Wisconsin students in hyderabad
Prasad A. Chodavarapu (prasad@kodak.com)
Fri, 15 Nov 1996 16:15:30 -0500
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[Rediff] [Navigator] [News]
[Image]
Commentary The Rediff Special / Ratna Rao Shekar
Capital Buzz 'I now know exactly how the Queen of England
feels'
The Rediff
Interview Alex Greteim, Linda Ohman, Brita Sauer, [Image]
Marjorie Krieg, Melissa Malley, Zoe Timms
Insight are undergraduates from American colleges now in
Hyderabad learning Telugu, and enthusiastic about
The Rediff all things Andhra like gongura pachaddi,
Poll Rajakeeya kathalu of the writer Olga, and Telugu
films like Prema Desam and Bharateeyudu. This at
Miscellanea a time when children in India think it is not
important to be familiar with their mother tongue
Crystal Ball and their parents are even less insistent about
instilling any pride in their native culture.
Click Here
"Desa baashalandu Telugu lessa?" asks Lisa
The Rediff Mitchell, the co-ordinator of the programme,
Special quoting the Vijayanagar king, Sri Krishna
Devaraya. "Telugu is the most lyrical, most
Meanwhile... consistent language," remarks Alex who has also
studied German, Persian and Urdu.
Arena
Alex, Linda, Zoe, and the others are third year
students of colleges in various parts of America
who have chosen to learn Telugu, and spend a year
in Hyderabad, under the University of Wisconsin's
year in India programme. The university offers
similar language programmes in Hindi and Tamil,
and those wanting to learn Hindi go to Varanasi,
and Tamil to Madurai.
Even among the handful of universities in America
that give students the option to study Indian
languages, a majority concentrate on languages
such as Bengali, Hindi, Sanskrit and Tamil.
Except the University of Wisconsin, no other
university offers the students the choice of
learning Telugu.
[Image]"The emphasis back home is all the time
on North Indian languages and cultures.
There is very little of translated work in
Telugu. During the course of research for my
Master's work on socio-linguistics I had come to
CIEFL in Hyderabad for two weeks. I had gone to
Lucknow and Madurai as well. But somehow
Hyderabad stayed in my mind. I thought the city
had a nice blend of Islamic and South Indian
cultures. I was hooked. I wanted to come back,
but I realised if I didn't know the language
there was no way I could get into the culture of
the people I wanted to know," says Lisa who has
studied Hindi and Tamil as well, and has lived in
India as a researcher on and off for the past
decade or so.
Lisa, a doctoral student in cultural anthropology
at the University of Washington, Seattle, was in
Hyderabad the whole of last year, studying Telugu
with Vimala, who also teaches the language to all
the American students currently in Hyderabad.
Lisa not only took Telugu lessons but taped
interviews in Telugu with local tailors and
vegetable vendors, and saw several Telugu films
in a day, (especially the mythologicals made
famous by N T Rama Rao), all in an effort to
imbibe popular culture.
She even gave a talk on the importance of
learning Telugu in Telugu for 15 whole minutes at
a local school!
There is a growing awareness even in America,
Lisa says, on the importance of learning a
language other than English. But then French,
Spanish, even Portuguese one would think would be
the natural options, and it is quite
incomprehensible how these American students had
even heard of Telugu or how this will be useful
to them late in life.
Some say they had heard of Telugu from professors
who had been here, others say it was more the
desire to spend a year in India than anything
else that made them want to learn an Indian
language. "Now that I'm learning Telugu, I like
it," says Marjorie simply.
When they announced they were taking a [Image]
year off to go to Hyderabad, friends and
families reacted with a little more than shock.
Linda, who is Swedish, was asked by her parents
if she couldn't think of doing something else to
earn credits for college work. "Whatever you've
heard about India, whatever you've read about the
country does not prepare you for the diversity
here.All stereotypes stand challenged," says
Alex.
There is nothing that can be said of India that
can be held as an absolute truth. Why talk in
terms of absolute truths when no two days in
Hyderabad are ever alike. One day if they find
the autorickshaws going on one side of the road,
there is no guarantee that they will go on the
same side the next day. Or the shower. They are
never sure if they will be hot water on any given
morning.
To these youngsters from America, the familiar
world has become strange, and everything they
have known has been turned upside down. They have
never seen anything as strange as the street
numbers as in Hyderabad. Lisa has given the
address of the house she is staying in to a
friend she is expecting in Hyderabad soon. She is
not sure if her friend will ever find 5-6-20/3.
Alex says if he was given a wish, he would wish
for one day in Hyderabad when nothing unexpected
happens.
But then education is all about learning and
coping. There was a time when Melissa would stand
politely in a line while everyone else pushed
past her to the counters at the post office. Now,
she and the others have figured out many things.
That the vendors in Hyderabad have one price for
the Americans, and another for the rest of
Hyderabad.
[Image]"I caught a fruit seller quoting two
rupees less on mangoes to another person
in Telugu, and when I brought it to his notice,
he was so shocked I knew Telugu, that he
immediately reduced the price," recalls Lisa. "We
know the minimum autorickshaw fare is Rs 5.80,"
says Melissa firmly.
Autorickshaw drivers, however, continue to be a
difficult lot. One disgruntled auto driver told
them, there was no use learning Telugu, as the
Andhra Pradesh chief minister had declared there
were no jobs in the state anymore.
But not everyone is discouraging of their efforts
to learn Telugu and integrate with life around
them. When they were travelling from Madras to
Hyderabad sometime ago, one bus conductor was so
pleased to hear that they were in Hyderabad to
learn Telugu, that he stopped by at a wayside
cafe, and ordered that they be given tea and
coffee on the house!
"It's actually the urban elite who are most
shocked to hear we are learning Telugu," says
Lisa who, incidentally, has read a lot of Telugu
literature.
The girls don't like they way they are stared at
all the time. But sometimes their very
foreign-ness works to their advantage. When they
went around the city during the Ganesh Chaturthi
festival, at one location they were allowed to
pass through to the very sanctum, their
photographs taken, and announcements made over
the public address system that the Americans were
with them. "I now know exactly how the Queen of
England feels," giggles Linda.
While a good part of the programme -- [Image]
thrice a week classes -- is devoted to
learning Telugu, the emphasis is on working in
other areas they are interested in. Melissa, who
is interested in public health, plans on getting
involved with rural health groups, while Zoe, who
is interested in environmental issues, is working
on a project on how use of the Musi river has
changed over the years.
Alex, who is interested in languages, is learning
Hindi and Urdu and is being trained to sing
ghazals. Linda and Melissa are learning the art
of applying mehendi. During the Divali holidays,
they will live with families in the Krishna
district. "Here we are each other's comfort
zones. But there for a week we'll have to cope on
our own," says Melissa.
Next May, they will go home. Some of them may
return to India, after college, to pursue their
areas of interest, as Lisa has. Others may just
go back to the US, with Telugu ringing in their
ears, and the pageantry of the Charminar in their
eyes. Whatever it is, just as their preconceived
notions of India have changed they too have
helped change the popular image of the American
abroad.
"People often think we live in mansions back
home. They are surprised to hear that we work to
pay our way through college, and do things like
waiting in restaurants and washing dishes," says
Linda. "Life in America is not at all like
Beverely Hills 90210, we tell people."
"Programmes such as these bring the world a
little closer. Each of us learns to understand
the other's culture a little better," remarks
Lisa, the programme co-ordinator. The others nod
their assent. But why is it, they ask puzzled, do
Telugu movie heroines wear western clothes when
they are rebellious, and a sari the moment they
get married?
Photographs: B Narsing Rao
[Image]
The Rediff Special
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