You pronounce poorly, I denounce amply .

Hi, I am Mike Patrick. " Mike Patrick" is what most non-Indians(read caucasians) here in the United States choose to equate to while encountering my name, much to my chagrin. Not that I am a narcist when it comes to my name but it's just that I don't like to be called differently. Considering the fact that many Indian city names are still being restored to pre-British de factos, my impediment is by far inconsequential. Chinese parents bless their newborns with a Chinese as well as an English name. But Indian parents have maintained a sense of dignity by not giving us an English alias. The sane among us, have thus established a singular identity with ourselves as well as others through our names and we would definitely not like to be called with a funky Anglicized variation of this inveterate insignia of sorts. But Americans who are educated in English, and with its scant alphabet compared to Indian languages find it all the more up-hill to pronounce our "often-confusing-to-westerners" Indian syllables with that sonorous desi accent. I argue that when we can pronounce American names, with alacrity, they should at least make a 'no-apathy' effort to pronounce ours.

It so happened that I was at an employer's showcase at my university and was wearing a sticker/badge on my shirt as Patnaik, M. While visiting one of the stalls and talking to one of the recruiters, I observed him struggle his tongue with my name. Getting nowhere close he finally said "Mind if I call you Patrick?" With the thought that this gentleman could possibly shape my future, I decided not to confront him and uttered a silent and subdued "No, I won't. You can call me so." In another incident much later at my workplace there was this technician from another company for whom i was the point of contact. He tried hard to pronounce even my first name and simply said "Could I call you Mike?" Dan probably came up with Mike as most others do because it stands for M in the NATO Phonetic Alphabet that we mostly use while spelling our names on telephone.(V as in Victor,O as in Oscar etc). He was a "super-cool" guy and so without any thought to propriety I told him with a grin, "Dan, look, I am not asking you to pronounce ApuNahasapeemapetilon from The Simpsons TV show. My name is just three simple syllables- Ma-No-J. My parents have given me a very simple and easy name and there is no need to make it simpler". I recalled Einstein, "Make everything as simple as possible but not simpler" He then made a conscious effort and with just two brief tries got my name right (Do'h!...His first try sounded Mango). Truly my first name is very easy to pronounce otherwise the esoteric Hollywood director Manoj Night Shyamalan would have changed his name to just Mike and not his middle name Nelliattu alone. Hence I strongly believe these Americans start to get jittery just by encountering a name that is not in their mostly-Biblical-names-database and do not try earnestly to get it right. Interestingly only the Americans have this "officially-correct" habit of abridging or clipping longer names. So Robert becomes Bob, Bartholomew condenses to Bart, all the William(s) are addressed as Bill not to exclude even the Office of the President of the United States, not so long ago. Wait, did I say only Americans like to make things easy? I was possibly prejudiced. My father's Aussie colleague addressed him as Pat and I was quite naturally, Patson. My mother's Japanese friend inevitably called me Manuji, in line with Oji,Genji or Kabuki from their quite exhaustive 'i-suffixed' lexicon. I wished she meant Manoj-ji in Hindi, i would have felt previleged and important at the least.

Going steady with names now let me share a hilarious incident. My cousin worked in corporate America for a few years. His 'gora' colleague called him Devil. Ask why? Because his word processor (WP) marked Devi everytime with a mild corrugated red underline with Devil as the nearest match. And that idiosyncratic person never ever tried to add it to his WP dictionary. Wonder what the WP rewards me for my full name? Don't bother, it returns garbage closest matches. It is not just the Caucasians, Kallus(Desi terminology for African Americans), Makkus(Hispanics), Chinkus(Mongoloids/Sinoids) that find it difficult to get our names straight. Most so called ABCDs (American Born Confused Desis but who themselves positively claim the C to be Creative) too share common ground with the other ethnic groups when it comes to accent and pronunciation of their own names.So Murali is pronounced Muraaly,Ravi is Raavii, Neeraj becomes Niraaaz and so on.

As a new Desi student at an American university, I learnt that the ABCDs referred to us as PIGS(Poor Indian Graduate Students) or FOBs(Fresh off the Boat). This sentiment was further highlighted in movies like Dude where's the Party(DWTP) , ABCD and a host of other shoe-string-budgeted Desi flicks filmed in USA. Kalpen Modi, that dude in the DWTP and The Namesake too experimented with his name. so Kalpen dissected his firstname to Kal Penn for his fancy stage name. And he claims his call-for-audition success rate increased quite remarkably. As a digression, I came across the ingenious work of someone who took that extra effort to expand ABCD upto Z. Here it goes: American Born Confused Desi Emigrated From Gujarat House in Jersey Kids Learning Medicine Now Owning Property, Quite Reasonable Salary, Two Uncles Visiting, White Xenophobia Yet Zestful.


Ever wondered how Americans interested to learn Hindi deal with the language? Well, there were and possibly are Sanskrit scholars in the West, there are noted western scholars who have translated ancient vedic and spiritual texts like the Rig Veda, Kama Sutra, Gita etc in to English; now you can have a taste of the other type of junkies and Hindi aficionados. One of my university coursemates who often swore like a sailor and was quite natural with using expletives in Hindi, taught our mutual American friend Darcy(name changed) some bad stuff too. Now I refrain from naming my Gujju friend lest I should face a fusillade of those expletives if he discovers this article. Once the three of us along with some others were dining at an Indian restaurant. Darcy loved Chicken-Tikka Masala and commented with a deep-toned "Accha Hai" to the waitress who appeared to be either Nepali or from the Northeast of India. I wondered if she understood the compliment as she just smiled upon hearing Darcy's byzantine Hindi. Darcy allegedly developed a liking for the waitress and when we were about to leave he asked us how to say "Thank You, you were very nice to us" in Hindi ? Before any of us could open our mouths my great coursemate exclaimed "mujhe ladke pasand hain" and poor Darcy went for it. The demure waitress retorted with a smile "They are fooling you. What you just told is of no interest to me but it means you love boys" One should have been there to hear the salvo of laughter in all our faces and a sense of remorse on poor Darcy's face... And on a trivial note, my doubt about the waitress's Hindi too got clarified. Though Darcy did not use any foul language in Hindi this time, he had been the butt of ridicule of some of we desis for using some cuss words at the wrong time. It was funny and at the same time entertaining to have a friend like Darcy.

As I am all set to return home for good in the next three months, my vivid experience of nearly three years in the United States has been an educative and enjoyable one. Though I may mock the 'inscruitable americans' for not getting my name right some nine out of ten times, I admire them for their resolve and diligence while building their nation. I often remind myself of Kennedy's overused and ever enduring quote, "Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country". Amen.

P.S. Here is a funny video on YouTube titled "If you thought Indian names are complicated"

Educated Politicians?

A couple of months ago i was excited to read that some Ex-IITians floated a political party in UP and that they were going to contest elections from key constituencies. After the election results were declared these bright and brave candidates had to face ignominy. They amassed an abysmally low vote count and even lost their deposits. I guess UP is bereft of an educated vote bank and what appalls me is that this is happening at a time when all claim India to be an emerging knowledge superpower. With this defeat, we have reiterated that politics is a game of the brawn and not brains. An intellectual and well-read politician is revered through out the developed world. I remember watching Charlie Rose talk to a US corporate big-wig about P Chidambaram and emphasizing his degree from Harvard; Charlie also spoke about Dr. Manmohan Singh with special stress on his Oxford education. Some of China's top decision makers are academically highly qualified, who obtained their advanced degrees from top US schools. India needs more erudite decision makers at the helm to sustain the behemoth of an economy she is progressing towards. So we wish the UP election outcome was only a blemish to be forgotten. May the educated polticians emerge victorious in the next election. The problem in India is that many of the educated abstain from voting. This is a severe epidemic plaguing the country and is proving too expensive.