I am a desi.
I realized that soon after I landed on American soil.
A stereotype about desis is that they share one apartment with 12 people, cut each other’s hair, and don’t buy anything without bargaining with the shopkeeper. I didn’t do any of that. I never shared an apartment with more than 6 people. I got haircuts from most expensive saloons, and purchased everything at list price. I was still a desi.
No matter how much I tried to imitate americans by dressing, walking and talking like them, I couldn’t get rid of that desi label from my forehead. Soon I gave up and accepted that I was a desi. Except that I considered myself as the coolest desi in town.
I really enjoying pissing off abcd’s by calling them a desi because I knew they hated it like anything. Talk about being confused, they didn’t want to be desis and white americans didn’t accept them as anyone else. Even african americans called us sand nigger. I didn’t know what they’re trying to escape from, their identity?
Nevertheless, I continued to enjoy the desi factor of life in the us of a.
Now that I am back home, I am surrounded by desis everywhere. But I can’t call them desis and make fun of them, ‘cuz they wouldn’t understand.
And guess what they call me, gora sahab!
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