Are NRIs not patriotic?

Hello! 

This post is about patriotism. This doesn't mean I am going to talk about army or navy. Neither am I going to talk about living for the country or dying for the country. Then, what am I going to talk about that's related to patriotism? Read more to know that.

        What do you think is being patriotic? Most people think not doing a masters degree in a different country is being patriotic, most others think working only in their own country is being patriotic and the majority thinks changing the display picture on social networking sites on national holidays makes them a patriot. I have travelled to a few countries, I am right now in United Kingdom for a few months as its my husband's onsite assignment. I am anyway getting back to my country, India in a few days. But given a chance to study or work for a company that's away from India I will surely take it up and still I call myself patriotic.

      There are many students who have dreams that are not possible to be achieved in their respective countries. A lot of students go to the USA OR Germany or Australia to pursue their dream of becoming a good enter, doctor or in most cases, become richer than present. If a person is going to shed off the opportunity he gets to work in a foreign land calling himself patriotic, then he/she is a fool. Everyone wants to improve the living standards of their family first. But still many of them are patriotic, I assure. How? I will tell you an incident in my defence.

     We have to surrender our house that we have rented here, back to the agency. We had to inform them with one month prior notice. As soon as we informed the agency that we were going to vacate the house, they had put up an advertisement on the net. Some people had turned up and had shown interest in visiting the property, the house we have rented. We had a visit planned the next day. I tried my best to clean, as much as I could. My husband reached from work and started cleaning the house a little more cleaner and better. I told him it was ok to make the house look like people are living but he did not listen to me and kept cleaning to make it look like a well maintained museum. When I asked him why he was taking so much pain and that we are paying rent to live here, his reply made me feel proud. He is a true patriot. He said, if the person coming tomorrow to visit this house is not an Indian and if the house is untidy, he will develop a thought that Indians are untidy people and Indians don't keep the house clean. 

In this land, we are a representation of our country and we should never give anyone a bad impression about our country because of us, he said. That's when I realised that being patriotic means owning the country, taking responsibility to create good impression about our country. He always does this even when we go out. In the movie theatre when the person who checks the ticket lets a white person inside without checking much and checks out unlimited card to match the photo with us, we feel ashamed. The only reason we could figure out for such discrimination was that maybe some of the Browns have misused friend's unlimited card that makes them distrust us. Our small actions outside our country might lay a bad light on our country. Remember, even outside India we are Indians, we represent our country. If ŵe take responsibility in not spoiling the image of other people from our country, we are patriotic.

    In this generation of increasing number of NRIs, my request would be to teach your kids the basics about the country they actually belong to. Teach them what colour the national flag is, what the national bird is along with some good things about the country that will make them proud of their origin. It's okay for them to learn the culture and tradition of the country they live in but it's important for them to know their origin at least to understand the lives of their grandparents and parents. Also, to understand that no matter which country's citizen they are, they still represent their original origin. Even if the kids hold a green card one can't change them from being a brown or an Indian by birth, can they'd?

I take pride in sharing what my nephew who lives in Kuwait right from birth knows about his country, India.

This is his hand written passage and his art.

I take this an opportunity to introduce this lovely kid. He is named prithvi, lives in Kuwait. He has a special talent of singing songs fully, without any flaw in lyrics along with the background music mimicked in between right from the age of 3. I love him loads as he is the first guy who made me his heroine to sing songs to.