This is a topic thats very close to my heart; in fact, I have had heated arguments on this with almost anyone who has interacted with me for a sufficient duration of time. And yet, this debate never ends; so why is it so?
To understand that, let us first ponder for a while at our (meaning the so-called desi grad students in US) kind of unique identity. OK, officially we are branded as NRAs, standing for non-resident aliens. No, we haven't suddenly jumped at this richest country of the world in a high-tech spaceship from beyond the realms of the Milky Way galaxy; we have merely boarded a flight that has carried us halfway round the globe to this promised land of trillion opprtunities. But we still qualify as "aliens" for all official puposes.
Leaving aside our labeled status, what sets us apart from any other immigrant lawfully or unlawfully, permanently or temporarily residing in this country is the fact that we come from India. Yes, India, in my opinion is probably the most enigmatic and fascinating nation in this world. We have bit of everything - forget about the geographical, cultural and religious diversity - just look at the socio-economic picture. I doubt if anywhere else in the world we'll find some of the richest guys in the planet sharing the same road with the poorest of the poor. Some of the most flourishing Fortune 500 companies vie for space with the most humble of paan shops in the same street. The latest L'OReal product competes for advertisement time with the most indigenous of herbal neem toothpastes. Harvard, and London School of Economics bred graduates share the same dais with folks who have never crossed the barrier of primary school, only to come up with more novel schemes to plunge the country into deeper chaos. This list can go on and on and on...in short, we come from a nation of humongous potential but very little track record to boast where literally anything under the sun is possible. You can get away with drunken driving by paying as little as 10 bucks (a quarter dollar) but you can go to jail for bringing a lost child to the police station on grounds of suspicion!!
And yet, everything is far from bleak...in fact, it is not a myth that Indian economy is booming; it is a fact that every year we produce not few thousands but hundreds of thousands of some of the most skilled workforce in the whole world. Whether we lose them to brain drain is another issue altogether, but the fact remains that our much-criticised education system manages to churn out so many of them with unfailing regularity. In spite of all the hue and cry regarding red tapism and what not, every damn MNC is dying to capture a part of the Indian consumer market. Every damn company is outsourcing IT and manufacturing operations to our shores. Every damn country is trying to woo Indian businessmen, entrepreneurs, engineers and scientists either to migrate or to collaborate in some form of the other. Every damn government is trying to win India's active or passive support on most issues. Isn't this an enigma? Isn't it one of the biggest mysteries of our age that with all its myriad problems ranging from a burgeoning population to poor infrastructure, India still occupies a pivotal place in the global order.
Anyway the point I have been trying to make is that coming from such a unique land, we are a unique set of people. This unique upbringing of ours influences us in such a way that we forever remain caught up in an intricate maze of confused desires and expectations. Now, of course, there are exceptions; people who really hate staying in US (have come here allured by the general craze and regret their decisions genuinely) and people who blindly love anything about US and probably hate anything that is remotely Indian. If we do not consider the exceptions, most of us are hanging in between. Quite literally, we are in a state of perennial dilemna; what to do next? Should we apply for HI-B, should we apply for Green card, should we raise our kids here, should we sacrifice wealth and seek solace in being close to family and more homely surroundings and so on. Thats not all; being the kind of dissatisfied and inquisitive lot we naturally are, we always contemplate a bit too much (as I'm doing right now). Is our society better than ours, is it proper to adopt this and that from their culture (example public kissing), is material prosperity more important than mental peace and so on. We hardly, if ever, find satisfactory answers. And yet, we trudge along in this journey called life, most often leaving it to Providence to charter the courses of our lives.
This is where, I believe non-conformism has a role to play. And this is where most people tend to get me wrong. I hope this blog will dispel most of their doubts. I strongly believe that nothing, absolutely nothing is and can be perfect in this world. Whether be it any human being or any society or any nation, the notion of perfection is utopian. It is always great to strive to attain perfection (and that is precisely what both science and philosophy aim to do), but still imperfections are bound to remain. This is the law of nature. Everything else that we study as laws of nature (e.g. Newton's laws) are strictly valid in a perfect world. But there is no perfect world. So everything needs to be modified accordingly to accomodate for such imperfections, irrespective of whether this imperfection is miniscule or huge, it exists and will exist in everything. In other words, it is meaningless to look for an ideal society/nation/environment. We can only optimize our settings based on our preferences and be happy and contented with whatever we have got.
So the next question obviously is: OK all this is fine. How does non-conformism fit into the picture? It just means that you learn to live with the truth. Whatever is good is good; whatever is bad is bad; it can't be good just because one particular nation or society practises it doesn't make it good. Similarly, if a particular society denounces something good as bad, it doesn't become bad; it remains good. Now I know many people will immediately jump at me and say who then can decide what is good and what is bad? Isn't good and bad meant to be relative? Frankly speaking, I don't have a satisfactory answer to these questions myself. All I want to say is that, of course, there are many grey issues in this world. But we all know some things are inherently good and some things are inherently. For example, I don't think anyone in the whole world will contradict me if I say that drunken driving is bad whereas helping a person is distress is good. So if we restrict ourselves to such clear-cut cases (which I believe constitute the majority), non-conformism helps us in dealing with our unique dilemna and be happy in life. We have to accept this mentally that everything about US can't and isn't good; neither is everything bad. Same holds true for our motherland. We should distinguish between the good and the bad, make choices and stick to them. We simply can't conform to whatever everyone else (or majority) is doing; we need to have the conviction and strength of mind to take well-informed independent decisions. We shouldn't feel shy to admit that roads in India are mostly in a terrible shape; at the same time we should never shy from proclaiming proudly that our public transport system is far better than America's. If we can do that, I think most of our vacillations will vanish and we can retain our unique identities even after settling in US; or for that matter we can utilize the work ethic that we have imbibed in US productively after returning to India.
Hope this stirs up lots of thought-provoking and enlightening discussions.
To understand that, let us first ponder for a while at our (meaning the so-called desi grad students in US) kind of unique identity. OK, officially we are branded as NRAs, standing for non-resident aliens. No, we haven't suddenly jumped at this richest country of the world in a high-tech spaceship from beyond the realms of the Milky Way galaxy; we have merely boarded a flight that has carried us halfway round the globe to this promised land of trillion opprtunities. But we still qualify as "aliens" for all official puposes.
Leaving aside our labeled status, what sets us apart from any other immigrant lawfully or unlawfully, permanently or temporarily residing in this country is the fact that we come from India. Yes, India, in my opinion is probably the most enigmatic and fascinating nation in this world. We have bit of everything - forget about the geographical, cultural and religious diversity - just look at the socio-economic picture. I doubt if anywhere else in the world we'll find some of the richest guys in the planet sharing the same road with the poorest of the poor. Some of the most flourishing Fortune 500 companies vie for space with the most humble of paan shops in the same street. The latest L'OReal product competes for advertisement time with the most indigenous of herbal neem toothpastes. Harvard, and London School of Economics bred graduates share the same dais with folks who have never crossed the barrier of primary school, only to come up with more novel schemes to plunge the country into deeper chaos. This list can go on and on and on...in short, we come from a nation of humongous potential but very little track record to boast where literally anything under the sun is possible. You can get away with drunken driving by paying as little as 10 bucks (a quarter dollar) but you can go to jail for bringing a lost child to the police station on grounds of suspicion!!
And yet, everything is far from bleak...in fact, it is not a myth that Indian economy is booming; it is a fact that every year we produce not few thousands but hundreds of thousands of some of the most skilled workforce in the whole world. Whether we lose them to brain drain is another issue altogether, but the fact remains that our much-criticised education system manages to churn out so many of them with unfailing regularity. In spite of all the hue and cry regarding red tapism and what not, every damn MNC is dying to capture a part of the Indian consumer market. Every damn company is outsourcing IT and manufacturing operations to our shores. Every damn country is trying to woo Indian businessmen, entrepreneurs, engineers and scientists either to migrate or to collaborate in some form of the other. Every damn government is trying to win India's active or passive support on most issues. Isn't this an enigma? Isn't it one of the biggest mysteries of our age that with all its myriad problems ranging from a burgeoning population to poor infrastructure, India still occupies a pivotal place in the global order.
Anyway the point I have been trying to make is that coming from such a unique land, we are a unique set of people. This unique upbringing of ours influences us in such a way that we forever remain caught up in an intricate maze of confused desires and expectations. Now, of course, there are exceptions; people who really hate staying in US (have come here allured by the general craze and regret their decisions genuinely) and people who blindly love anything about US and probably hate anything that is remotely Indian. If we do not consider the exceptions, most of us are hanging in between. Quite literally, we are in a state of perennial dilemna; what to do next? Should we apply for HI-B, should we apply for Green card, should we raise our kids here, should we sacrifice wealth and seek solace in being close to family and more homely surroundings and so on. Thats not all; being the kind of dissatisfied and inquisitive lot we naturally are, we always contemplate a bit too much (as I'm doing right now). Is our society better than ours, is it proper to adopt this and that from their culture (example public kissing), is material prosperity more important than mental peace and so on. We hardly, if ever, find satisfactory answers. And yet, we trudge along in this journey called life, most often leaving it to Providence to charter the courses of our lives.
This is where, I believe non-conformism has a role to play. And this is where most people tend to get me wrong. I hope this blog will dispel most of their doubts. I strongly believe that nothing, absolutely nothing is and can be perfect in this world. Whether be it any human being or any society or any nation, the notion of perfection is utopian. It is always great to strive to attain perfection (and that is precisely what both science and philosophy aim to do), but still imperfections are bound to remain. This is the law of nature. Everything else that we study as laws of nature (e.g. Newton's laws) are strictly valid in a perfect world. But there is no perfect world. So everything needs to be modified accordingly to accomodate for such imperfections, irrespective of whether this imperfection is miniscule or huge, it exists and will exist in everything. In other words, it is meaningless to look for an ideal society/nation/environment. We can only optimize our settings based on our preferences and be happy and contented with whatever we have got.
So the next question obviously is: OK all this is fine. How does non-conformism fit into the picture? It just means that you learn to live with the truth. Whatever is good is good; whatever is bad is bad; it can't be good just because one particular nation or society practises it doesn't make it good. Similarly, if a particular society denounces something good as bad, it doesn't become bad; it remains good. Now I know many people will immediately jump at me and say who then can decide what is good and what is bad? Isn't good and bad meant to be relative? Frankly speaking, I don't have a satisfactory answer to these questions myself. All I want to say is that, of course, there are many grey issues in this world. But we all know some things are inherently good and some things are inherently. For example, I don't think anyone in the whole world will contradict me if I say that drunken driving is bad whereas helping a person is distress is good. So if we restrict ourselves to such clear-cut cases (which I believe constitute the majority), non-conformism helps us in dealing with our unique dilemna and be happy in life. We have to accept this mentally that everything about US can't and isn't good; neither is everything bad. Same holds true for our motherland. We should distinguish between the good and the bad, make choices and stick to them. We simply can't conform to whatever everyone else (or majority) is doing; we need to have the conviction and strength of mind to take well-informed independent decisions. We shouldn't feel shy to admit that roads in India are mostly in a terrible shape; at the same time we should never shy from proclaiming proudly that our public transport system is far better than America's. If we can do that, I think most of our vacillations will vanish and we can retain our unique identities even after settling in US; or for that matter we can utilize the work ethic that we have imbibed in US productively after returning to India.
Hope this stirs up lots of thought-provoking and enlightening discussions.
