happening in India too. No one should take the customers as for granted.

I didnot exactly understand what you meant when you said:

What brings about the difference? Can a system really change people?
Western arrogance is so ingrained that an Indian at the wine counter at a supermarket in London, when asked to show a particular brand of brandy, promptly replied, "Oh,that's too expensive."

We work hard to earn money, to achieve success. Many of us spend, but most Indians don't spend lavishly.

You said "Indians do not respect themselves and, therefore, each other."
I put the question back on you. Do you respect yourself? Do you respect the taxi driver when to take a taxi in India? Do you respect your fellow Indian?
True that there are some, though, who take pains to show that, once these top-shot(not all of us top shot kids) kids come back from the US, they have a conducive atmosphere to work in. The selling bait is always consumerism - there are so many bikes and so many washing machines being sold. Indeed we are himan beings and material benifit is a big factor that we have to over come to come back home. Upon return we can add and modify it all. But to expect that everyone who will come back will bring back wealth of change to India is unfair expectation. No change can occur over night. We are not god that can give everything a kick-start. But surely often good results come because of the exposure that we get from abroad.

Let us guess what happens? You said that these little gods, are you refer to us, have become so used to toeing the line (the so-called openness allows you to ask questions, aw yeah, but very subtly provides its own answers) that what we are doing is not questioning Western superiority but deriding Eastern inferiority. This is however not true. Please remember that, it is we who are in foregn land, not they. Hence when we face a different type of feeling that is quite unknown to us, when we are asked questions as to why in India things are such, often we and many of us, are not able ro answer. This is because India never taught us how to answer.

No country teaches. Often Japanese going to USA also have similar problems. But as we gather experience, we start realizing the positives and negetive of India. In Soc.culture.india, you will find large number of readers, quite proud of India.

I will give you an example. People often ask how people in India can marry with knowing each other for some time? How can there exist 90% arranged marriage? I often defend that Arranged marriage is often more succesful the western marriage because there is more chance of carefully examining the match. We off course accept the mistakes of India. Like we accept that killing of kashmiri muslims in Kashmir is not good, it is better to try to solve the problem. That doesnot mean we don't wait to point out the mistakes of the other sode. May be American system is geared displaying its wares in eye-catching colours to hide the vacuum it thrives on. May be many Indian quietly stands in the queue to buy it, but don't under-estimate us as fools or blind. We have our eyes and are seletive. may be we are not right always.

A reader of Rediff From Japan
If possible, publish this email

From: Johann D. Mulla-Feroze <mullafer@sas.upenn.edu>
Date sent: Tue, Sat, 09 Jan 1993 00:13:54 -0500

Response to "Big Apple Gone Rotten

Dear Sir,

I am writing in response to the article "Big Apple Gone Rotten" by Farzana Versey in your Jan 7, 1997 issue.

In her second paragraph, Ms Versey states "My education in Bombay ... came close to leaving me illiterate ... " Sadly, she is absolutely right, and the results show clearly in her writing. This article lacks purpose, and the few recognizable points are scattered haphazardly throughout the text. The concept of transitions between paragraphs seems alien to the author, and the connections between sentences within a paragraph are tenuous at best.

The closest thing that approaches a topic sentence in this essay comes at the end. This would not have been a bad idea had the author built up to her point so that the topic of this essay would have been obvious. However, her thesis statement "Does a foreign education really equip you to deal with life?..." comes as a surprise. She mentions education briefly at the start of her essay, and then says nothing about it until the very end. I, for one, see no connection between the bulk of her essay and what I assume is its central point, ie. the value of a foreign education. I am curious where taxi drivers and waiters fit into a discussion of the value of education, except to underscore the strong correlation between education and success. A few other things that seemed completely irrelevant are:
1. the discussion of a wine counter in a London supermarket,
2. Indians respecting themselves and others,
3. paragraph talking about the "paraphenalia of psychological dependence".
There are others, but I'm sure that I'm going to leave that for you to pick out.

I was very disappointed to find an article like this as part of your publication. It shows a complete lack of editorial direction over the features that you publish, and such articles can really hurt the credibility of your publication. Maybe you should stick to publishing news stories where the facts govern the content until you find writers who not only have opinions but are also able to express them clearly.

Sincerely,

Johann Mulla-Feroze

From: Vijayanth Devadhar (TECH) <vdevadha@krinfo.com>
Date sent: Wed, 08 Jan 1997 18:08:03 -0800

Re; Big Apple gone rotten

Hi,

This is in response to Ms. Versey's article titled "Big Apple gone rotten", about American Education experience.

Views expressed by her seem to be driven by bias rather than reality. Eventhough, there might be cases befitting the characterstics described by her, it is highly unfair for categorizing entire group as that.

Thanks,

Have a Nice Day !

-Vijay

From: Subrato Sensharma <SSENSHARMA@IMF.ORG>
Date sent: Wed, 08 Jan 1997 11:33:13 -0500

Left Or Right - the quintessential dilemma of Indian Left

An old bengali proverb says that you cannot afford to keep the 'sari' ( the one piece womenswear) over your head while you are into dancing.

The left in India is precisely trying to do that! It now evokes loud laughter in everybody's mind when the Left wants to maintain distance from the "bourgeoisie parties". After having tasted the blood ( if not the flesh also!) in two central government terms, the Left is all the more eager to shed all it's clothes and participate in the group dance rituals, but wants to keep the sari over the head also! It is only a matter of time.

Late Mr. Dange was the most practical in his analysis about the ideological future of leftism. Next was the CPI. Now it is the turn of CPI-M. One hopes that this 'comedy' will continue to entertain all of us.

Subrato Sensharma Previous Mail