Christian Indian and Arrival Day

THE EDITOR: Arrival Day...Indian Arrival Day . . . makes any difference? Should it? Do Non-Indians have difficulty with this label? What I find disturbing is the interpretation of the event which has been given national sanction and slowly bursting from its seams in gigantic proportions with the passing of each year’s celebration . . . . it is Indian! It is sari, chutney, tassa, rum, curry duck, doubles, roti, bhougee, mango, cuchela, nannie, buss-up shut and much more... it is for the Hindu and the Muslim and the Fatel Razack. These folks can be marshalled, cajoled and brewed to provide the right type of brand required to remind us of the right to be Indian in a land that is literally full of douglas and a handful of whites who probably go off to Tobago for the occasion.

So who wants to celebrate? The groups that get subsidy from the government . . . . Hindu and Muslim religious organisations, fledgling or otherwise anybody else? So religion seems to play a big part in this celebration. My concern is the perceived marginalisation taken by the Christian Indian. Those established Indian Catholics, Anglicans, Presbyterians, Jehovah Witness, Seven Day Adventist, the born again Christians who belong to the numerous evangelical houses littered in all of our communities. What is their stance on this thing called Indian Arrival Day? Do they identify with the celebration of the Muslim and the Hindu on this day? Is there active participation and representation from their organisations? Do they feel Indian? Does their God permit them to perceive these Hindus and Muslims as their equal, their brothers and sisters or are they perceived as barbarous and heathenistic?

After all, these Indians have been here for quite a while now. Or is it that an Indian is an Indian, no matter what, regardless of color, creed, status and profession? Even if the Indian has a non- Indian name! Maybe it is just a matter of ethnicity . . . all in the genes. I am sometimes quite disturbed that external factors feel it necessary to remind me that I am Indian (them against we or we against them), rarely, if at all. I am reminded that I am a Trini with a passion for all that abounds in this land. Pan, some kaiso, geera pork, souse, pudding, hops bread and cheese, callaloo, paymee, bottom in the road, pelau and of course our prized possession . . . . our beautiful women . . . etc, provide so much gratification and sense of belonging along with my own up-bringing in urban San Fernando, my Siparia Old Road roots and the Christian dogma unleashed on me at Naparima Boys’ College?

It’s as if you have to “bat in your crease” when it comes to ethnicity, only talk it among your kind, a universal law. So, is the Christian Indian a hybrid Indian? Do they have a stake in this Arrival Day celebration? And if they do, at what price? Or is this thing for the real McCoy Indian, the grass roots type; pot belly, rum drinking, Divali fasting or Eid fasting kind? You know, the proletariat type, flashing the brand names and in the cutting edge of MTV fashion, cell phone and body art! What is it? Something born out of a conditioning, a cult thing, an identity crisis . . . no retreat, no surrender . . . And what happens to all of the Indians’ dougla family? What is their take on this entire issue of Indian Arrival Day? It would be really nice to see some of these non Hindu, non-Muslim Indians be highlighted and celebrated, even post humously . . . . Artistes such as, the late Sam Selvon, Dr Isaiah James Boodhoo, Jones Gilbert and Samuel Issak for starters!

SHASTRI MAHARAJ
Port-of-Spain