An article in Deccan Herald “The Days of Desi” makes for an interesting read for Desis in Pardes.
The author, Surekha Kadapa-bose explains “the end of 2017 is witnessing a sudden cacophony, a sudden urgency, and a new-found love for everything desi. This, of course, is a delightful U-turn from the previous passionate adoption of everything foreign. But, just as we went to extremes to adapt the Western lifestyle from the 1970s to the new millennium, we now seem to be doing the same with desi. There seems to be a bit too much stress on desi food, fashion, culture, religion, rituals, films, music, education etc.”
There is a general misconception that fashion, as shown in the big fat wedding scenes of Bollywood films, is ‘the’ desi attire – men dressed in long silky sherwanis, bandhgalas, with a angavastra wound round their necks, and women, of course, have to be dressed in voluminous ghagras with miniscule cholis, blingy saris etc…
After desi attire comes food. The craze for desi has made inroads here too. The best examples are the popular junk foods – pizzas and burgers – which are originally adopted from Italy and America. Now they are getting Indianised and are being served with a desi touch. You get pizzas with toppings like tandoori paneer, chicken tikka, paneer vegorama, and burgers with stuffings like veg aloo tikki, masala dosa, paneer and so on.
My take on this variation: if one is so much in love with desi khaana, then why not say “no” to pizzas and burgers, and have Mom-made dosas, parathas and samosas instead?
GaramChai.com has long prided itself in being the single stop source for “Desi in Pardes” with extensive listings of Desi Restaurants, boutiques, places of worship and culture
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