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| Diversity |
| Wednesday, August 08, 2007 |
We know one of India's motto is Unity in Diversity. Having done most of my schooling in Kendriya Vidyalaya aka Central School, the motto is totally ingrained in my head. I had friends from all parts of the country, as I think now, I didnt know what their mother tongue was, or which part of India they were from. Among many good things about KV, like being able to move schools in the middle of a school year, due to transfers for our parents, I liked the multi-cultural environment the school provided.
When I think back, the one thing that sticks out were the music sessions. Even without realizing, I learnt songs in so many languages from all over India. And now when I sing them to myself, it is no surprise that I remembered most of the lyrics. It reminds of those good old days, it brings a certain inner peace. I googled for these songs, I was happy to find someone had taken the pains to post them online here. Someone had also written a full post about it in their blog, I already feel a bond with the person.
The main theme of the songs were Unity in Diversity, and mainly about how proud we are of India and how proud we should be to be Indians. Not Tamil Nadu or Maharashtra, or any other state, but of India. Each morning, we sang a song from the song book, which had the different songs in different languages. Out annual day celebrations included dances from various states, bengali, kutchipudi, kathakali, bharatnatyam, oriya etc etc.
I want to post one of my favorite songs here. It is funny I used to know the song byheart, without understanding the meaning of it. Now I do, of course.
Jaya jana bharat
Jaya jana bharat jan man abhimat
Jan gan tantra vidhatha (2)
Gaurav bal himalaya ujjvala
Hrudaya har ganga jal |
Kati vindhyachal sindhu charan
Tal mahima sashwatha gaatha ||
Hare keth lehare, nad nirjar,
Jeevan shobha urvar |
Vishwa karmarat koti bahu karash,
Ag nita pag duv pathpar ||
Prathama sabyatha gyatha, sam dvanitha gun dhatha,
Jaya nav manavtha nirmatha, satya ahimsa datha |
Jaya hein, jaya hein, jaya hein, shanthi adistatha ||
Our competitions, rankings etc was through out India, which made it really tough for us. Our music group used to participate in singing competitions mostly, our teacher composing our music and lyrics, and we practiced during lunch breaks everyday, always late for the Math class after lunch, to get a cold stare from the teacher. Sigh! Those were amazing days.
Our main language of communication was Hindi, not English or Tamil, because of the number of non-Tamil speakers in class. So when to came to movies too, I listened to more Hindi songs than Tamil songs. I never learnt Tamil formally in school, but my Dad did teach me to read and write in Tamil. I was able to read Aanandha Vikatan and Kumudham with great ease, though I sucked big time in Tamil 'history'.
For a short period of time I was ashamed to have studied in KV because folks thought only the poor people studied there. It was heights when a friend from the school where I did my Junior College asked me if my parents put me in KV because the fees was lesser. (Rs 15 per term, beat that ;--)). But now I am proud to be a KV product.
It did come as a surprise when in College I found many people so anti-Hindi. I studied in a college were the bulk population was from Tamil Nadu, and one in sixty from out-of-state. Although I liked my college and my friends in college, I regretted some times that I should have studied in a place where the mix was proportionate like REC or BITS.
But of course the seed was already sown in my heart. I am comfortable around northies, I am able to relate to them a little bit, I got along with them well, sometimes better than my Tamil counter parts. Now they are often surprised to hear me speak in Hindi, wonder how come I dont have the usual accent the Southies do when speaking Hindi.
At work place, in our team, we often have Region tiffs among Indians, about who/which is better. I never participate, I just listen and laugh at the jokes. I am glad I am able to appreciate each State in India to offer what it has, and how each State is different in its own way.
Ok, so why am I thinking about this out of the blue?
It was Diversity Day at work. It was nice to take a couple of hours off of work, ;--), to watch some performance from other employees. We watched all kinds of dances, Persian, Belly Dancing, Tahiti's Hula Dance, Iranian Dance, and of course Indian Dance. We had an opportunity to listen to some violin, sandhoor performances. I felt goose bumps when I saw the flags of all the different countries hung in the Cafe, to denote the diverse culture of the work place.
It is like I have completed a full circle. I am back to enjoy the Unity in Diversity at a whole new level, across the real world. I also felt a little guilty that I never to do anything outside of work at work place, blaming it on lack of time. This would be added to my long list of things for self improvement - participating in things other than work at work place. |
posted by SK @ 6:46 PM  |
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| 15 Comments: |
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Nice post! Definitely helps to have that kind of exposure, broadens one's outlook.
Incidentally I was volunteered by my manager to a new committee within the organization "how to make ABC a fun place to work at", so for the past few months, its been interesting - meeting and conspiring and coming up with new ideas every month.
India's 60th is also nearing..so this post is very well timed :).
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Hey nice post :) Reading your post has brough back memories of me singing some patriotic songs in school too :)
"It did come as a surprise when in College I found many people so anti-Hindi."
I have seen many people being anti-Hindi too. I don't know why they are like that.
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Btw, reading your travelogues is a long-term pending work for me ;) Will complete that soon
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great story. I identify pretty much with the situation. I did my schooling at the border of Andhra Pradesh- Maharashtra, in a place where a paper factory(by the birlas) was the source of living. So naturally people from all over country where there an the language was pre-dominantly hindi.bcos our was a christian missionary institution, english was a must in school. But hindi was so deep rooted tht even when i met other telugu friends we used to converse in hindi. n i used to laugh at the weird hindi accent tht my cousins had :)
but watz with the new system in karnataka and tamilnadu thts trying so hard to enforce the local language over english. knowing local language is good if not must, but in the era of globalization when we boast our advantage over the chinese is english, how efficient is this deprivation of english? I was planning a post on it.
N thank god im hyderabadi, where u can survive if u knw just hindi n english , but not just if u knw telugu.
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good one...while language is one dimension patriotism is the other dimension that links..so very true of unity in diversity...we lose touch with such songs after schools..but the roots are built deep in us during the school so we can relate to such songs immediately any day.. and thanks to AR Rahman songs like vande mataram and jana gana mana have become everybody's favorite..
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Altoid,
Yes, totally. :--)
Its definitely good fun to participate in things other than work at work place. :--)
Aparna,
Welcome here. :--)
Great! School days are always fun to remember.
Oh do take your time to read them, I can understand, given they are so long. :--D
Maverick,
Do post your thoughts. I am not totally against promoting local language, I am for promoting both. I dont think English will ever leave our system, no worries. :--)
Siva,
Welcome here. ;--)
Yes, the stuff taught in school always goes a long way.
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AS a followup to Mavericks comment, my opinion on the regional language love (read as thrust/enforce)by the politicians is more to do with the vote bank rather than the love for language. Even they know there is not going to be any economic impact by introducing local language except that they can cash in on the emotions of language (read as caste, creed,color, language) :) ... thats the sad part...
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hey, nice! KV girl :)
Grew up with one just around teh corner, always thought they were cool in their own way.
so all set to wear the tricolors? :D
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So what dance did you perform? :P What did you sing?
Do you watch "The Office"? Diversity day always reminds me an episode from that show. Hilarious show.
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Siva,
Actually thats true, and sad. :--(
Rads,
:--) Did you really think they were cool. Or is it for my sake you are saying it haha.
As I said, wore green and white, no safforn. ;--(
Twisted,
Hehe no, as I said in the end, I have to _start_ doing something, have done nothing yet. :--)
I have watched some episodes of The Office, will watch out for the Diversity day one. :--))
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well...u shd've sung there..atleast....ene time vendi iruku...u r a good singer already ;)...karoke potu paada vendiyathu thaane... do it next time...btw...happy independence..!:)
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Rs 15 per term
Really?
And I understand what you refer to when you said anti-Hindi. In fact even now when I hang out with Hindi-speaking ppl, they are pretty shocked that I speak the language w/o any signs of being a South Indian! And I am told 'Hey you dont look Tamil' .. Well... :)
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Hey Daks,
Heheh, illa there are so many others who are so much better. :--) thanks!
rebels,
Yes. :--) hehe yes, you dont look like a Tamilian. ;--)
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no no, really. I am admitting it now, though those days I turned my nose up in the air. I went to a "convent" school :D
I like the way the curricuum's structured. Makes you a thinker :)
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Nice post! Definitely helps to have that kind of exposure, broadens one's outlook.
Incidentally I was volunteered by my manager to a new committee within the organization "how to make ABC a fun place to work at", so for the past few months, its been interesting - meeting and conspiring and coming up with new ideas every month.
India's 60th is also nearing..so this post is very well timed :).