Best of both worlds?

As first generation immigrants, we stand at the crossroads between two distinct civilizations with the awareness of the strengths and weaknesses of both. Historically, people's traditions, values and choices have inevitably been limited by the geographical accident of their birth. However, leaving the land of your birth and starting your adult life in a different nation puts us in the somewhat unique position of being able to cherry pick cultural and societal norms from both our native and adopted country- keep what we like, reject what we don't. We can do so because we are situated in a rather rare niche, where since we don't completely belong to either cultural group, we can consciously decide which values and lifestyle choices from each best fit and empower our lives.
For instance, Asians generally have a philosophy of living within their means and not borrowing on credit what they cannot forsee paying back easily. This contrasts greatly with the American lifestyle of lavish spending, and saving as an afterthought. Obviously, staying true to their traditions has real and tangible benefits for Asian immigrants. On the other hand, the American culture of entrepeneurship, of rewarding thinking outside the box, is the one value that has led to their enormous progress as individuals and as a society over the last century. Growing up in a conformist and collectivist society, learning this contrasting modus operandi can contibute greatly to realizing our own potentials.
There are innumerable examples of what we keep, what we let go of, and what we learn from scratch as we become residents in a new land. But what's really exciting is recognizing that we have the choice to do so!

Second chances

I was thinking about how Indians as a cultural group are so rigid about giving individuals in society second chances. From a student failing in his or her chosen subject who finds it hard, if not near impossible, to switch fields midway though their education to a divorcee who carries the stigma of a failed marriage as a black mark on their character the rest of their life, the system is geared to be inflexible about personal failures and extentuating circumstances. Like the rest of India, this mind set seems to be changing.
The movie Laaga Chunari Mein Daag I saw recently seemed to me to be a modern day interpretation of the old classic Umraao Jaan, more representative of what I hope the future of India would look like than the boring remake of the tired old sob story released last year. The ending was especially satisfying in that a woman driven to desperate measures could find a man who man enough to recognize who she was on the inside. Sort of an Indian Pretty Woman ending with much more family melodrama thrown in. The only thing that I thought they did wrong was to potray the protagonist as this martyr who just keeps sacrificing herself. Indian women need role models not just for the men in their lives to change but also for themselves to challange the hypocrisy that devalues them.
There have been other movies such as Astitva and Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna, which addressed the previously taboo topic of adultery and divorce. It seems like at least there is a small section of Bollywood that wants to show that modern life is not black and white as fantasy creations like Hum Aapke Hain Kaun would like us to believe. Real people are faced with complicated situations in real life. They often stumble and falter, make poor choices, and give in temprarily to the dark side which is present in each of us. Why do we as a society deem it ok to sit and pass judgement on those who fail in any of the various social roles they are expected to play? So much so that the suicide rate for women under 30 in India continues to spike. There is something unrealistic about the social pressures exerted that would rather see a life end than face the shame associated with an indiscretion.
I am not implying that the western values of excessive individualism and lack of willingness to compromise in relationships are what we should aspire to. It is just that there has to be a happy medium between turning people who make mistakes into outcasts and a divorce rate of 60% being the norm! As children, we are constantly geared towards this one-shot mentality, where if you don't get it all together at the right time, you are doomed forever. Life is full of second chances-of unexpected opportunities that lead you to explore paths that you did not even imagine, to reinvent yourself, to rewrite your legacy, to reclaim your share of happiness despite all the tragedies. Reminding younger people of this bigger perspective is something not quite emphasized in the Indian parenting style currently.

What is real?

Sometimes I wonder if I may be sleepwalking through life. What if all I have, all I believe in is just a illusion, just an extended rationalization I have led myself to believe so that I can make sense of things? Or worse a result of early but strong beliefs formed in the setting of societal pressures? If all I know so far may possibly be just a creation of my own mind or of others' expectations of me, then what is real?

How I lead my life, what dreams I have, what importance I give to the relationships in it, what rules I adhere by and what the purpose of it all is- what if my understanding of it all is just wrong? What if I was supposed to have different goals, a different perspective, what if I am actually running away from the path I was supposed to take to realize my destiny? What is reality and how does one go about finding it? These are not questions that 20 years of conventional education can help me answer. So I continue to seek.

Completion

A wish, a dream
long in the making
so many hours unslept
so many spent waking.

Anxieties and doubts
trials and tribulations
work and then some more work
have now ended in congratulations.

Stating the next leg
in the journey of life
success tastes sweet
after much strife.

Blessings and support
I have had along the way
to so many I am thankful
who helped me get to this day.

Belated Angst

It doesn’t make sense
the chaos, the confusion
the criss-cross lines
the zig-zag puzzle
the irregular pieces
that don’t fit together
the jagged edges
the ragged corners.
It all falls down, falls apart
Is that when it really starts?
Will I wait my whole life
for that one epiphany?
And will it come only when
the ashes mix with water?
Will the secret be whispered
to my soul then?

The gnawing,
unseen, unrecognized
Inside.
They say “smell the roses,”
and I try.
Maybe it’s the cowardliness
to pause and look
really look and see.
After all, it’s numbingly hazy
when it just rushes by.
The speed of the ride offers
a strange kind of solace.
And then what when I hit a speed bump
and be thrown towards the sky?
Will I fall flat on my face?
Or will I surrender to the air
And learn to finally
fly free?

-Neha, 2002

The Female Psyche

Women, unlike men, are able to understand the subtelties of other women's minds. Or so I thought. It turns out, in fact, that men may have better understanding of a certain aspect of feminity than women do. Recently, I spent the good part of an hour arguing with a close male high school friend and my husband, both of whom were of the position that women in general, even those who may be good friends or close relatives, are naturally envious of each other, and try to put each other down, directy or subtly, to compensate. They contrasted this to male friendships where apparently men follow an honor code of not interfering in each other lives in a negative manner. As you can imagine, I was pretty incensed by this gross generalization, and proceeded to give various examples of how this was just a stereotype and not true of my own experiences with girlfriends and so on.

However, in the last few days, I have come to see the other side of the story, and of the reality behind the stereotype. I feel now that not only are most women affected by the envy gene, but also that they lack complete insight into this fact. Women, who are known to have vastly more sensitive emotional radars than men, seem unable to pinpoint the emotional impetus behind their own social behavior. They, more often than not, are unable to recognize the fundamental insecurities that drive them to make that snide comment behind a female friend or relative's back. Or the frustrations with the relationships in their lives that inadvertently put them in a competetive mode with one of their own kind. With all the talk of girl power and the solidarity that women express with each other nowadays, the old stereotype about female interactions should have worn thin by now. And yet, the very human emotions that gave rise to the stereotype continue to hold true, even if to a lesser extent than in previous generations.

Now anyone who knows me is aware of my strong feminist streak and my sincere belief in the capabilties of all women. So, instead of just accepting this contradiction in women as some inherently programmed behavior, like the men in my life did, I decided to try to explore how this pattern of behavior comes about. One theme that was quickly apparent was that the women who are consumed by envy to the exclusion of their better intentions tend to be the ones who feel the most unhappy and helpless in their marriages, role as mothers or life in general. Women often give more, and emotionally invest more in relationships than men do. So logically following, they expect more returns on this investment in terms of the importance they are given, and the happiness they deserve. When this expectation is not met, they have two choices, to stop and seek other options, or to stay and swallow their misery.

Now here, I speak of a certain class of women- the ones that I have the most familiarity with- the Indian women in my mother's and my own generation. However, I feel that with a difference of only degree, this analysis is equally applicable to other women in the U.S. and the worldover as well. What most women that I know have done, due to either the way they were brought up or societal pressures, is stay in relationships that are far short of the ideal that they seek. They have spent lifetimes with men they have nothing in common with, and in-laws who have done nothing but create trouble for them. And in the large majority of cases, they have made this compromise quietly.

Now here is the thing, the female psyche is anything but quiet. At any given moment, there is a whirlwind of emotions, thoughts and rationales going on in the female brain. When people joke about how women feel happy and sad and several grades in between at the same time, they forget that it is actually true. Women, unlike men, are verbal beings and seek expression of their innermost feelings- their joy and their pain. However, they may not always be in control of how and when this expression comes about. The longer the pain goes unexpressed, the more warped the final venting of it will be. Take for instance, a woman who is financially dependent on her husband whom she never loved. She becomes friends with a woman she admires, the one who is self-sufficient in her career and is supported by her spouse. One would wish the first woman we mentioned would be happy for and inspired by her friend. But as we all know, misery loves company. So the woman instead uses her knowledge of the quirks in her friend's relationship to subtly create misunderstandings . So when witnessing the inevitable fight, she can console herself by saying "ah, see, even her life is not perfect!"

Don't take me wrong, I believe that there are plenty of women who are sources of support and inspiration for other women in their lives. Just as there are men who play mind games and exhibit behavior that can only be classified as "catty." Yet, being subtly or overtly oppressed by someone of your own gender has far more irony and disappointment ascribed to it. Afterall, you expect to cry on your girlfriends' shoulders when the men in your life treat you wrong, and not the other way around. You also expect those who have undergone the same trials and tribulations that accompany womanhood to show more empathy towards each other.

So what is it that causes women, of the same age group or from different generations, to replace the obvious solidarity between them with venomous insecurity and envious backstabbing? Again, I find myself pointing to the utter helplessness such women feel in their lives. Unable to find appropriate outlets for their frustrations, they vent by indulging in silly mind games. The long-term answer to this dilemma lies in raising a generation of women who are self-sufficient, not just economically but also emotionally. Women who have a myriad of options, and are not afraid to exercise them. Women who are not only raised to believe in themselves, but are also given every opportunity to fully realize their self-potential. My hope is that at least my generation will be able to raise daughters who can overcome these stereotypes. Until that happens, I wish women would lessen the self-loathing that they project on other women in their circle of influence. Afterall, what goes around comes around.

The Guest House by Rumi

This being human is a guest house
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

The Tango of Marriage

We took a class recently on the elegant Argentinian dance of tango. As I was being charmed by the suave instructor's smooth syncronization with his teaching and real life partner, I could not help thinking how this dance seemed rather like a metaphor for a marriage. When the two partners are in sync and attuned to each other, the result is a beautiful and graceful tango together. On the other hand, when the partners fail in their respective roles in the dance, they inevitably will end up stepping on each other's toes and looking rather foolish!
I especially liked one of the teaching techniques used by the instructor. We were all going to do the same four steps, but he asked the dancing partners to pick a sentence with their own unique cadence. The respective partners would then either interpret that sentence from the dance sequence their partner led them through, or vice-versa, dance the steps out in the exact cadence that their partner specified. Fo instance, "I want to dance Tango" can be said and danced "I waaaaaaaaaaant tooo daaaaaaaaance tango" or "I want to dance taaaaaaaango," or even "IIiiieee want to dance tango" where the pauses and the emphasis is executed in the steps representing each word! The key was hearing your partner's voice or watching his moves so that you were both on the same page. Married life is pretty much the same. Hearing, really hearing your partner's words or sometimes even their silence can make life a much enjoyable tango!

Love- a setup?

Hardly a controversial idea. Anyone in any sort of an intense love relationship, whether husband and wife, a mother and child or siblings who stay close, can attest to the strings attached to the much lauded joys of this mysterious emotion. How about the possesiveness, the over-amplified hurt radar, the dependency and the compensatory indifference, the overreaching interference, the smothering resentment of an individual identity, that can accompany this all-too-powerful state of connection with another being? When you can die for someone, it also usually means that you can make their life a living hell.
I quoted a verse on love before in this blog that is worth repeating because it represents the ideal love that we all seek, and more often than not fail to both give or recieve. Yet, we can aspire, because love with all its foibles, still seems the one ideal worth striving for-

"Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance."

Now that I am finally ready to work, what will my job look like?

Anyone entering or even thinking about the field of medicine knows that the training is long and rigrous, and finacially it will be an investment without any immediate returns well into your late 20's. Now as I get ready to graduate and enter the world as a working adult, I am beginning to ponder what will my job look like in the next 5 years or the next 20? The healthcare industry, for long an economically unsustainable and socially inequal field, now totters on the verge of collapse. The number of uninsured has mushroomed to 45 million while the insurance premiums double every few years for those who do manage to get employer-paid insurance. Health care reform and universal healthcare in some avatar or other seems inevitable. Add to that the slow pace of tort reform and the ever-inceasing malpractice insurance rates in this highly litigous society.
I anticipate practicing in a vastly different scenario than the one that existed for the generation of doctors before mine. Private practices are becoming an icon of the past, and patients are now thought of as "consumers" or "clients". The whole ethos of medicine seems to have chaged to bring medicine, a field traditionally ensconced in the halo of selfless service, more in alignment with the modern realities of business and individual choice. Doctors are hardly known for standing up for themselves until almost too late. We are usually so wrapped up in the cozy prestige of the profession that we assume society will take care of us. Maybe that's why while labor laws for most fields came into being early in the last century, the 80-hour workweek rule for medical residents was instituted only a few years ago. While insurance companies spent several decades finessing how to cheat doctors and patients out of resources to increase their profits, physician led organizations such as the AMA have only begun to fight for dramatic cuts in physician compensation in the last 5 years or so.
As government now focuses its sight on doing something about the flawed idea of employer /individual insurance that leaves many with little option but to use the emergency rooms as the one and only stop for healthcare, I wonder what does that mean for future practitioners of medicine? As the insurance billing nightmare grows bigger, many doctors are looking to less patient-oriented but more paying options to make a living. Discussions of entering into lucrative healthcare-related business ventures such as MRI/CT Imaging centers or getting special training to do mundane but well-compensated procedures are not uncommon among newly graduated physicians. It makes me sad that at the end of 7-10 years of medical training, their mindset is hardly different form that of a new MBA grad dreaming up business ventures. So is medicine then really just another form of business? What will the job that awaits me in the real world really look like 5-6 years from now? Will it fail to meet the basic expectations that I had of the field of medicine on entering it? Will I have to compromise the ideals of service and patient care so that I can make my ends meet? These are scary questions. I can only hope that the answers can be more favorable if sought collectively rather than for each physician as an individual.

The Prayer Beads

The Prayer Beads
By Neha Jain Sampath
for Rani Aunty

It was crowded in the CT scan room. Three generations in the cramped space, all with worried expressions mirroring each other. Her daughter and her mother were hurrying to undress her and take away all the valuables. Her liver was failing and they needed to find out if the cancer had spread to it. Nobody even paid attention to the dark saffron beads as they were unceremoniously stuffed into the duffel bag…

And then when she died, nobody could find them. The whole house was turned upside down, they had been her favorite beads, a precious momento. It was as if she had carried them away into the after-life with her. It was a small disappointment, one of several to come through the years when she would not be present at graduations, weddings, the birth of her grandchildren…

Her husband wanted to fulfill the one wish that he knew she had held in her heart even though she had never asked him for it. It was one of several cosmic secrets she had carried in her heart, for she had been special- one of those rare spirits that moved everyone she touched, who gave always without asking for anything in return, but inspiring generosity anyway. He visited her spiritual sanctuary, the small ashram in a beach town in India that had given her peace and strength through the years. She had always wanted to visit with him at her side but was willing to wait till the desire came from him. And now, time had run out. He went there with his children, hoping to find an absolution…

As they sat watching the sunset, he reached over to grab the camera from the bag that had accompanied him through several towns over the last week, like a faithful companion. And that’s when he found them. How could that be? He had looked, Sameera had looked, Ajay had looked, over and over, into that very same pocket of the very same bag. And yet there lying innocently, as if they had been there all along, were the beads that they had all somehow missed. Then, he laughed. It was her little message to him. She had come with them on this trip afterall.

Sufi verses

The Happy Virus- by Hafiz via Daniel Ladinsky

I caught the happy virus last night

When I was out singing beneath the stars.

It is remarkable contagious-

So kiss me!

Maneesha Jain's books recs

I am posting this for chachi:

Here is the list that I read in last four months ( *=my ratings):
Sidhartha by Hermann Hesse:***
Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee :*****
Notes from underground by Dostoyevsky:***
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho: *
The cry of peacocks by Rupal Jain:*****
Starting "MiddleSex by Jeffrey Eugenides" this week.
Everyone here is talking about "The Secret" by Rhonda Byrne. I think there is a CD or DVD that goes with it. It is not a fiction.

The Kite Runner

I can't believe I waited this long to read this much-acclaimed book that came out a couple of years ago, but I am glad I finally did. Though author Khalid Hosseini writes of his homeland Afghanistan, his colorful and rich characters have echoes of the open-hearted compassion, and neighborliness of the citizens of pre-independence India. Not surprising, given the close proximity and shared histories of the two regions. This novel had it all- loyalty, friendship, betrayal, redemption and the bittersweet quality of reality. The setting is that of pre-Russian occupation, pre-Taliban Afghanistan. The story is of the innocence and end of childhood, of the frailities and imperfections in the best of us, and of new beginnings and coming full circle. For a first novel, and by a physician at that, it is a truly inspiring treat!

Soulmate

The one connection
that opens my soul.
Pries open the door to my heart
shut so tight
to let some air in
so I can finally breathe
and exhale out my fears.

So alone in a room
full of people.
That one voice that knows me
that one familar face
that shoulder to cry on
and some wisdom to drown out
my occasional insanity.

That one friend
that one friend!
The other half of me
yang to my ying
who fills up my incompleteness
oh, that one being
who hears my silent tears.

Apacalypto- sneak peek into a sneaky movie!

Mel Gibson can't stay away from controversy it seems. The quote at the beginning of the movie about the "real reason" behind downfall of great civilizations should have put one on alert right away, but, Gibson actually manages to lull the viewer for a little while into believeing the film is no more than a brilliantly costumed and photographed jungle chase thriller. Once you get past the testicle-eating, organ ripping, dirty tribal joke grossness, the central plot of the movie actually is pretty decent and well-executed.
However, the great Mayan Civilization (as Mel would have us believe) consisted of mostly devilish blood-thirsty savages led by corrupt demagogues, whose highest point of existence seems to be in rejoicing in the mass human sacrifices of their neigboring forest natives. The potrayal of the Mayan city is so out there, and one-dimensional that one wonders whether Mel used Spanish conquistador accounts of "savage heathens" as reference for the depiction. The not-so-subtle mesage in the background of Gibson's adventure epic is that the Mayans were such a morally depraved civilization by the time the European colonialists got there, that the elimination of its culture and forceful conversion to christanity was the better way to go! Staunchly catholic Gibson manages to slip in a sneaky defense of the "white man's burden" rationale of the colonial empires!