Sunday 12 November 2017

Fatamata

I was in class 8, studying in Delhi in the 1980s. An African girl had joined our school, because the school principal, a remarkable lady, was engaging with Africa closely, and with the anti apartheid struggle.

Fatamata, called Fatty otherwise, was so named because she was born on a Monday, Fatamata in Swaahili. She became my friend, also because no one else really became friends with her I think, and I made her mine. Also I liked her and she was a gentle soul with an endearing accent.

The racism inbuilt in the children was obvious. One day a boy - I still remember his name after a generation's timeframe ! - Rakesh jeered at her, 'Arre Kaali' ('Hey, you black thing'). I was furious, and despite the inhibitions of adolescence, I yelled at him loud and long. Not one other voice from the class was raised in her support. That day i hated the crowd I was in, and also realised that my path could be a seperate one. And that I would choose that friendlessness to being part of a mindless crowd.


 
  • Mark Johnston
    My point of realisation was around age eight when we moved from town back to the country side and joined a village school. I talked with everyone as my family had taught me. When I was instructed by classmates not to speak to some of the children because they were 'Tinks' (Gypsy Travellers). I could not grasp that as a sensible reason and was 'sent to Coventry' by most of the class. I continued to talk to the children who were looked down upon by the majority and eventually the others talked to me again.
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    • Aparna Krishnan
      all these are coming-of-age experiences, and which mould us into our adult choices. Ome way or the other.
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    • Mark Johnston
      A prejudice is always but one aspect of a person or of a community. Perhaps the difficult bit is to be able to quietly challenge the prejudice whilst refusing to despise or dismiss its apparent perpetrator. We can surely only do that if we work towards honestly recognising and challenging our own multiple and far reaching prejudices too.
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    • Aparna Krishnan
      true. as gandhi also said !
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  • Anjali Nair
    I can relate with this.... The only 'madrasi' girl in the class, I was often called 'kali' specifically by a group of Hindi speaking North Indians.... That was way back in the 80s.. unfortunately time and education has changed nothing!
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    • Aparna Krishnan
      I was also the only 'madrasi', and used to be told condescendingly, 'aap madraasi log tho bahut intaaaligant hothe hain', basically meaning that one was only fit for studying, and also neither looked good, nor dressed well nor ... !! came to the south with a sense of relief !!
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  • Narayanan Hariharan
    Can understand how that anger is still simmering............In the land of the coloured people., esp in Kenya and Uganda , our trading community ( who are invariable from the north western India ) are getting killed for racism and slowly but steadily outward racism is curbed...........
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    • Afsan Chowdhury
      I have worked in Africa - Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda,, Ethiopia, Zambia, etc- and the attitude of the Indians are terrible. A very rich Indian bank owner once told me, " How can you mix with these animals ?". .Blacks hate Browns more than even the Whites. The word Gujarati is an abuse in Kenya. When being abused, a Bengali lady was very shocked and said, " How dare you call me a Gujarati" It was both funny and sad.
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    • Narayanan Hariharan
      And one can count the very few inter black - brown marriages...............after more than 3 centuries of " commercial rule "...........out of marriage sex and children are common but not official marriage...........what a pity
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  • Afsan Chowdhury
    When we were in Karachi in 1964, I would get regularly beaten up in school by kids and abused as "machlee khor" ( fish eaters) . I didn't understand why it was an abuse till I did research on social history. The Rajputs from whom the Mughals learnt about India considered Bengalis as low caste fish eaters. Rajputs upper class were vegetarians. So it traveled to the Mughal mind and ultimately to the Pakistani mind. Its a journey of racism. We all carry racism genes -subjective- but we need objective conditions - family , education, society- to trigger them. I ma grateful to my family to have never heard any racist expression.
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  • Pattu Raj
    When you stand up for someone and speak against the injustice, all the others simply turn the other way.. This is another of our national triat. The person stands up alone..
The blog post is a trivial incident dating back to middle school. And yet it matters.

When I think of our own daughter, among her many experiances, one very small event dating back to when she was four or five years stays important to me.

She had gone to the mango garden with her other friends. This was Naren and Umas garden. Naren and Uma are close friends, practically family, and we moved to this village because of them. There in the field there was a wood apple tree and the children collected many falled wood apples. Then Narens cousin, a Naidu farmer, accosted them. He barked at her friends and asked them for the fruits. This was caste belligerance of a Naidu against the SCs, and his feeling that it was his cousins farm. My daughter told him off, saying they had come together and it was her Naren Thathas farm. That he cannot shout at her friends. Maybe the children all understood the caste dynamics, and the other children stayed silent. He raised his hand in annoyance, but she refused to return the wood apples, and the children then came running back to the village with the spoils.

The mothers of the children were very pleased with the story, and patted our daughter on her back. She in turn was also pleased.

A very small story of very long ago, which she herself might have forgotten now. But it is of such small steps where we stand on our convictions that our strength builds.

These are what matter, small day to day events that test us, challenge us, and build us or weaken us. This is what we need to engage with with all children.

Awards, ranks, medals, marks. the college the child gets into ... these are far smaller matters than character.

But over years, along the path, the finest and deepest friendships based on similar values and beliefs have happened. Maybe few in number, but wonderous ones.

I wish I could teach all children that to go with one's heart, even at the cost of risking being alone, is worthwhile in many many ways.Teenage is the time when fundamental choices of life are made in many implicit ways.



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There was this very well taken video on FB showing how badly Africans are treated in India. I was telling Dr. Girija and Mukundan about it. Their observation was that this may not be so in villages. And then I realised they were right.
Yes, a village would treat any and every guest with respect and cordiality. And that is India - the India I have learnt to love and respect. Where 'athithi devo bhava' is valid still. Where civility and consideration is a way of life.
You, Komakkambedu Himakiran, Veena Maruthoor and 11 others
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  • Gangadharan Kumar
    IMO - the issue of "color" is very deep rooted in the minds of people (including villagers). While the Africans may not be ill-treated, the reaction to a "white" skinned person could be extremely different (on the positive side). That has been my experience at least.
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  • Zulfi Haider
    wow sorry to say you really live in some other planet!
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  • Aparna Krishnan
    Zulfi Haider, you have come to our village for some one day some 10 years ago. I have lived there for over 15 years. Long enough for all delusions to die, and also for many dearly held theories to also be buried.
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  • Aparna Krishnan
    Gangadharan Kumar, certianly issues of color are deep seated in villages as elsewhere. I am referring here to a deep seated civility and culturedness. Where the two retarded children (though certianly 'different', and from who's drooling I shy away, though I am ashamed to admit it) are allowed to walk in and out of homes. Where my 'sworn enemy' has always invited me into her home when I pass by and given me something to eat if there was, overlooking our wars over field boundries, and crossing over of cattle, becuase to invite a person home is the way. If an Africal were to come to the village, I stand by my position that courtsey will be extended to him or her in full. And she will not be hooted and mocked at - I would stake my life on that.

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