My Indian-Australian Identity

Arya Choudhury (14 years)

Being an Indian child in the Western world is close to living a double life. Between the warm parathas and Hindi songs at home to the Chapel Service and English songs in school, are two different worlds. Growing up as an Indian child, I’ve always had boundaries that some of my other friends didn’t have, which as a young 7-year-old was a challenge for me.

The constant pressure to fit in with the Aussie society but also to bring home good grades to impress the folks was difficult. Fitting in was the biggest challenge. I would tend to gravitate towards the other Indians in my year and distant myself from the Aussies. It was intentional but it was natural. Having a friend that I could relate to and talk to about my life was all I wanted as a friend when I was in the primary years of school. The Indian tradition always forced me to study or wear kurtas to Pujas. The kurtas always felt heavy on my shoulders. All I wanted to do was play basketball in the backyard, hoping to make it to the NBA or play in the Champions League. As an Indian Australian, we would always be seen as the opposition on the court, whether it’s us as Australians in India or us as Indians in Australia.
As the years passed by, it became a self-guided quest to find myself, while still performing and studying. As a child, we all have dreams and imaginations, which become goals and slowly our ambitions. When we cross our early teen years, life gets tougher. Study hours slowly increase, and the competitive spirit keeps growing.

I started to form opinions; the world opened up to me with bigger and newer perspectives. My respect for self-made international icons grew and my awareness of poverty and the value of education strengthened. Those early dreams of being a football or a basketball star are broken and demolished by the confined traditional lawyer, engineer, and doctor pathways. My goal 7 years back was to play and compete at an international level, but that hasn’t changed. I still want to compete and win at a national level, but my perspective changed towards the way to achieve it.

Many Indian-Australians would see being an Indian in Australia as a disadvantage because of racism or the constant feeling of being unwanted, which is all true, but I see it as an opportunity to beat them in their own country, in their own game. All I want to say is that I will use our so-called disadvantage of being Indians in a Western world as an advantage and opportunity to succeed.