“You must live every moment of your life in such a way that if you had to live it over and over again till infinity, this would be a good thing.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“They say in the east you love the person you marry and in the west you marry the person you love. But maybe it's a lot simpler than that. Maybe you just love the person you love.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“And it now occurred to me that maybe the whole point was, in fact, to lose yourself. But not in the sense of confusion--in the sense of connection to something bigger than yourself...Getting lost to be found.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“She was right. After all, if she herself had wondered whether she was Indian enough -- she, who had always been to me a sort of epitome of Indian -- then who could be? Who could claim the sole right or way to an identity?”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“But you have to realize, there is no such thing as this tidy little box you think you have to fold up and fit into; it simply does not exist. That's what I'm learning, learning as we speak.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“Believe it or not, Dimple–and I would believe it–I am just a regular person who has decided to be who I am in life. That's all. That's how you make your life magical–you take yourself into your own hands and rub a little. You activate your identity. And that's the only way to make, as they say, the world a better place; after all, what good are you to anyone without yourself?”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“As the conference continued it occurred to me finally that it wasn't really about Indian history as it was written, but really about rewriting it by taking a fresh look at race, ethnicity, gender, and a mix of sociocultural questions...
I just couldn't believe how far along the desi scene was, not just socially but intellectually, how many people were out there thinking about it. This whole event so far rocked my world, muddled me still more, and delivered a series of tiny epiphanies, all at the same time. To be honest, I was quite intimidated by the dialogue going on, as well as by the passion and conviction of these people on so many subjects which I, frankly, had never really even thought about.
...A history of a people in transit -- what could that be card catalogued under? And the history of the ABCD. Everyone seemed to know about this ABCD thing -- that didn't seem very confused to me! And it was a relatively new phenomenon; it had never occurred to me that things going on now could have a history already. The moments that made up my life in the present tense seemed so fleetingly urgent and self-contained to me: I'd always felt my life had very little to do with my parents' and especially their parents' histories...and that it would have very little effect on anything to come.
But the way these people were talking -- about desis in Hollywood; South Asian Studies departments; the relatively new Asian Indian slot on the census -- was hummingly sculpting the air, as if they were making history as they spoke. Making it, messily but surely, even simply by speaking. I was feeling it, too -- a sense of history in the making. But where did I fit in to any of it?
And how come no one had told me?”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“Life viewed from nine different camera angles; life played at nine tempos. Mixed, montaged; multiple. In the course of one lifetime. Maybe that's what reincarnation was all about. Reinvention.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“American Born Confused Desi Emigrated From Gujarat House In Jersey Keeping Lotsa Motels Named Omkarnath Patel Quickly Reaching Success Through Underhanded Vicious Ways Xenophobic Yet Zestful.
or
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
Now you know your ABCDs.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“You see,' Gwyn said slowly...'With an Indian boy maybe you can, you know, explore all that stuff. Go kamasutronic, so to speak.'
I nodded, but I was feeling battle fatigue and was now thinking the tip of another thought: Or maybe an Indian boy would get that most of us don't know that stuff. That it was a lot of hype. It was the bindi blondes who were all over this scene, not the holelessly nosed Indian girls.”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
“...Sabina [was] onto something about mehendi not being tantamount to temporary tattoo, and how it's been appropriated by Western capitalist culture. But the mehendi originated in Africa, and so India appropriated it from a people of color as well, according to Upma, and thus we shouldn't wear jeans or listen to Queen, then. But Freddie Mercury was Indian, Sabina pointed out, Parsi, and plus, half of these things are made in India anyways if you check the tags. Somehow eventually arriving at: Whatever it was, why did a white girl have to wear it before it was regarded as cool?”
― Tanuja Desai Hidier, quote from Born Confused
Tanuja Desai Hidier
Born place: Boston, Massachusetts, The United States
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“Most of what passes for legitimate entertainment is inferior or foolish and only caters to or exploits people's weaknesses. Avoid being one of the mob who indulges in such pastimes. Your life is too short and you have important things to do. Be discriminating about what images and ideas you permit into your mind. If you yourself don't choose what thoughts and images you expose yourself to, someone else will, and their motives may not be the highest. It is the easiest thing in the world to slide imperceptibly into vulgarity. But there's no need for that to happen if you determine not to waste your time and attention on mindless pap.”
― Epictetus, quote from The Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness and Effectiveness
“What could my mother be
to yours? What kin is my father
to yours anyway? And how
did you and I meet ever?
But in love
our hearts have mingled
like red earth and pouring rain.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
“There are no events but thoughts and the heart's hard turning, the heart's slow learning where to love and whom. The rest is merely gossip, and tales for other times.”
― Annie Dillard, quote from Holy the Firm
“You cannot repay evil with evil.”
― Susan Campbell Bartoletti, quote from The Boy Who Dared
“The qualities of character can be arranged in triads, in each of which the first and last qualities will be extremes and vices, and the middle quality a virtue or an excellence. So between cowardice and rashness is courage; between stinginess and extravagance is liberality; between sloth and greed is ambition; between humility and pride is modesty; between secrecy and loquacity, honesty; between moroseness and buffoonery, good humor; between quarrelsomeness and flattery, friendship; between Hamlet’s indecisiveness and Quixote’s impulsiveness is self-control.49 “Right,” then, in ethics or conduct, is not different from “right” in mathematics or engineering; it means correct, fit, what works best to the best result. The”
― Will Durant, quote from The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the World's Greatest Philosophers
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