Tag Archives: indian

Raksha Bandhan

Nationality: Indian
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/29/14
Primary Language: English

Text:

“Theres a festival every year for the bond between a sister and a brother. The sister will tie a knot on the brother’s wrist so that signifies their bond… its like a bracelet type thing. There’s a certain type of string for religious reasons but it’s really any kind of string. It’s gotten pretty elaborate now but that’s only to make it look good. The ones that I use are just a very simple red band. In our family, all our cousins do it, 9 cousins total. Eight of them are girls so I’ll have eight bracelets on my wrist, and I’ll give them each a gift. In our family, it’s money, so I will give them each $50. So it’s like they give me love and I give them money… It’s not always money but that’s how we do it in our family. The girls also give us sweets, it’s like a ritual to show the love between a brother and sister. So you keep the string on as long as possible and you’re supposed to let it fall off by itself. I’ve kept mine on for as long as a year. The knots are called Rakhi. It’s a certain time of the year, but I don’t remember what the date is. For the actual event, you have a chair and you have a fire that’s lit, and you put a dot on the brothers forehead, you tie the knot, and you feed them the sweet. The the next one comes… Oh, the sweets are just desserts, and there’s usually a variety of them.”

Background:

My informant loves the festival, because he likes anything that brings family together. But now there are more generations who don’t care as much. Whereas before, 50 or so people would show up, now only 40 or 30 people come because people are living in different places, and people don’t want to go. He still does it though, but it is hard to get everyone together all at once.

Context:

This a festival that is held annually, and each family with host their own. It sounds like each family will have different variations as to who attends the festival, what sweets they have, and what kind of gifts they give.

Personal Thoughts:

I think this festival really stresses the importance of family in Indian culture. However, it’s interesting that it is only about the bonds between siblings, and not the bonds between elders and offspring like most other Asian countries. An image of some sample Rakhis are shown below.

 

http://www.sify.com/news/musical-or-cartoon-rakhi-take-your-pick-this-raksha-bandhan-news-national-mh1okdeaaih.html

Guru Nanak Dav Ji: God’s Omnicience

Nationality: Indian
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/29/14
Primary Language: English

Text:

“The founder of my religion (Sikh) was a guru, Guru Nanak Dav Ji, there’s 10 gurus. It’s been told that he’s walked hundred of thousands of miles from India to Asia and the Middle East. He would happen upon people with different religious beliefs, and one day he ran into a bunch of moguls who were muslims. They were upset because when he was pointing his feet to the east. They believed that God was in the east, so it’s disrespectful to have their feet pointing that way… the some way it would be disrespectful to have your feet point towards a religious text. And the guru responded, ‘then point my feet towards a place where God isn’t present.'”

He was god is formless, shapeless, you can categorize him. It’s about the omniscient. God’s not in the East he’s all around you.

Background:

My informant heard this legend from his grandma. He likes this one and stories like this because it’s essentially not just a story, but theres a deeper meaning behind it. A lot of these stories illustrate the practicality of his religion, and he likes that his religion tries to be as practical as possible. There’s a trend about doing things you really need and not just doing things for the sake of doing things. This legend shows their main belief that there are many paths to God, and he is all around us.

Context:

This legend is commonly passed down through families, and taught in Sunday Schools for Sikhs.

Personal Thoughts:

I felt like this legend was a great story that shows the Sikh’s main belief that God is omniscient and that there are many paths to Him. It was very clear that the story meant a lot to my informant, and he found a lot of identity in his religion. I also think it’s interesting that this story is not written down in any religious text, but instead it’s purely passed down through word of mouth, which is very different from Christianity.

Akbar and Birbal: Kichri Story

Nationality: Indian
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/29/14
Primary Language: English

Text: 

“One day, Akbar challenged this dude to sit in a cold puddle all night, and he bet him he couldn’t do it. I don’t really know why, it’s just one of those dumb things that you bet with other people. The dude ended up completing the challenge, but Akbar wouldn’t give him the reward he promised him because he said that there was a lamp nearby that gave the guy heat. The guy said that the lamp was too far to give him any heat, and plus, it was out of his control, but Akbar refuses the excuses. The next day, his servant/advisor Birbal invited him to dinner. They sit and talk in the living room, and Akbar starts getting hungry and asks if the food is ready. Birbal assures him that it’ll be ready soon. Four hours pass and Akbar is getting really hungry, so he goes into the kitchen himself to see what’s going on. He find that Birbal placed the pot of Kichri (a type of lentil soup) on a very high cabinet, close to the ceiling, very far away from the stove. He gets angry and says, ‘Birbal! How do you expect this soup to cook?’ and Birbal replies, ‘the same way the lamp heated the guy you challenged.'”

Background:

My informant told me that Akbar was a real Muslim King, and Birbal was actually one of his wise servants who was Hindu. He said that Indians love Akbar because he was a progressive person, and didn’t kill Hindus even though the two groups don’t normally get along. Instead, he appointed a lot of Hindus to be a part of his cabinet, and even married a Hindu woman. He said that there are a lot of stories that revolve around these two characters and they are commonly told to kids. He thinks that the moral of this story is to be reasonable and fair.

Context:

These stories are normally told by parents to their kids.

Personal Thoughts:

It was very interesting because my informant didn’t remember the details of the story so he actually called his parents to ask them what the story was. I got to hear both his mom and dad retell him this story of Akbar and Birbal. I hear that there are a lot of Muslim/Hindu jokes that revolve around these two characters too, but they are never mean-spirited. I think this was a way for the two cultures to try to negotiate peace, and break the negative stigmas against the other culture by telling their kids these stories starting at a young age.

 

Chanda Mama

Nationality: Indian
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/29/14
Primary Language: Hindi (urdu)
Language: English

Original Text:

“Chanda Mama Door Ke

Puye Pakaye Bhur Ke

Aap Kaye Taali Mein

Mune Ko De Pyali Mein” (Hindi)

Direct Translation: 

Uncle moon from far away

Is making Puye (dessert) with sugar

You eat in a plate and

give the little child a little plate

Background:

This is a lullaby that the informant remembers hearing as a child. His dad mainly sung it to him, although his mom would sing it from time to time too. There was one night that his dad didn’t sing it to him and he couldn’t sleep. The informant said that it reminds him of his childhood now and going to bed.  When I asked if there was a deeper meaning to the lyrics, he said that it seemed pretty nonsensical, but he said that it’s significant that you let parents eat first out of respect.

Context:

The informant’s parents sung this lullaby to him when he was a child. He said it’s a pretty common song that parents would sing to their children in Indian culture.

Personal Thoughts:

When I first asked him what it meant, he said he didn’t know. But when I asked him to type out the lyrics, he started to realize what it meant because he speaks Hindi. I thought this was interesting because the song had simply started to represent a warm feeling of bedtime with parents, rather than what the lyrics actually were talking about.

 

Hovan

Nationality: Indian
Age: 21
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/29/14
Primary Language: English

Text:

“There’s a festival we do for new houses. Oh, that’s just… We go in, we set up a fire. The fire just signifies that the prayers we say get lifted up in the air…. yes we do a fire inside. It’s a box made of wood with a fire lit inside. There’s prayers that are said, I only remember one of them. [Click the link below to hear the prayer that he recited to us] There’s a priest that stands next to the fire, and the immediate family make a circle around him. Then everyone else is outside of the circle. The priest says the prayer then everyone else joins them. Each time you say a certain word, you would put a certain type of offering in the fire, like an almond. It’s like food for the gods. These offerings are provided either by the priests of by the immediate family. If provided by the immediate family, the priest has to make it holy.”

Prayer for Hovan

Background:

My informant had no idea what it means. He said it’s different from everyday Hindi, and he only knows conversational Hindi.

Context:

The ritual happens when someone buys a new house. This ritual happens in order to bless the house.

Personal Thoughts:

There is once again a strong theme of family in this ritual, and is very heavily religious. The fact that my informant knew the prayer, but not what it meant, signals that this was more of a tradition for him, than an active practice of faith. It is an interesting liminal period between homes.