The Namesake Post A # 3

Gogol now attends Yale University, in New Haven, Connecticut, a moderately far distance away from home. I am not sure if what is described next is the typical college life at Yale, but I do know that the lifestyles at Indian colleges are vastly different than those of American colleges. He has two roommates, (which is not the different part), Jonathan and Brandon. After the three of them get their items unpacked, Brandon asks Nikhil (because that is what he tells him his name is) if he wants to smoke a bowl. Gogol grows a goatee, starts smoking cigarettes at the parties around campus, and starts having sex. I guess that growing a goatee doesn't really have much to do with difference between lifestyles, that is just personal preference. What does have to do with it is the amount of sex, drugs, and hard partying. In India, the smarter students are, the more driven they are, as well. It seems that in America, if students are super smart, they take advantage (in a bad way) of their intelligence, and just degrade themselves, because they can get away with it. It seems that Gogol has fallen a little bit into that category.

Post B # 3

Gogol is now in tenth grade, and is ashamed of his name. He is alienating himself more and more from his true heritage, and it is showing noticably. The first girl he kisses, he says, is kissed by Nikhil, not Gogol. "He shakes his head [...] as astonished as they are [...] 'It wasn't me,' he nearly says. But he doesn't tell them that it hadn't been Gogol who'd kissed Kim. That Gogol had had nothing to do with it (98)." He remarks earlier how he could never see himself saying "Hi, it's Gogol," over the phone to a girl he was dating. In fact, he decides to go and legally change his name in a court of law. When he is asked why he wants to change it, he replies, "Personal reasons," to which the judge answers, "Would you care to be more specific?"
After his name is changed, he remarks how he feels more confident, and feels he can approach more people. He also remarks how he feels a wave of embarassment whenever he is still called Gogol, as he still is by his parents, highschool friends, and relatives.
When he goes off to college, it is like a fresh start for him. Nobody at Yale knows who he is, and he is free to tell them whatever he wants. Of course there is peril in him telling them anything that is short of the truth, but college is the first place he has been able to fit in. I know that this is not the best example, but the girl he loses his virginity to, he introduces himself as "Nikhil."

Post B # 2

The next few chapters of the novel seemed a bit odd to me. Gogol becomes an older brother as his mother has a daughter, whom they name Sonali. The odd thing about this chapter is the constant changing of names. Gogol is enrolled in school and his parents decide to change his name for school, to a "good name," meaning one that American kids will be able to pronounce. They put on the registration form that his name is Nikhil Ganguli. My uncle is named Nikhil, and I personally think that Nikhil is a harder name to pronounce, then Gogol. I just think Gogol is a less common name, so I guess I agree with them changing his name. What I don't understand is that there were already two other Indian students in the school, and their names were Jayadev and Rekha. As far as I know, they didn't change their names any. It just struck me as weird, that the Ganguli's would be changing Gogol's name for school, and then have Lahiri talk about two other Indian kids who had left them unchanged. Maybe she was trying to stress the fact that the family is still getting used to life in America, and that the other kids had been there for their whole life.
In addition to Gogol's name, Lahiri talks about how Sonali's name is gradually changed at home (not even in school or a public place) from Sonali, to Sonu, Sona, and then finally Sonia, which is the name that I guess she sticks with. I don't know if it is just me, but I thought that the whole name-changing seemed a bit out of place, even for an Indian family that is trying to fit in, in a country like the United States.

The Namesake Post A # 2

Another culture gap between the Ganguli's life in Calcutta, and their life in Boston, is the ways of transportation. The ways people move from point A to point B are drastically different. In addition to that, the family just moved to a university town outside of Cambridge, no longer in an urban area. "She wishes [...] they could have stayed in the city. She is stunned that in this town there are no sidwalks to speak of, nostreetlights, no public transportation, no stores for miles at a time (49)." It doesn't mention this in the book, but in Calcutta, most people travel by S.U.V.s or by rickshaw, which is a version of a primitive car. They are moderately noisy, and are not quite the ideal vehicle to drive. Already, however, it seems that Ashima has been accustomed (a little bit) to the American cities, because she does miss the fact that there were a bunch of industrialized ways of transportation, and stores everywhere. She is not, however, completely accustomed to the ways, yet. "She has no interest in learning to drive the new Toyota Corolla it is now necessary for them to own (49)." Although the Corolla is considered to be a pretty good, safe, car by most American's, Ashima does not express an interest to drive it.

Zimbabwe Elections

I chose the Zimbabwe Elections for many reasons, but mostly because I have heard so much about them throughout my life, but I realized that I did not know much about them, or Robert Mugabe.

History on Mugabe
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/643737.stm

The weight of the elections
http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/News/news210420086.htm

Zimbabwe Government
http://go.grolier.com.ezproxy.hclib.org/gol

Post B # 1

I have only read 37 pages into the novel, but so far, I like The Namesake. I just saw "1968" pasted right above the title for chapter 1, but if that hadn't been there, on page 31, the narrator mentions the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, which took place on June 6, 1968. The novel starts out in sometime in August of 1968, and takes place in Cambridge, ten minutes to Harvard, and twenty to MIT. Ashima has just started to go into labor with Gogol.
Lahiri does a great job of narrating, and almost makes it seem as if the novel switches off from being told from the viewpoint of Ashima, Ashoke, and another narrator. "But nothing feels normal to Ashima. For the past eighteen months, ever since she's arrived in Cambridge, nothing has felt normal at all. It's not so much the pain [...] its the consequence: motherhood in a foreign land. [...] But she is terrified to raise a child in a country where she is related to no one, where she knows so little, where life seems so tentative and spare (6)." Perhaps her biggest fear is living in the United States, and having to raise Gogol in a country unfamiliar to both of them. That fear seems natural, because people generally fear the unknown. Anyway, though, when I read the paragraph about this, I didn't even notice that it was written in third person, and it seemed completely from her point of view. Another quote about Ashoke, I also thought was written in first-person, just from his point of view, instead of Ashima's. "He now desperately needs a cup of tea for himself, not having managed to make one before leaving the house. [...] He takes off his thick-rimmed glasses, fitted by a Calcutta optometrist[...](11)." This is a unique writing style that I have never encountered, and I am excited to read more of this.

The Namesake Post A # 1

One cultural difference between the modern lives of American's and the life of the Ganguli family is the difference in which the woman of the house regards the man. In United States pop culture, television, and literature, to put it bluntly, sex is shameless. It is portrayed as a completely okay activity for most ages to engage in. In Indian films, kissing or touching is an example of something that almost never happens. I watched a film earlier this year called Ashoke, and it followed that criteria perfectly. He basically meets his dream wife, and there are probably about five scenes where they could kiss, but they don't. So I guess that Indian films are much more conservative than American films in that sense.
In addition to that, the wife Ashima tells the reader how she never addresses her husband by his name "Ashoke." "She has adopted his surname but refuses, for propriety's sake, to utter his first. It's not the type of thing Bengali wives do. Like a kiss or caress in a Hindi movie, a husband's name is something intimate and unspoken, cleverly patched over. [...] She utters [...] to replace it, which roughly translates roughly as 'Are you listening to me (2)?'" In the U.S., husbands have many nicknames such as "honey" or something stupid like that, while in the Ganguli family, Ashoke is sometimes addressed as "Are you listening."

4th Quarter Outside Reading Book

I chose the novel "The Namesake," by Jhumpa Lahiri. I wanted to read it mostly due to the fact that I have not read many pieces of literature by Indian authors. It is about a family who comes to the United States from Calcutta, and about a boy named Gogol, and his experience growing up in America, and although I am half-Indian, I haven't really had to experience the culture gap inbetween India and the United States. This book will give me a better idea of what it is like for someone in that position.