Week 5 - Family First
This week was another quick one at IBJ, with the courts still on vacation. I was busy preparing a presentation that my boss is giving to the IBJ team in Myanmar. The Myanmar project started in 2012, and recently entered into a two-year partnership with myJustice, an organization funded by the EU in order to implement a stable and impartial judicial system in the country. With this funding, IBJ Myanmar has been able to establish four centers across the country – a huge deal, especially in a developing country! The presentation focuses on educating the populous on their legal rights and improving prison reform. Hopefully, IBJ can continue to expand and help bridge the understanding between government and its citizens.
The main joy of the week came when I finally was able to fly down to Mumbai to visit my family. Bombay is really a second home for me, a place where I spent a lot of my childhood. By my estimation, I have spent about four years cumulatively in Bombay between all the trips my family has taken. After a month of 100+ degree weather, I almost jumped out of my seat when the captain mentioned that the temperature was only 30°C (86°F). I was even happy to step into the pouring monsoons, and I hate the rain. It helps to enjoy these smaller comforts. When I landed Friday night, I immediately felt a sense of familiarity and comfort that I had not experienced in Delhi. Both are India, but to me the cities could not be more different. If Delhi is like DC, with its embassies and countless government buildings, then Bombay is somewhere between Los Angeles and New York – an urban sprawl, with glitz, glam, and a never-sleep attitude.
Why do you call it Bombay? Short answer: that is what I have always called it. Bombay is the anglicized name given to the city by the Portuguese, then British, and starting in 1995 the name was officially changed to Mumbai. A lot of Indian cities have had name changes since, to try and reflect the local culture more appropriately – to truly break the chains of colonizing oppression. A nationalistic movement spread, although it unnecessarily politicized a minimal issue.
Calcutta --> Kolkata; Madras --> Chennai; Bangalore --> Bengaluru; and so on. Some names stuck, and others were ignored. So, when I talk about the city in English, I usually say Bombay – it is more familiar to me, as that is what my parents and grandparents and everybody else called it – they still do today. In Marathi, it is Mumbai (मुंबई); in Hindi, Bambai (बंबई) (sounds like ‘bum’). It mostly just depends on who you are talking to and in what language. Each variation is so similar that if you don’t know which to pick, you can make it up on the fly!
“Where are you from?” “Mmm..bumbay?”
Many of my earliest memories are from my time spent in Bombay, being with my grandparents and my cousins. While friends in the States watched football and basketball, my grandparents taught me the virtues of golf, tennis, and of course, cricket. I even went to preschool here! Every time I come to visit, I am reminded of how important it is to stay connected to your heritage, history, and culture. My grandmother – Aji, in Marathi – is one of the most important people in my life. Her stories always astound me, and her life is one people can only dream of. She was one of very few Indian women to study abroad, graduating from Bryn Mawr College. She traveled the world as the head of various departments in Air India, meeting with Prime Ministers and Princes. At eighty-years old and suffering from Parkinson’s, her mind and wit is still as sharp as ever. Though, she can ramble a bit, as grandparents are wont to do. Apparently, there is a clock in Dexter Scott King’s office that she gifted him twenty years ago. How did I not know that before?!
I hope I can keep learning from her, and keep learning from this great city.
