Can I Sit With You?

N. Chandani
Elementary School

Both of my parents came to the United States with the hope of prosperity. My mother and father, both doctors, met each other in New York and shortly after, got married. I have one brother who is four years older.

I still vividly remember the first years of grade school with horror. Growing up in India, my mom always had long thick black hair that was made into two braids like Pippi Longstocking. So in turn, she dressed me the same way for school in the United States. It was difficult enough to have a different name than everyone else, let alone I was the only girl in first grade to have long thick black hair and two braids attached to my head. Let’s just say Pocahontas was my newly established name. All of the other first grade girls had simple and pretty names like Sarah and Julie. They had short blonde hair with cute barrettes and ribbons. I pondered time after time why couldn’t my mother see this? Was she blind? At that moment I didn’t want to be Indian, I just wanted to be a normal first grader. Every day I would beg my mom profusely, to please, let me have one braid. I would have done anything: eat my vegetables, do my homework, anything to get rid of the dreaded two braids. But no. Every day she would put those two ugly braids in my hair and off to school I would go.

I had one trick up my sleeve. As soon as I got on the big yellow bus to go to school, I would wrap one braid around to the other shoulder to give an illusion of one braid. It was pathetic, yes, I know, but all I wanted was to fit in so desperately. I remember one time in particular when I had school pictures. My mom, as usual, made two braids in my hair and even got a little fancy with pink sparkly barrettes and a little rouge on my cheeks. This time when I got on the bus, I got the courage to take out the braids completely. Finally, for the first time, I felt like everyone else. I took my first grade pictures confidently with my hair free and flowing.

A couple of months later my mom received my school pictures. She didn’t say much but the look is one I will never forget. It was a look of hurt and disappointment. A look of pain that only a mother could have. At the time I did not realize what the big deal was. I thought my mother’s goal in life was to make me miserable. What was the big deal if my hair was in braids or just let loose?

I am twenty-one now and I believe just recently, I have understood why this meant so much to my mother. The braids were meaningless, but the symbolism of them was everything. You see in my mother’s eyes her little girl was denying her culture. Every time I asked her to take out my braids it made her feel as if I was embarrassed of her and where we come from. My mother knew that over time I would lose certain parts of my culture but I don’t believe she thought it would begin so early. Perhaps this is why she held on to the braids. She wanted me to have piece of who she was. She never asked me to put the braids in my hair again, and to be honest I was not about to ask her to.

Today, I still have a tough time looking at myself as the world truly sees me. When I look at myself, I see me as I see everyone else around me; sometimes I forget that I am not Caucasian. I am Indian. No matter what I do I can’t run from it or deny it. Not even freeing myself from Pippi Longstocking and Pocahontas can help me run away from who I am. I am, and will always be, the little girl with long black hair and two braids. I will always have the name no one can pronounce, the name that stands out. There will never be a time when I can be the girl with blonde hair and blue eyes. I won’t have the family who drinks milk with their dinner and - I am happy for that. Even if I don’t look, act, or sound like everyone else, that’s okay. There comes a point in each person’s life when they can either use their differences as an advantage or be inhibited by those differences.

Never let adversity define your life.