My People...

I heard this phrase twice already from two people who created quite an impression in me, both of them Quebecois (yeah I know, what do you know?). One of them was starting off a shpleesh on people without roots and I immediately jumped and said, 'yeah like me': he was very surprised, he didn't mean it as quite a compliment apparently. I told him I had heard one can not have both roots and wings and how I thought I was a person with wings. He says, now every time he sees the word 'roots' he thinks of me.

Just like I gave him food for thought, he gave me food for thought too: he said 'I like to have wings, but I keep my roots too, I like to keep in touch with my past... they are my people...' So I have been thinking lately of my own people. For someone who traveled half the world away, I keep very strong connections to some people from my past, albeit a very very few. With the exception of one place, Ernst & Young, I have kept in touch with at least one person from every other place I went to school or worked with. Facebook has helped revive lost friendships, but to most of them of course, I don't feel too connected, but yes, in a global scope, I shared a time of my life with them so I am curious about their whereabouts etc and I am glad that they're there... out there as close as facebook can make you, which is not too close. May be someday I will find some people from E&Y too on facebook - I had a great time there with some witty people who I would like to get in touch with again... But there's always the thing, will they accept me for what I have become now?

Anyway, this picture is from the Sri Lankan New Year that I was invited to: a celebration in Connecticut.

I should mention at this point, we are nothing without our friends, specially the people who when you say you are having a stressful time, will say 'hey why don't you just come over, there's some party that might unwind you'... I am truly fortunate to have such friendships...

Ok coming back to the photo... So there were all these cool SL food that I haven't eaten for ages... Well this woman of the party host family had cooked everything, and I mean everything, that is authentic Sri Lankan... amazing... It was really very tasty...

There was a lot of typical SL banter, sometimes sharp, sometimes not very polite - but it is the norm in SL. Some of it, in fact most of the banter, I have never seen in the US; I see it somewhat in French Canada, but to a much much less degree. But that is how they are - they lay it all out in the open and people are not shy to express themselves verbally whether in a positive or negative way. I think this is sort of common to South Asians. I am not saying the South Asian way is better or the Western way is better. I think both ways are just as great with up/down sides in both. It is good to be expressive, but it's also good to learn to tame your thoughts and filter them before they leave you as words.

Then later in to the night, some people started singing a makeshift karaoke in the basement. There was a guy on a tabla with a mic and then the others all had those good ol' lyrics books of Sinhalese songs. 90% of the people couldn't hold a basic do-re-me pitch, oh but they sang songs with minor chords. And that again is how it is in SL... I can not imagine this happening in a Western society unless people were really drunk. I must mention, about 75% of the people singing had had no alcoholic beverage at all. No, I don't think there's a correlation between that number and the number of people who couldn't hold a tune!!

I don't have any SL friends here, nor did I have any in MN. So I had forgotten how 'my people' are. At this New Year party, I participated in all their very Sri Lankan activities but couldn't help but sometimes observe them with a certain sense of nostalgia. I don't miss Sri Lankan people, but their company reminds me of a time of my life I was very much like them, a past that I know I have overly romanticized; but a past I nevertheless can not and do not want to re-create.

I have grown apart and away from a lot of Sri Lankan ways of life. Those ways that in my mind I thought were inappropriate, not necessarily inappropriate in a global point of view.. I have tried to learn from Minnesotans and am now trying to learn from French Canadians. The result is a body who doesn't belong to any of these three places; a person who will never fit in to any of those 3 places. My French Canadian friends are quick to point out my American ways and I am taken by surprise - I never thought I had an ounce of that in me; but it's true I took some of Minnesotan with me. I look at 'my people' and I can map the origin of some of my ways. I think the way I laugh and immediately start joking with strangers is very South Asian, among many. It will be very interesting to see how much and what I will take from the French Canadians - I have a feeling it is going to be a lot; it is the group of people I have enjoyed the most thus far, that is to say the group of people I had the strongest love-hate relationship with...

I don't miss my people, but I am glad they were part of my life: they enriched my life in ways that no one else ever could... Just like Minnesotans did, just like all my international-student friends did, just like the French Canadians will do...