blessings from my taxi driver

People tend to think of God at three moments in their lives: birth, death, and marriage. I've seen births, I've seen deaths, and I've been to weddings, and yet, still, the only time I think of God is when I ride in a New York City yellow cab.

A few weeks ago, I took a cab to Vin's place. I was in pain underneath the weight of all of my textbooks, all hardcover, all maroon, and all stamped in gold, in an almost imperious, abrasive, unsettling gold. I hailed a cab with my left foot, and one screeched to a halt. I threw my books inside, dove in headfirst (unnecessarily), and yelped, "61st and York." As he was about to leave, I yelled out. "Wait! I think I left something in the vestibule." He hesitated, and then laughed, "I don't mind, I get good tip." I ran back to my apartment, found nothing, and ran back outside.

I sat back inside, letting the ripped, cheap leather and the soft, incomprehensible murmur of someone on his cellphone envelop and immobilize me. I stared outside, watching the city lights blur past me. I thought of my insurmountable amount of homework. I thought of my lost writing dreams and I thought of my friends, and how much I would miss them next year. I thought of how soon my entire life would change. I thought of wedding planning, of the great offense Indian guests take when, well, anything happens, and of the beauty that is in a large family coming together and celebrating you. I thought of my parents' expectations of me, I thought of my parents'  incredible spirit and energy. I thought of how, no matter how liberal or progressive people characterize themselves on Facebook, that at certain points in a woman's life - birth, death, marriage - society bears down upon her with a scrutinizing eye. I thought of Vin, I thought of our busy lives, and I thought of how I had not seen him alone, in silence, for weeks, maybe even a month.

And then I started silently crying in the backseat. 

The driver was off the phone. "So, where you from?"

I knew he wasn't talking about New Jersey. "India," I replied. "I am Gujarati." He asked me if I could speak Hindi, and I told him I understood it perfectly, so he could speak to me in Hindi if he didn't mind that I responded in a very English heavy version of Hinglish.

He was thrilled. He asked what I was studying, if I was married, where my parents were. A sudden anxiety washed over me. "I'm engaged, and I am in law school."

He started, and became very serious. "Beta, that's so wonderful. Please keep studying. Focus on school and grow. Nothing else is important. I hope you are not distracted by all small-small things. We need people like you in the law, beta. You can help us one day. I hope that the next time I see you, it will be on the Supreme Court. Beta, you will be a great lawyer, in the Supreme Court."

I smiled. "Thank you so much." He shook his head. It was nothing, he was just telling me the truth, and he wanted to know I had his blessings and he would pray for me. I wanted to reach out, through the dirty, plastic barrier that divided us, and put my hand on his shoulder, but the cab abruptly stopped in front of Vin's place, and I was jerked back into reality - a reality where it is not OK to touch an uncle's shoulder. I walked to Vin's apartment with my head held high, acknowledging all the sacrifices everyone had made for me to get to where I am. Before Vin opened the door, I closed my eyes, and for one very long, very heavy moment, I prayed to God that he give that cab driver all the happiness in the world. 

Today, I was walking from far uptown to go to school. It was a complicated walk - the Pope is in town and streets are arbitrarily closed off (in the name of ceremony, perhaps). After the second time I was redirected down the street, my shoe broke in the middle of the crosswalk. I certainly couldn't walk to school, and so hailed another cab. An older man with kind eyes and a turban pulled over. I got in and told him the law school's address. "Wait, Washington Square Park and Macdougal is the school, right beta?" I nodded. I told him I would have normally walked, and I stuck my foot out and showed him my broken shoe. He looked at me intently in the rearview mirror.

"Beta, you would have walked from here all the way down?" I assumed he was about to lecture me on how I am too frail. "That makes me so happy, beta. That is one and one half hours! Walking at your age is so good for you. People here, they don't walk, they take taxis." When I told him I was Gujarati, he exclaimed, "Oh! That's why you walk so much, beta. Very good, very good."

I got excited. "Yea! And it's good for the environment. And those subway prices are so expensive, too, right, uncle?"

He agreed. And then he asked me how old I was, expressed surprise that I was 26 (he said I looked like his 18 year old niece from Buffalo), and asked me about my parents. He asked if I spoke Hindi, and I told him what I told the other taxi driver. He told me he had been in America since 1988, the year I was born. 

I told him palak paneer was my favorite food, and that I wished I was from Amritsar, where he was from, so I could eat palak paneer for breakfast instead of dhoklas (which I don't eat for breakfast anyways). I asked him if he frequented the Punjabi deli on Second Avenue, and he told me he preferred the one on Houston and Avenue A and the one on Ninth Avenue and 21st Street. He said they had more vegetarian options, since the one I'd mentioned was Pakistani. 

As I left the cab, he told me I had his blessings. He said, "By grace of God, maybe I will pick you up in a taxi again someday, beta. So nice to meet you." I smiled. "I will see you at the Punjabi deli, uncle." He shook his head, in that ambiguous way that all Indians shake their heads - not saying no because they still have hope, but not saying yes because they recognize reality. I shut the door, and he quickly rolled down the window and said, "Beta, say hi to your parents for me."

"I will, uncle," I said, and I limped off with my one shoe, praying for him and his family, and thanking God that I met such goodness this morning.

One Story

I have always liked the idea of one. One favorite flavor of ice cream. One language spoken at home. One homeland.

It's a nice idea, but unattainable.

Tonight, the Islamic Center at NYU sponsored Aasif Mandvi, the tragically humorous, unheroic hero of voiceless, confused, hybridized browns. He read two stories from his new book, No Land's Man. The first story was about the way in which he tried to fit in at his high school in Florida, as a new transplant from England, where he had moved from his Bohra community in Mumbai. I almost thought he was reading back to me my life story; it was a story about youth and discovery and sky blue Volkswagens, not a particularized story about a larger, mythicized "Muslim American identity." The second story was about the trajectory of his inspiring and impactful career.

He then engaged the students - who came from all over NYU - in a thoughtful Q & A. People asked funny questions about light moments in the stories and for advice as Muslim artists and writers. People posed profound questions about race and religion and multiculturalism. He was asked about his perspective on the Broadway play "Disgraced," in which he played the role of Amir. In response to a student expressing her dismay and discomfort about the play's conclusion, which she said extended stereotypes to modernized/westernized/Muslims, he said that the playwright, Ayad Akhtar, was not trying to speak for all Muslims. Rather, he was just telling his story - what he was feeling, how he saw the world, how he saw Amir. It was not a political message, not a sermon. It was not his duty as a Muslim or Muslim American or American to spread awareness about his "cause" or "group." It was just one story. It was his story.

No matter how hard I try to fit my story into a neat package - a package of Indian American or American Indian or New York City or Law Student or Ridgewood or Woman - I can never get it to really stick. I do not adequately represent any one thing or any one person. Mandvi advised a student about this constant tension, that nauseating, irritating, gnawing sensation we have lived with in seeking to define ourselves. He said, "Your multiplicity is your source of power."

I will never have just one. I like Bailey's ice cream and mint chocolate chip ice cream. My mother blesses me in Gujarati and my father praises me in English. The boundaries of my homeland begin in Ahmedabad and end in New York City. Amid the versatility and the colors and the languages and the insecurities and the tragedies and the bounty, there is not one of anything - except, perhaps, one story. My story.