Comments on: The chink in my armour.

By: bobs

bobs — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 05:19:00 +0000

Iam also from north east ..i dont agree whtever u hv writte…even ppl fr northeast dont think themself as indians and refer to ppl in delhi an indian guys and indian gals..beed to ghungroos many times n never faced any problems..even we need to change out attitude…

By: Ayush

Ayush — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:14:33 +0000

Racism is a human condition and it will never end. India is actually a very racist country, especially to the north-easterners.
But just like any other nationality, you can’t paint everyone with the same brush. A lot of us actually don’t think of the north-easterners as foreigners.
Also, “chinky” isn’t really a derogatory word in India. Its like calling someone “blondy”. You can’t possibly tell me that I can’t ever refer to a blonde friend of mine as “blondy”.

By: Axomia girl

Axomia girl — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:24:16 +0000

Hi
Once in a office function we were to sing. During discussion someone said lets sing “hum bewafa” hargis ne the. And turned towards me and said, probably u shud do the jinga lala hu part.

By: desiderata

desiderata — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 10:59:03 +0000

My cousin (pure Maharashtrian) married a Manipuri and upon meeting his family and friends at their wedding I decided they were far more friendly, civil, polite, social and well-dressed than the Maharashrian brigade, who were surly, rude and boring. And racist, yes.

By: Raj

Raj — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:13:04 +0000

@ Juna and MGM
Is the fact that there is racism in India suppossed to be a revelation? It exists.

I’ve lived in the UK for the last 36 years, Germany 1 year and travelled on business to every country in europe, including your new homelands of Denmark and Norway. If you think your experiences of racism in India are bad then they would pale into insignificance if I had the time or inclination to describe what coloured people in Europe have had to put up with.

I come back to my point which is that Indians are not unique in this area. In my experience 90% of the time racism is subtle and rarely blatant and in your face. The little smirk here or the nod of the head or the inability to look at you when you talk to them.

Still, you two have escaped Indian racism. I guess Danish and Norwegians are indeed more evolved than the rest of europe! They certainly think so and Norwegian patriotism during WWII was very helpful to the jews. I guess the fact that they have managed to keep most non europeans out of their countries has nothing to do with this.

I hope you continue to blog from Denmark. It would be interested to read about how you settle in.

By: peace

peace — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 04:55:30 +0000

and yes..u do have an interesting blog

By: peace

peace — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 04:53:17 +0000

first…for me calling someone chink was more about how someone looked and thats about it…never to categorize someone to be looked down upon. me being from a part of india where you don’t find too many people from the north east i never knew much about it and neither could i imagine racism against people of the north east could exist..
second..never said i thought ‘bihari’ was derogatory..with some of my closest friends from bihar…i could never think like that

By: June

June — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 14:59:23 +0000

A ‘Bihari’ is someone who lives in or has ties to Bihar. It identifies people belonging to a region. It is not a derogatory term. Chinky is. I cant decide which is more worrisome…that you are ignorant about chink being a racist term, or that you think calling someone ‘Bihari’ is derogatory.

By: peace

peace — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 14:45:43 +0000

hey…as an indian i really feel great to be a part of a society which supports so many diversities….meeting ppl from the north east for me is a part of an enriching experience that is india..
anyways the point i wanted to make was that the notion of racism is different for different people..i never knew that calling someone a chink would count as racism. i guess using phrases like bihari,chink or wtever without any malice or without an intent to degrade someone is ok…

By: Suki

Suki — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 09:28:45 +0000

Thanks for this post. I thought of commenting, but it became a post so I’m putting it up on my own space.

Background – I’m Bong, but I wear a bandanna. Which gives people the right to assume(in my own city dammit) that I a) am a foreigner, b) don’t speak Bengali, c) am Christian, or d) have a cut or bald patch on my head. It’s interesting, to say the least. And annoying that while Americans and Delhiites could pronounce my name – Sukhaloka – just fine, Bongs turn it into whatever suits their fancy.