(She took pity on me and let me write a paper about genetics instead.)Īs I developed into teenagehood, I felt like I never quite belonged anywhere. They strongly encouraged me to enter medicine instead, even though by then I had showed no aptitude whatsoever for biology and had even ran out of the room bawling when my teacher insisted I dissect a fetal pig. Like Rishi with his comic art, I was told that while writing was nice, it was not a career respectable Indian girls had. It was also hard for my family to understand my need for creative freedom. Like Dimple, I nearly had an apoplectic fit, which only mystified everyone else. Growing up a teenager in two different cultures didn’t make things any easier! I distinctly remember having a conversation with a well-intentioned relative in which she insisted that, as a married woman one day, I would need to cultivate the fine art of dressing up for my husband daily before he arrived home from work. I moved to the US from India when I was fifteen years old. Although I never did have my marriage secretly arranged by my parents (and thank goodness-I doubt they could have ever found me someone as adorable as Rishi), I’ve definitely felt the same generational/cultural clash with my family as Dimple struggles with in When Dimple Met Rishi.
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