In a reflective exploration of identity and belonging, the author shares memories of growing up in Madras and the complexities of creating a new home in America.
When I lived in Madras—what it was called when I left the city in the early nineties, before it became Chennai—home was something I could feel before I even opened my eyes.
I was awakened not by an alarm but by my parents’ prayers, their chanting rising softly through the walls. It was a sound that enveloped me in gentle comfort. The air carried the familiar scents of filter coffee, fresh sambar, my Amma’s hands, and the fragrance of jasmine in my oiled, braided hair. I wore that fragrance like a second skin, a blessing I hadn’t asked for and didn’t yet know to be thankful for.
Some mornings, Amma would sing, and Carnatic music would flow through her and her tambura, ancient and alive, filling the house like sunlight fills a room.
At the temple, I would step inside and breathe in the fragrances of ash, camphor, and tulsi, coming alive in that sacred space. Outside, the scorching Madras sun relentlessly sought out every shadow and corner. In the evenings, dipping my feet in the warm waters of Marina Beach, accompanied by the cool evening breeze, felt like a quiet mercy.
The hustle and bustle of city life included the milkman, the vegetable vendors, and my Amma’s relentless negotiations with them to save a few chillarai. Within the chaos of the day, there was an organized structure and a sense of safety.
Playing outside was our primary form of entertainment while growing up. It was a joyful, freeing atmosphere, almost a luxury for children today.
Then came the moment of leaving after 25 years.
I hurriedly stuffed my suitcase with sarees, salwar kameez, Amma’s sambar powder, her spices, and a Hawkins pressure cooker wrapped like something precious.
Because it was.
I tried not to look into my parents’ eyes, to avoid holding on too long to the heartache I saw there—the incomprehensible feeling of an only child crossing an ocean into the land called America.
America was a fantasy, a shimmering dream, uncertain yet entirely mine. Those were the days before cell phones; we relied on an AT&T plan with designated hours and small windows of time to press their voices to my ear. It was our only connection to home, to our parents and loved ones.
Thus began the way of life that has been mine for over three decades.
There is no noise or hustle and bustle here. Sometimes, there is a silence so intense that even now, when I return from India, I pull my ears to check if they are clogged.
Hopscotching between two worlds felt like pandi on the hot pavement. I was always torn between the duties of a daughter, a wife, and a mother, as if I could only be one thing at a time.
Home is supposed to be a safe place, but that has not always been my experience. The misogyny and patriarchy I absorbed while growing up in India followed me to California, appearing in different shades and forms. For a long time, I lived in between two worlds, two cultures, unsure if that in-between could ever be a home.
Reflecting on my journey, I found myself assimilating, acculturating, performing, and belonging—sometimes doing part of it, sometimes all of it at once. I hoped the dominant culture would finally acknowledge and accept my existence.
My brown skin, striving to fit in—not only in white spaces but also in black spaces, brown spaces, and every space in between—always felt slightly outside my frame as I continued to negotiate my place and my being.
Now that my parents are gone, I realize that I no longer have a home in my homeland. The longing lives quietly, deep and permanent within my bones, even as the ache becomes less sharp with time.
It surfaces with the smell of coffee, in the sound of a tambura on a YouTube recording. The scent of jasmine remains suspended in unexpected places, like in the marketplace or on a stranger’s hair. Suddenly, I find myself standing in a house that no longer exists, aching for a morning that will never come again.
But now, I am beginning to understand that it is possible to create something new—my own home, not derived from the one I was born into, nor from shuttling between two worlds that never quite felt whole to me, but from something more loosely woven. I am learning to gather home the way we gather a sari—not binding myself to its structure, but draping it freely, allowing it to move with my body, letting it be worn in more than one way.
A home not made from duty or longing alone, but crafted for my own being, with my own hands, on my own terms; not from either, but from both and mine.
And while I’m at it, I may even pick up the jasmine and the tambura, holding my beloved Marina Beach in my mind as I feel the sands at the edge of the Pacific Ocean.
According to India Currents.
