Interview Transcript with Ashima
Me: Ashima Ganguli, thank you so much for joining me today for this interview. I really appreciate your time.
Ashima: Oh Thomas, it is quite an honor son.
Me: Well then, lets get right to it. Last year in AP English, you expressed some concern about raising a child in a country that was so foreign to you. Were you ever able to get over these concerns?
Ashima: You are correct as a future mother who has just moved from India I am deeply concerned. In fact, ‘“I am terrified to raise a child in a country where we are related to no one”’ (6). I have started to gain more Bengali friends in America, but friends are just not the same as family. Without my mother and father nearby it will be difficult to ever really move past my concerns of raising children in a country that is so far from my homeland and from where my parents once lived.
Me: Indian culture differs in many ways from American culture so how has it been difficult participating in a class where all of the other 21 students were all Americans?
Ashima: Obviously this was extremely difficult for me. I tried to teach them about my heritage but many times they seemed to rebel against us. It was almost as if they denied my Bengali viewpoints not because they did not like the Bengali customs, but because they wanted to defy me, like many other teenagers.
Me: So as you stated many times last year in discussions, you plan to have kids soon after graduating from high school. How will you handle the issue of teaching them Bengali or American customs and traditions?
Ashima: Thomas, I have been asked this question many times in the past year because many students seem to be interested. The question is best answered with a little vision that I sometimes dream about in my head. Repeatedly I see this dream of going to the ocean with my husband and young son. And as my son ventures out on the rocks with my husband I call out, “‘He’s too little,… He’s too little to go so far”’ (186). The reason this story illustrates my approach to the assimilation of my future children is because the ocean symbolizes the American culture that they will want to assimilate into. Also, my own lack of enthusiasm to allow this future son to journey into the ocean demonstrates my reluctance to allow him to assimilate into American culture. Does this answer the question Mr. Donley?
Me: Very much so Mrs. Ganguli. Next I would like to know whom you turned to in times of desperation last year because we all experienced it. It is truly grueling at times.
Ashima: Well I really did not have many close friends here in America. Often times I would write to my relatives in India because as you already know, I ‘“have no relatives in this country”’ (79). I really relied on my good friend Joeseph Sitzwohl and I turned to him with all of my problems. But I did not start to trust him until many months after we met because my first impression was that he was a unique intellectual type person. But as we both grew closer I learned I could really confide in Joe.
Me: That brings me to another question I would like to ask. How did you handle Joe leaving AP Eglish?
Ashima: As I just said, his decision to leave was very hard on me because I did not have anyone else I was so close to.
Me: But you should not be angry with him. He just wanted some time to work on some of his songs that he has recently produced. He has a whole album and all of the songs are quite good if you have not heard any of them yet.
Ashima: Do not try to tell me how I should feel about my friend’s behavior. You know Thomas, you are a bold reporter to make a statement like that.
Me: You can blame my AP English class. This year they have imbedded in me the willingness to quickly criticize others. I am terribly sorry.
Ashima: Just do not let it happen again.
Me: I do not mean to be rude, but you did have other classmates.
Ashima: I was not finished yet Mr. Donley.
Me: Well actually, I am finished because that is all of the time I have today. Thank you very much for meeting me today and this will appear on Monday in the Tiger Times as the feature story.
Ashima: Great, I am looking forward to it.
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