Abstract
This paper attempts to bring forth
the issues raised by Rishi Timisna, a novice novelist in the Nepali literature,
about the situated Diaspora, that majority of the Nepali youth faces due to
their willingness to earn more overnight and
how they get indulged in such
circumstances which led them to be nowhere. The paper discusses the term
‘Diaspora’ in regard to the nostalgia that different characters had during the
onset, horizon and the end of their presented life in the novel. The struggle
faced by the characters in the different sets of life is relatively viewed in
this paper. Moreover, within the boundary of the Diaspora writing, this paper
tries to see the unforeseen diasporic character in the womb of Rosa Kelly.
Keywords: Diasporic
writing, immigrants, Cultural shocks, war and politics, displacement and
in-between-ness
Cracking the Nuts
“Country
roads!
Take me home
To the place I belong.” (Timsina, 2012)
The Novel, Wisthapan, ends with the song by
John Denver, reflecting on the past, present and plan for the future. Rishi
Timsina, a novice writer in the field of Nepali literature ends up his novel with
the song, nostalgic about his country, the environment, the roads, and the
moments he spent with, his neighbors, parents and friends. However, I believe the story beings where he
stops.
Diaspora:
An Introduction
Etymologically,
the term Diaspora is coined from Greek word Diaspeirein - "to
scatter about, disperse", from Dia means "about, across" + Speirein
means "to scatter" (Bhatt, 2008). It was used by the ancient
Greeks to refer to citizens of a dominant city-state who emigrated to a
conquered land with the purpose of colonization, to assimilate the territory
into the empire (ibid.). However, the term also refers to the involuntary
movement of people from one country to another. Diaspora, is synonymously taken
as the process of immigration, however, it is not only so but also the displacement
spatially, temporally, culturally, psychologically. In fact, Diaspora, in my
point of view, is the deep nostalgia towards one’s own nation, culture and
identity which is due to the displacement.
Major
Issues in Diasporic Writing
Diasporic writing
mainly focuses on the nostalgic feeling about one’s own culture and it seems
like ‘immigrant writing’ (Bhatt, 2008), mirrors a ‘double vision’, at once of
‘yearing backward’ and ‘looking forward’(ibid). This shows that, the double
complexities of the peoples past and the future and the displacement that can
be seen in the time, place, culture, and even in the psychic is the major
issues in the diasporic writing. The complexities of ‘in-between-ness ’ is the
another issue in the diasporic literature, which left people unknown about
their roles and responsibilities in the society- neither in the origin nor in
the destination. The dual complexities can often be seen as the major social
issues which brings the ultimately ‘identity crisis’ in the peoples life. The
feeling of leaving the nation for the second generation people to be in the
‘father land’ mostly brings the identity crisis and criticism for leaving the
land of the opportunity or the land where he/she spent most of the time. While
in this circumstance, the psychological pressure for the people will be
unbearable; this sometime may lead them to lose life too. Dr. M. F. Salat, as
mentioned in Bhatt (2008) says, ‘the Diaspora as belonging to everywhere and
nowhere at the same time, just like an ‘untouched soul’.’ This condition of
nowhere and everywhere critically brings the identity crisis and the effect in
their psychic matters a lot in their life. Similarly, this process of being no/everywhere
brings the socio-cultural traumatic conditions as well. The cultural shocks,
hybridity in the culture, and a new process of cultural assimilation can raise
the question of adaptation and re-adaptation in the same or different culture
time and again. A mixed cultural milieu opens up new vistas of communication
and dialogue in this cosmopolitan world, as a result, diasporic reciprocation
has become one of the recurrent themes in post-colonial world literature (Bhatt,
2008).
Biographical
Sketch of the Author Rishi Timsina
Rishi Timsina,
was born in 1978, in the eastern part of
Nepal. Grown up as a village child, he sensitized the vicarious knowledge of
the Diasporic concept and the ‘homeless in their own home people’, through the
experiences of his neighbor and the Bhutanese Refuses. How come you write the
thematic Diaspora in such a situated circumstances? Answering the query Timsina
says, ‘The strong inclination of my
friends towards the ‘Khadi Muluk’ and
my father’s nostalgia being in Arab for three months attracted me to go in
depth about this sorts of writing’(Timsina, 2014: based up on the personal
conversation).
Mr.
Timisina, is a Graduate from Dhankuta Multiple Campus, and M. Ed. form Central
Department, Tribhuvan University. His writings are published in the college
magazines and also in National Dailies frequently. He mostly prefers to deploy
the reality of the Nepalese youth and he writes for the major issues that
professional people face on their life. ‘Helmet
Teacher’, ‘Fatima Ko Diary’ are a
few of this sorts of his short stories published in the National Dailies, as a
Novelist, this handy novel is his first of this type.
The
plot and the General Overview: a Diasporic Assimilation.
The diasporic song and the diasporic
development of the plots fill the whole novel. The major characters display the
longing to be home with the ups and downs of their life in the different lands.
The materialistic goal of migration hits the mind of young Baru, the central
character in the novel, and his long for going abroad in search of better
future is the major aspect of the novel, Wisthapan- the displacement.
Though
the novel gives the glimpses of the war-torn Nepal, and the political
instability, its main focus seems to be in the periphery of the nostalgia that
the characters develop in their long term life. The novel touches the
basic part of the peripheral political
scene, but it doesn’t give the internal scenario of the political instability
of Nepalese scenario.
Biru
meets Rosa Kelly, a foreigner, when he was hardly surviving without food and water;
moreover, he was affected by the tension as he waited a long to the ship in the
Arabian Sea. Rosa uplifts him from his state of questioning surviving.
To be
more specific, Wistahapan is not the story of the political member and
political leader, however, it is the story of a Neapli youth who, like the
young people here, would like to go to the foreign land, longing to earn, wants
to make home in nearby city, like to add up land however, finishes all his
property assimilating his ideas with a nearby broker. In the novel, the readers
can view the problems of the Nepali contemporary society where mostly youngsters
are attracted towards migration.
People
who move out of their homelands and live elsewhere by choices are emigrants.
Here, however, Biru strolls in the new lands in search of new future but his
miserable condition of his life makes him nostalgic about the country, place
and the home he was from. Yet, the other characters like Rosa Kelly, a European
and Gloria, a grown up in America represents the diashphoric characters here.
To be more specific, Rosa lies in the between-ness of Europe and Nepal as she
gets married to Baru, who gets back to the unnamed place after she gets
pregnant, leaving Baru, in Nepal. Her nowhere-ness is unseen in the novel, and
to me the major question is that of the ‘Nepali Fetus’ growing up in her womb
will be in the state of nowhere-ness (?). She represents the in-between-ness of
Europe/Nepal/Nowhere (?), which is the true disporic claim I would make in it.
Similarly, Gloria, born in Vietnam, a war-torn state, was grownup in the USA.
Her decision to get back to Vietnam after all can also represent the in
–between-ness type of picture in the novel. Moreover, the central character,
Baru, himself is in the midst of the cultural, political, social, economical
and personal displacement and in between-ness which carries the flavor of
diasporic writing.
Mr. Timisna, deploys the thought of diasporic
characters in his novel, as a very good writer in this field. With the
development of the novel, I can sensitize the feeling of diasporic features as
William Safran delimits the certain conditions for a person to be a diaspora: dispersal from a centre to
two or more peripheral or foreign regions; retention of collective memory,
vision or myth; the belief that full acceptance by the host country is not
possible with consequent alienation; regard for the ancestral homeland as the
true or ideal home and place of eventual return; commitment to the maintenance
or restoration of the homeland to its safety and prosperity; and personal or
vicarious relations with the homeland in an ethno-communal consciousness(as
cited in Poudel, 2013).
Biru’s memory to the homeland, his place of
existence in the country environment, and the temporal and spatial remoteness
from his root gives the flavor of diasporic genre. Similarly, Gloria, returns
home, Vietnam, being grown up in America. Rosa a married woman to Biru, gets
back to her homeland, taking the Nepali seeds of Biru. In my point of view, not only the descriptive generation
as Rosa and Gloria represents the diasporic nature but also, Mr. Timisina,
plants the diasporic scene in the womb of Rosa, to the unborn baby who is
migrated to the new land from his father land in the womb. As Rogers Brooker
claimed further that diaspora in their new lands always keep a distance from
the mainstream, and this trend continues for a long, long time, transmitted
from generation to generation. This thought of Brooker is the key point to
strengthen my point of view to see the unborn baby to be diasporic in the new
land that always seem to remain distanced from the mainstream, from the culture
his father was from, and moreover, he remains uprooted from the root he was
supposed to belong to.
Wisthapan, as a novel stands apart from the
other novel in comparison to the practice made by the novice writers. This
novel can be compared to ‘Muglan’, by Prof. Dr. Govinda Raj Bhattarai, ‘Muluk
Bahira’by Laina Singh Bangdel and ‘Basain’ by Lil Bahadur Chhetri, where the
readers can visualize the problems of characters and the situation of
Nepalese people and their sufferings through the lenses of
the diaspora studies.
The novel shows the
cultural shifts in its scenes. Biru’s life in Goa, is a part of cultural shift
where he forgets ‘whey’ of his home and enjoys the ‘beer’, dancing in the dance
party and enjoying the moments with the westerners in the full moon night, the
scene setting in the beach, where he happens to be with Rosa in the romantic
sensational mood are the settings in the cultural shifts. Similarly, getting
married to a Nepali, and adopting the culture of Nepal which is totally
different from the western culture is another part of the cultural shift in the
novel depicted in by Mr. Timisina. This reflects the sense of lost as well as
the sense of gain in the diaspora studies. While transmitted from one culture
and civilization to another, we realized the sense of lost with the previous
culture and sense of gain with the new culture as well. In this study, gain and
lost both occurred at the same time. The desire to gain the lost increases more
and there is no satisfaction with the new achievement. Biru, Rosa, and Gloria
all the characters are facing the same problems. Gloria was taken to America
from Vietnam. But she longed to reach to her own ruin village. Rosa came India
for social welfare and became activist against the human broker. She entered as
a bride in Nepalese society. She has learnt many things from Nepalese house.
But for once she wanted to go to her own village. Likewise, after a short
living in India Baru learnt lesson of life.
Conclusion so Far
This
novel can be viewed from the different perspectives and lenses of literary
genre. However, in my point of view, taking the support from Cohen (1995), ‘the collective forced dispersion of a religious and/or
ethnic group precipitated by a disaster, often of a political nature’, I can claim that, Biru migrates because of
the political reasons, as he cannot find a job suitable for him in ten years of
political instability. He cannot reach and settle in the foreign land due to
the cultural shock being unaware of the
culture of brokers. He cannot resettle in his own land because of the political
reasons. Biru’s suffering is the replication of the true diasporic feeling
which many youngsters represent, unspoken their hidden truth is depicted here
in this novel. The identity being lost in the own land due to political
insurgency is the barbaric state that majority of the Nepali faced in the
country, which this novel speaks representing the voices of youngsters from the
voice of Biru. And the novel ends with the song,
“Country roads,
Take me home,
To the place I
belong...” (Timsina, 2012)
Where I believe the story begins.
References:
Bhatt,
M.B. (2008). Struggle to acculturate in
the Namesake: a comment on Jhumpa Lahari’s work as diasporic literature. A
paper presented in the twentieth conference of th International Association of
Historian of Asia, New Delhi.
Timsina,
R. (2014, January 21). Personal conversation.
Payudal,
M. (2013). Who are the the diasporic people. In Blog retrieved from
http://www.maheshpaudyal.com/p/english-articles.html
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