Indian people.

I’m an Indian girl. I was born there and lived there till I was 2 years old. I went back for holidays and went to a school there. During the time I was here in the UK I went to functions and was mostly in the company of Indian women. I didn’t find any difference between women from India and women from England. They were both delightful to me as a child. The odd bitchy exception. Women loved me, I was always a little curious of men in general because I had comments about my body; I had developed early and even as a child I had breasts. I wasn’t the little baby doll so in no way I am sure did they have any inappropriate feelings for me, being small eyed, plump and happy (I sure looked happy back then) but I had these smooth cheeks women used to go gaga over.

When I was about 8 years old, I noticed when I smiled at a woman looking at me or in my direction, she did not respond well. Back then I was naïve and an innocent, my smile was without pretension or any fake “quality.” It was a pure chubby cheeked wide smile. I can see it even now in the photos.

At 11 when I was at secondary school, I suppose this is like high school to those in America, it was of course the time when things are really developing. Physically I had fully developed but I had always been the chubby jovial kid, and to some women the pretty chubby jovial girl. But at this time I noticed how certain children in my class wanted to keep their distance from me. I noticed how my friend big dark eyes, curly hair and thin tall body could make friend so easily and I would smile and there wouldn’t be anything. At that time I didn’t feel nervous around people even though I was shy but it was becoming in a way, part of my charm- as opposed to being crippling as it got when my social phobia came into full force and I couldn’t take my eyes off the ground. I’m still not recovered from that and whenever I now see someone glaring at me just for me looking ahead, it actually takes effort to lift my eyes and try and hold my head up high and walk as I used to- before the bullying got to me.

Anyway, at secondary school we had a couple of Indian girls and boys. The Indian boys would make fun of me, call me fat, laugh at me. I used to glare at them and ignore them. They were little snitches.

The Indian girls would give me the same treatment. I always felt I wanted to just go up to an Indian girl and just talk to her because I have a history with India growing up there, having two fully Indian names, Indian parents who speak Hindi to each other, knowing Hinduism, I just felt we could talk about these things together. But, no.

Looking back, it wasn’t the fact that I wasn’t tall, thin but I just don’t come across as cool enough. I know that’s an incredibly superficial analysis but I have noticed how people want to be around those who are cool and those they look up to. They don’t want to be around someone they have something in common with if that something is not cool. It’s my person. Me. My mum and I got talking this weekend and she said whilst I’m chatty and friendly, people perhaps sense I am intense. I don’t let go of things easily. That is true. I haven’t let go of the past and I don’t shrug things off. Even when I smile, I guess they see that sadness that is there in me. That sadness I get just from everything. Everything affects me. I’m strong, I get people telling me how strong and brave I am but I suppose my intensity is just not cool.

But she said we are who we are.

I can make myself adapt and I’m no longer shutting myself off from the world even though get pain everyday but that’s it, it’s the pain. I guess at that time I looked sensitive and I sure was, it showed. And now that sensitivity has not got less.

I started this post with Indian people..I guess we’re just talking people in general. I wanted to say how I noticed Indian people look up to the Westerners a bit more; they try and copy them in fashion, movies, music, it’s there for us to see and language, words like cool, when they talk an Indian language, there are varieties of the Indian language and one is Hindi, they also use English words next to an Indian word/s. It’s as if the English and American influences have even come into language and are there without even thinking about it, there in their unconscious.

This intensity has given me something as a writer, as you can see I can write for England or India, though what I write may not be good, boy the word count is a lot, but it’s given me difficulties too.

There is one Indian girl I know who has a problem with me. I go into her shop, she admires my mother and sister but the way she looks at me, I once smiled at her, she looked away. Her reaction is much like what I have experienced with Indian girls, women and boys and men.

My mum once said to me Indian men like their girls to look resemble movie stars. They don’t like the average girl next door thing. But that’s not my thing. That’s what I am. I wear what I want to wear not something sexy. I look neat, clean and that I can't help. I can wear something grungy, I still look the same. I've had one comment relax your shoulders and smile but I used to do that and I never got any different reaction.

Going back where I was, I was going on to say that whenever I’m out, I see the Indian males look at the girl who ‘s wearing the shortest outfit but still looks elegant. The model-y type of girl. The visually stunning one. There’s a big thing in our country and countries with dark skinned people about the colour of skin. I have been told by dark skinned Indians how beautiful I am with my fair skin. However, by the Indians just a little darker than me, who have more olive skin tones than brown, I see them giving me weird looks. Some girls laugh to each other, some look me up and down and whisper to the girl beside them. The boys just laugh. The men avoid the direction of my gaze sometimes on them and sometimes ahead all times due to watching where I am walking ( I daren’t bump into anyone, the amount of times I’ve gotten banged in the arm or had an irritated sigh or glare just for being..there). I used to think this was because of my weight, whilst not being obese,I was a few kilograms overweight and always got the comments about it but now I know it’s me. After they avoid my gaze, they look at another female quickly and stare at her face, hair and body.

I’m very used to the looks inbetween my eyes and if by accident my eyes meet someone's and if male they look at someone else after they frown or stare hard at me bang on between my eyes and then they quickly look to another female. By non Indian men, it’s mostly avoidance, complete avoidance. I don’t think they even value me as a customer, I’ve had to ask them twice for their help and they’re always talking to me and looking away.

By quite a few African men, I’ve noticed them look at me the way Indian men and non Indian men look at women who are not me.

I just wonder who chose this very specific lifestyle for me- as if the lifetstyle I would like to choose and whom I would want to have any interaction with is not something I can have.

And Indian women..the ones who are older than me give me the same response as non Indian women. Which I’ve talked about before.

None of this is new I don’t think I’ve often talked about it. I talk about it to have it out there. No hiding for me. I want it exposed. I have it on my mind. It used to affect me deeply, now I know I can process it later when I write. Perhaps I am scarred from it and perhaps that is evident. All I know is I take the same picture now as I did when I was younger, all depends on what I feel like doing at the time. I don't pose, don't think I have in my life.

And how do I process my day? I used to get upset, now it's a headache and I just want to have it out there pure and simple. It’s become a part of my life because of my interactions with people. I’ve had to work harder as a customer and walk on the sidelines literally so not to get in anyone’s way.

I suppose it’s the lack of coolness which other people when they laugh at my face or imitate when I walk past or look at me with a smirk which I’ve caught many times, I’ve noticed it’s been something which seems to want to map out a direction for me. It has in some way. I don’t just feel nerves before an audition, I can’t go because my fear cripples me. I want to though. But tell me I have an audition tomorrow it will seem like the end of the world to me, every part of my body tense and everything bad feeling heightened. The enthusiasm, the lust to perform goes completely. It was there a little once, now it’s not. Unless I know I haven’t got an audition. If it’s a future, it seems far off and I can dream but I don’t have to face. That’s cowardice. That’s what I hate in people who mock me. They’re cowards but I’m not applauding or justifying them, they DO something. I don’t. And me- I don't. If you don’t do something, you can’t get hurt more.

Today I saw someone that I felt something connecting them to my present need. I seem to want to settle down. It’s this feeling I get. Perhaps it’s the something to lean on or some stability in the uncontrollable reality of every day but I want to get married. I want to wear the dress, have the ceremony and I want to move in with someone and start a family. Once upon a time I would have wanted it to be only if I loved them truly madly and deeply and I didn't even want marriage. Now I seem to want to focus perhaps on a family. I want to move on knowing how little I have moved on..though I try my best as physically and mentally possible at the time..half of the times. The thing is, they must love me completely too, I still have that in me to only get married if this is the case and I know it but not quite believe it (that will come in time due to my issues with the issues other people have with me and are apparent- sad I know) but I’m giving more leeway nowadays. Whereas I once only had a crush on someone whom I would feel butterflies over at first sight, now it’s not the case anymore.

So anyway, I merely looked and was polite. I don’t think about stuttering when I talk to someone because I don’t do it that much but if I do, it’s become the least of my worries for want of better words. And when I talk about the one guy I sometimes talk about whom I saw in November, I know that I had a blood red boil, which caused the doctor to ask what I had done to myself, half the size of a 5 penny coin on my cheek ( I always get the eczema, impetigo and acne on my cheeks- one time on my chin but that was a couple of 5 pences size- it spread, what can I say) so when I saw the guy whom I liked from a distance, there was an authority about him and his face was beautiful, I don’t remember his features but he had a beauty to him but when I had to speak to him, I could barely look at him. Today I looked at this guy but he was shy, I could tell from looking at him earlier. He didn’t have the politeness and reassuring quality of my other guy but the thing of it is, that doesn’t even register to me anyway. As if I just want to settle down. Or perhaps it IS because I look at people, really look at them and I feel drawn to him in some way. Perhaps it’s both or unfortunately just the first one.


And nowadays, my confidence is not confidence. It’s bravado. I want to have my confidence back. I have always had my lust and after a few bad days, I need to release some energy that way too but I can’t imagine being made love to by someone whom I lust after and love as equally as they do me..meaning I would either be more so or they would and it would only be after years of living together, we would be at the same level.


To end this, something that is never ending but I have written everything on my mind, I must work hard and go the long way I have to go because that’s how I will get things in my life. By things I’m not being specific. I just wish I could get a break. That’s not even an opportunity, for me it’s just someone not being mean to me.

Also, I’m floundering.