In excelsis deo
Dec. 26th, 2006 02:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ravenThe Christmassiest thing I did today - stay up until two am with Pedar watching The West Wing. Christmassy, because the last one we watched was "In Excelsis Deo." At which Pedar turned to me and and asked what that actually means - obviously, it's a contracted version of "Gloria in excelsis deo", but I never realised I didn't know what that meant until just now. Probably "glory in the height of God", or something.
My flist has not been a thing of joy this afternoon. It seems to alternate between itemised lists of what people got, telling me the really, truly, this time it is definitive meaning of Christmas - God? family? Amazon gift certificates? - and complaining about family, pine needles, food, or that no one else gets what Christmas is actually about, it's really secular/Christian/midwinter pagan, and everyone who disagrees with me is a heathen, OMG.
O tidings of comfort and joy, etc. I am clearly a horrible person.
Anyway, where was I? I managed to miss most of today, to be honest, by sleeping through until three, at which point my mother appeared with much noise and yelling to tell me we haven't packed, we haven't bought anything, was I planning to waste the rest of my life in bed, etc. She wanted me to make lists. I stumbled around the house and made lists. I meant to go for a walk with Pedar today, down to the beach, because we've done that before on Christmas Day and it's magical - on the one side, the ground is frozen hard and there is no mud, no rotten leaves, and you come to the beach and there's silence and seabirds, no footprints and nothing moving in the estuary, just you and the sky and sea. On the other side, you can walk for miles, past houses and gardens and through past the level crossing, and see no-one. It's astonishing and faintly surreal. But by sleeping till three, I missed the daylight. By half three it was too dark to read inside. I was supposed to make something vaguely festive for dinner, so I ended up roasting a metric tonne of vegetables with olive oil whilst my mother waved lists at me.
I don't know how she finds the energy, myself; both my parents are on call tonight, and my mum disappeared at seven to do the long night shift, bemoaning loudly the expected influx of Christmas drunks. For her sake, I do hope no-one's bottled themselves or whatever; she's in surgery and hating it. I'm expecting her to wander in vague and blood-spattered round about nine. And wielding lists.
Argh, what was I talking about? This was all meant to be a prelude to my talking about Rang de Basanti, which was on tonight again, so Pedar and I sat down to watch it once my mother had gone (along with half the metric tonne of veg). It's my second-favourite Hindi film of all time - er, let's face it, there are only two Hindi films I like and it's one of them - and it's probably the least Christmassy film ever made, so it made good viewing. And I was watching it, and later TWW, and thinking, well, I know lots and lots about Western culture. I know about Christmas. I know the story. I know there weren't necessarily three wise men, and I've seen The Gift of the Magi, and I've been in Christmas choirs enough to know the words to In The Bleak Midwinter and when I was five, I was in the nativity play. (I was the donkey. It was a traumatic time in my life.) And that's not to mention the many years for which people have sent me cards, given me gifts they didn't have to give, tried to make me a part of their festival, and for which I am truly grateful.
But, you know what? People don't know about my culture. Now this isn't to say I know, myself, which culture I belong to - this is the source of many years of existential emo, indeed - but I have an idea, sort of. I mean, I don't know what I mean. Something. Look, I am not Christian and I am not (only) British and I will not apologise for that. I am a Hindu, and while I'm not entirely sure what that means, I have an idea. For a start, it means that my name is not Iona, the name of a Hebridean island from where St. Columba brought Christianity to Scotland. My real name is Pragya, which is derived from a Sanskrit word meaning "wisdom", and was chosen according to the position of the stars at the second I was born. Minus the five-and-half-hour time difference between Liverpool and New Delhi, of course, and of course I don't use the name, but that's still true. It happened.
I'm from an old Brahmin Hindu family, and "Brahmin" is a word referring to the old caste system, of which, I'm afraid to say, my family were at the top. Brahmins were priests, scholars, writers, and once upon a time, they were advisers to kings. Which meant nothing by the beginning of the last century, but it amuses me to note that even so, post-independence, my paternal grandfather was a civil servant of the federal government. And part of that old thinking lingers in my family, which values academia above all other things.
I guess that's the plan, really. That's what I was taught to believe when I was growing up. My family has a puja place behind the kitchen door, with flowers and fruit and a light that never goes out, and it has a bowl of sultanas perched on it, because, well, fresh fruit goes off. Every morning for the seven years I lived in this house, my mother said goodbye to me at the door and pressed one of those sultanas into my hand. It's what's called aashirwad - blessing. For me, religion is like that, sweetness and bright colours and light and flowers, and joy - so an interdenominational Christian school was a shock. I remember that so, so clearly - the greyness of it all, the endless litanies about Jesus (who was who? and did what?) - and that first Christmas, which was the first Christmas after I started school. I remember being four and wanting very much to be an angel in the play, because the tinsel they got to wear in their hair was so pretty. (All the years afterwards, I was the narrator.)
But it was a huge, amazing culture shock, and I'm pleased to be here so many years later and feel like I not only survived, but became part of what was so alien then, but I don't know, maybe I've lost something. No, I know I have, and I haven't gained enough to replace it, because I am not, and will never be, a person without qualifier, a person who can stand up and say this is my place and these are my people. I can't go back, and I can't go forward, I've lost the right to belong in either place.
So there you go. That's my problem with Christmas. And I'm going to bed now.
("Glory to God in the highest" - that's probably what it means. I just thought. And I guess the "don't be bitter about it this Christmas" resolution just went straight out the window.)
My flist has not been a thing of joy this afternoon. It seems to alternate between itemised lists of what people got, telling me the really, truly, this time it is definitive meaning of Christmas - God? family? Amazon gift certificates? - and complaining about family, pine needles, food, or that no one else gets what Christmas is actually about, it's really secular/Christian/midwinter pagan, and everyone who disagrees with me is a heathen, OMG.
O tidings of comfort and joy, etc. I am clearly a horrible person.
Anyway, where was I? I managed to miss most of today, to be honest, by sleeping through until three, at which point my mother appeared with much noise and yelling to tell me we haven't packed, we haven't bought anything, was I planning to waste the rest of my life in bed, etc. She wanted me to make lists. I stumbled around the house and made lists. I meant to go for a walk with Pedar today, down to the beach, because we've done that before on Christmas Day and it's magical - on the one side, the ground is frozen hard and there is no mud, no rotten leaves, and you come to the beach and there's silence and seabirds, no footprints and nothing moving in the estuary, just you and the sky and sea. On the other side, you can walk for miles, past houses and gardens and through past the level crossing, and see no-one. It's astonishing and faintly surreal. But by sleeping till three, I missed the daylight. By half three it was too dark to read inside. I was supposed to make something vaguely festive for dinner, so I ended up roasting a metric tonne of vegetables with olive oil whilst my mother waved lists at me.
I don't know how she finds the energy, myself; both my parents are on call tonight, and my mum disappeared at seven to do the long night shift, bemoaning loudly the expected influx of Christmas drunks. For her sake, I do hope no-one's bottled themselves or whatever; she's in surgery and hating it. I'm expecting her to wander in vague and blood-spattered round about nine. And wielding lists.
Argh, what was I talking about? This was all meant to be a prelude to my talking about Rang de Basanti, which was on tonight again, so Pedar and I sat down to watch it once my mother had gone (along with half the metric tonne of veg). It's my second-favourite Hindi film of all time - er, let's face it, there are only two Hindi films I like and it's one of them - and it's probably the least Christmassy film ever made, so it made good viewing. And I was watching it, and later TWW, and thinking, well, I know lots and lots about Western culture. I know about Christmas. I know the story. I know there weren't necessarily three wise men, and I've seen The Gift of the Magi, and I've been in Christmas choirs enough to know the words to In The Bleak Midwinter and when I was five, I was in the nativity play. (I was the donkey. It was a traumatic time in my life.) And that's not to mention the many years for which people have sent me cards, given me gifts they didn't have to give, tried to make me a part of their festival, and for which I am truly grateful.
But, you know what? People don't know about my culture. Now this isn't to say I know, myself, which culture I belong to - this is the source of many years of existential emo, indeed - but I have an idea, sort of. I mean, I don't know what I mean. Something. Look, I am not Christian and I am not (only) British and I will not apologise for that. I am a Hindu, and while I'm not entirely sure what that means, I have an idea. For a start, it means that my name is not Iona, the name of a Hebridean island from where St. Columba brought Christianity to Scotland. My real name is Pragya, which is derived from a Sanskrit word meaning "wisdom", and was chosen according to the position of the stars at the second I was born. Minus the five-and-half-hour time difference between Liverpool and New Delhi, of course, and of course I don't use the name, but that's still true. It happened.
I'm from an old Brahmin Hindu family, and "Brahmin" is a word referring to the old caste system, of which, I'm afraid to say, my family were at the top. Brahmins were priests, scholars, writers, and once upon a time, they were advisers to kings. Which meant nothing by the beginning of the last century, but it amuses me to note that even so, post-independence, my paternal grandfather was a civil servant of the federal government. And part of that old thinking lingers in my family, which values academia above all other things.
I guess that's the plan, really. That's what I was taught to believe when I was growing up. My family has a puja place behind the kitchen door, with flowers and fruit and a light that never goes out, and it has a bowl of sultanas perched on it, because, well, fresh fruit goes off. Every morning for the seven years I lived in this house, my mother said goodbye to me at the door and pressed one of those sultanas into my hand. It's what's called aashirwad - blessing. For me, religion is like that, sweetness and bright colours and light and flowers, and joy - so an interdenominational Christian school was a shock. I remember that so, so clearly - the greyness of it all, the endless litanies about Jesus (who was who? and did what?) - and that first Christmas, which was the first Christmas after I started school. I remember being four and wanting very much to be an angel in the play, because the tinsel they got to wear in their hair was so pretty. (All the years afterwards, I was the narrator.)
But it was a huge, amazing culture shock, and I'm pleased to be here so many years later and feel like I not only survived, but became part of what was so alien then, but I don't know, maybe I've lost something. No, I know I have, and I haven't gained enough to replace it, because I am not, and will never be, a person without qualifier, a person who can stand up and say this is my place and these are my people. I can't go back, and I can't go forward, I've lost the right to belong in either place.
So there you go. That's my problem with Christmas. And I'm going to bed now.
("Glory to God in the highest" - that's probably what it means. I just thought. And I guess the "don't be bitter about it this Christmas" resolution just went straight out the window.)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
on 2006-12-26 04:36 am (UTC)I suppose the question is whether you can be both rather than neither. And this is something that most people wrestle with to one degree or another. I grew up a white Christian (of varying kinds) in a small town where almost everyone else is white and Christian, but even so, like most Americans, I have a multitude of identities to contend with. I'm half Greek, three-eighths Scots-Irish and one-eighth German. I was baptized Greek Orthodox and am thus the only one still left as Greek Orthodox in my immediate family, since my mother moved on to Anglicanism. Add to this the fact that I became an Oxonian at eighteen, have lived in another country for six years now, and have a British accent (!) by the standards of the people of my home town. By choice, in some weird way, I consider myself partially British too.
This is not in any way meant to downplay how weird and unsettling it must be to find everyone celebrating Christmas when you're from a completely different tradition. But perhaps it may help to know that many other people feel the same sort of issues, even if it isn't always obvious on the surface. Personally I try to feel like I've gained something rather than lost something. But I suppose the difference is that I've done most of what I've done by choice...
*is now rambling*
no subject
on 2006-12-28 01:55 am (UTC)You're absolutely right about the importance of choice. I'm an Oxonian by choice, and that internalised itself with ease; I can certainly describe myself as such with pride, pleasure and not a trace of cultural emo. Thank you for telling me about your heritage. I didn't know you were half-Greek - can you speak Greek? (And, seriously, a British accent? *g* Hee!)
no subject
on 2006-12-26 08:07 am (UTC)Rang de Basanti is fun except the South Indian dies! And the white girl irritates me despite the fact that I was in almost the same situation (with regard to being the white girl in among a bunch of rowdy Indian boys) and she pulls it off with a little more grace and a lot more Hindi.
no subject
on 2006-12-28 01:56 am (UTC)In Rang de Basanti, everyone dies! In gruesome and bloody fashion! That's the point! And Alice Patten is the daughter of Oxford's chancellor, which amuses me.
no subject
on 2006-12-28 01:59 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:02 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:05 am (UTC)I want to speak Hindi like the crazy white girl!
no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:13 am (UTC)(how's your Hindi going, by the way?)
no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:16 am (UTC)Clearly my Hindi is slipping. I pick up the book from time to time, but I've been trying to work on my French instead, for obvious reasons. Now and again I spend a couple of hours in the teacher's lounge improving my script, though, and reviewing my grammar.
no subject
on 2006-12-26 09:41 am (UTC)And for the record, I have my pet theories, but I don't know the 'real meaning of X festival' any more than any one else. [/militant agnostic]
no subject
on 2006-12-28 01:58 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-28 09:06 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-26 12:08 pm (UTC)If it's any help though, nearly everyone i know feels like that at some point, they just aren't able to express it so eloquently. I know i do... And while i am technically an apathetic agnostic pagan* i am also nearly half jewish** with a chunk of romany (meaning that the majority of my DNA has been kicked out of most places at some point) but could easily pass for aryan (as long as you didn't look at my roots...) i doubt that has anything to do with it. Look on the bright side, feeling not 100% of any particular culture means that you're mainly from Earth, which has to be a head start in our globalised 21sy century culture. Sort of thing.
*I don't know if i care if the gods exist
**I have a suspicion that my surname had an '-ovich' in it a few generations back
no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:00 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-26 12:12 pm (UTC)Damn, I need to add some more little books to that list for my next Alt-Oxford story too, if I'm sticking with Imogen's grandmother being Chinese (I keep wavering because it makes her even more of an avatar of one of my friends than I ever intended).
Oh, and beaches in winter are great. I miss living within walking distance of the sea.
no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:06 am (UTC)The sea is the one thing I miss about living where I do. The might of the incoming Atlantic is one thing, and the three-feet-deep-Cherwell quite another.
no subject
on 2006-12-28 08:21 am (UTC)Taj, of the character group in search of a plot, is an atheist who got there from Sikhism via a brief flirtation with Buddhism. So I suppose he's nicely conflicted even before you throw in the inter-generational relationship with Susan and all the step-family issues.
I don't think I've ever written a seaside story. I should do something about that too.
no subject
on 2006-12-26 12:44 pm (UTC)(I would comment on something more intellectual other than tinsel, but, well, this is me. Sorry.)
Am I still okay to come and nag you on the 28th? There is no turkey leftovers this year (el gasp!) and also they would have gone off etc etc but I can bring The Good Ones from Torchwood! Which is much more exciting and I will resist the urge to shout violently at Owen.
(Have you seen Doctor Who yet and has the comm exploded? I haven't checked because I am afeared of spoilers.)
no subject
on 2006-12-26 02:43 pm (UTC)(I have seen Doctor Who! It is great! Comm has been incredibly quiet and well-behaved!)
no subject
on 2006-12-27 07:30 pm (UTC)Is there any point at all you're free? (Might be best to text me - my internet access will be questionable at best from now until January...)
no subject
on 2006-12-27 03:59 am (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-27 04:19 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2006-12-28 02:18 am (UTC)(It made me grin that you signed off with "g'luck, our kid" - 'cause if there's anything I am, by definition, it's Scouse.)