A Glimpse into India; or, My Love Affair with Bollywood

Bombay cinema is also known—indeed, probably better known—as Bollywood. Since this is derivative of the name “Hollywood,” of course, a number of Bombay filmmakers object to the term, considering it demeaning, as if Bombay’s were a shabby would-be Hollywood. In fact, although it has yet to become popular with mainstream American audiences, Bombay cinema is an even bigger industry than the Hollywood dream factory, releasing more films per year and playing to an even bigger audience, both domestically and internationally.
Laura Resnick, “Bride and Prejudice,” Flirting with Pride and Prejudice

I do not want my house walled in on all sides and my windows to be stuffed. I want the cultures of all the lands to be blown about my house as freely as possible.
Mahatma Ghandi


It all started with Lagaan.

A little over a year ago, Dr. Benjamin Murphy—a close friend who, invariably, makes cameo appearances in my novels—recommended this movie. I had read a few articles about the booming film industry of India and, to be honest, in spite of knowing that it enjoyed great popularity and critical acceptance, I still assumed that films coming out of Bombay would be jokes, pale imitations of their Hollywood counterparts.

And it didn’t help matters when Dr. Murphy said that Lagaan was a musical. “In fact, all Bollywood movies are musicals,” he said with a grin. I was already reluctant to watch a Bollywood film, and when he added that I was ready to run in the opposite direction.

Although I love music (at one point in my life I dreamed about becoming a musician), I have an aversion to musicals. Music is, in my estimation, a nearly impossible means for sustained storytelling. Only a handful of musicals have succeeded in having a consistently good score as well as a noteworthy libretto. I guess that’s why the refined joys of opera elude me.

Because of this, I would’ve skipped Lagaan if my wife hadn’t shamed me into keeping an open mind. We rented the movie at Blockbuster—astonished they had it—and, grudgingly, I sat back in my recliner to watch.

What I saw surprised me; and it was a pleasant surprise, indeed. Since that first time I’ve learned that Bollywood films are not really musicals—at least not in the sense in which Hollywood has taught us to view them. The songs in Bombay cinema underscore the themes explored in a film, but they don’t attempt to move the plot forward. The singing and dancing are more like interludes—and highly entertaining ones at that. And the music is, well, Indian, and the musical strains of this country have always made my ears perk up.

And in the case of Lagaan, I found the story fascinating. The film explores, in an allegorical fashion, the first stirrings of rebellion against British colonialism via the game of cricket. Ultimately, the question in the movie becomes, can the people of India learn to beat the colonizers at their own game—in sports and, by extension, in politics.

I enjoyed Lagaan, immensely. And afterward I patted myself on the back for adding another experience to my list of cross-cultural accomplishments. But then something unexpected happened: for the next few months images and sounds from Lagaan kept intruding into my thoughts—without beckoning—haunting me.

I soon had to admit that after only one viewing I had become a fan of Bombay cinema. I wanted to see more. But where in Panamá could I find Bollywood films?

Ah, but one of the wonderful things about living here is the diversity. Panamá is unlike any other Central American nation. People from all over the world, drawn by the commercial opportunities the path between the seas offers, have settled here, making this country their home. And although by the second generation most have become fully Panamanians, the immigrants and their descendants have also managed to retain much of the culture of their former homelands. It should not surprise anyone, then, that one day, as my wife and I were strolling along Balboa Avenue, across the street from Multicentro, we noticed a new store: King’s Food, catering to the local Indian and Pakistani communities.

Curious, as well as being lovers of Indian food, we wandered inside. And there, to our delight, in a glass display counter, was a large collection of Bombay films—all for rent. Since that discovery, eight months ago, we’ve been enjoying Bollywood weekends. These films have become our window into the cultures of India.

For those who live in Panamá City, if you are adventurous enough to give Bombay cinema a try, just ask the clerks at King’s Foods what they recommend. Be sure to tell them that you’re a beginner. That’s what my wife and I do, and their suggestions have never let us down.

For the rest of you, the internet is loaded with information about Bollywood, including movies you can legitimately download.

A few words of caution. Before embarking on this journey one needs to know that Bollywood films are highly predictable. A movie we rented recently, Swades, had a brief preamble. Even before the opening credits started rolling I had already figured out the plot. But I welcome this as it allows me to concentrate on observing how people from another culture and with a different set of spiritual beliefs deal with dilemmas that are universal.

Also, Bombay films run three-hours. (Exceptions are recent productions such as Monsoon Wedding and Bride and Prejudice, which are designed to help Bollywood seduce the western world). Marathon films are what Bollywood audiences are accustomed to and what they expect. They certainly don’t suffer from attention-deficit-disorder. When I first watched Lagaan I didn’t know this, and in spite of enjoying the film, after two hours I started to wonder if it was ever going to end—sort of like a game of cricket, I guess.

But there’s always an intermission in Bombay cinema—it’s part of the movie-going culture. Take advantage of it. Get up, stretch your legs, make some popcorn, and get something to drink. And when you’re ready again, hit the play button and allow the filmmakers of Bombay to resume their magic.

Now . . . if only Panamá had an Indian restaurant.

On Eats, Shoots and Leaves

Life is tons of discipline. You first discipline your vocabulary; then your grammar and your punctuation.
Robert Frost

Sticklers Unite!
Lynne Truss


Can a book that explains the rules of punctuation be entertaining?

Absolutely.

A friend of ours—who is a fellow lover of language—gave the book to my wife and me as a Christmas present. At the time I thought it an odd gift. But now, after having read Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, I’m happy to report that our friend’s assurances that we would love the book were on target.

For the past three years, Eats, Shoots and Leaves—a treatise on the frequent misuses and abuses of punctuation—has been a best-seller throughout the English-speaking world.

“A book about punctuation, a best-seller?” you say.

You bet.

Lynne Truss’s (do I still need to add another s after the apostrophe when a surname ends in double s?) book has been amply reviewed; so I won’t burden you with my critical commentaries on her work.

Instead, I’d like to note that all of my life I’ve been terrified of punctuation. Even today, as a published writer, I still agonize over the placement of commas, colons, apostrophes, and other assorted guideposts that, as Truss reminds us, are there to simplify a reader’s journey through a text.

And I’m not kidding about the fear. I sometimes stare for what seems like eons at a hardcopy, paralyzed over whether I should use a semi-colon or a period. In fact, the only punctuation mark I rejoice in using is the dash—I feel such an affinity for this mark that my editors have frowned over my exploitation of this friendly device. (Truss writes that when dashes are used in abundance—as certainly happens in my case—they suggest “baroque and hyperactive silliness.” I like that. The next time someone asks me to describe myself, I’ll say—“I’m silly in a hyperactively baroque way.”)

But most of all, I’m thankful to Truss’s book—the origins of which can be traced to her frustration over the use and abuse of apostrophes in commercial signs—because it has assured me that my fears regarding punctuation are natural; that I’ve been justified in agonizing over the rules governing the placement of these signposts because, although wondrous, they are highly complex; and that the best writers in literary history have also experienced excruciating pains in determining their assignment.

Yes, as a reader I thoroughly enjoyed Eats, Shoots and Leaves. Lynne Truss, in addition to being erudite, is wonderfully witty. Her expositions on the history of punctuation, the dismal state of its present use, and its uncertain future vis-à-vis the internet, make fascinating and fun reading. Indeed, as soon I finished the book, I immediately started to read it again—and with relish.

Although Lynne Truss didn’t convert me into a stickler—as she proclaims to be—thanks to this Christmas gift I shall be forever mindful of not offending this illustrious group of people, for I know that nothing casts more fear into a writer’s heart than a punctuation freak with a marker.

Acknowledging Prejudice

Everyone is a prisoner of his own experiences. No one can eliminate prejudices—just recognize them.
Edward R. Murrow

Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experiences of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
Douglas Adams

En Panamá es folclórico decir “negro de mierda”.
Franz Wever, President of Panamá’s Baseball Federation


The afternoon of Friday, March 10, the telephone lines of RPC radio were jammed—it seemed that everyone in the country wanted to discuss Panama’s 10-0 loss to Holland in baseball’s first World Classic. The overwhelming majority of callers were bitterly disillusioned, and they pointed their fingers at everyone—from the President of the Republic to the batboy—while trying to pin down the culprit of the team’s poor performance.

But what astounded me was something that was never mentioned. Not once. It was something that, only a few days earlier, had stunned me to the core. Yet on the afternoon of Panamá’s loss, it didn’t seem to be on anyone’s mind.

On Monday, March 6, in La Prensa, Guido Bilbao reported that last December several Panamanian team presidents and Roberto Kelly—a former major league player and then manager of the national team—had a heated argument over the refusal of the presidents to allow their players to adhere to Kelly’s proposed practice schedule. In frustration, Kelly called their decision hypocritical, particularly in light of their condemnation of Mariano Rivera—the Yankee ace reliever—who opted to rest during the off-season.

According to the article, one of the presidents—who still remains unidentified—after listening to Kelly’s remarks, turned to Franz Wever, the president of Panamá’s federation, and said, “Esto te pasa por contratar a negros de mierda.”

Within days of that meeting, Roberto Kelly resigned.

In the United States, baseball has been a remarkable forum for challenging racism. The signing of Jackie Robinson to the Brooklyn Dodgers helped open doors for African-Americans not only in sports, but in all professions. And, without question, Latin Americans who reside in the US have benefited as well—particularly baseball players who, at present, are prominently represented in the sport.

What’s more, in the ensuing years, major league team owners and executives have been suspended, fined, or fired for making racist remarks.

But Latin American society has yet to reach American levels of awareness when it comes to the subtleties and perils of racial discrimination. This was clearly evident when Franz Wever, president of Panamá’s baseball federation, casually stated during an interview that the offensive remark is nothing to be concerned about because it is a mere manifestation of Panamanian folklore.

Those of us who live in Latin America need to realize that such comments severely damage our collective soul. These remarks strike at the heart of our humanity and of our oneness. And in glossing over what was said about Roberto Kelly’s heritage, we are ignoring one of the more serious issues confronting the world today: how to deal with she or he who is different from you or me.

When we allow racist discourse to go unchallenged, we condemn the embattled ethnic groups to sit on the margins of their nation’s development. And this, in the case of Panamá, condemns large numbers of people of African and indigenous descent to remain underfed, uneducated, and unemployed.

We must no longer tolerate racist comments such as the one directed against Roberto Kelly. If indeed such remarks are part of Panamá’s folklore, then this is a cultural trait that Panamanians must first learn to recognize, and then learn to live without.

A Tale of Many Readers

Hold a book in your hand and you're a pilgrim at the gates of a new city.
Anne Michaels

Life-transforming ideas have always come to me through books.
Bell Hooks


Back in 1997, in North Carolina, when I was part of Appalachian State University’s faculty, I had the privilege of serving on a committee charged with creating a reading program. The notion, now commonplace in most US colleges, was to select a book for all incoming freshmen to read over the summer. Then, during orientation, led by faculty and staff volunteers, they would discuss the book in small groups.

At one of the committee’s first meetings, I nominated Julia Alvarez’s In the Time of the Butterflies. This sad but beautifully told story astonished me when I read it, and it was having the same effect on the students in my Latina Novel course. Of course, other equally worthy books were nominated, and after several weeks of delightful readings and often intense debates, Alvarez’s work was chosen for the honor of initiating Appalachian State’s Summer Reading Program.

Elated over the committee’s decision, and excited about introducing this remarkable Dominican-American writer to the college community, I was bewildered when, as soon as the announcement about the new program was made, several members of Appalachian State’s student government declared their opposition to it. They accused the university’s administration of acting in an authoritarian manner by requiring all entering freshmen to read a book. They also claimed that Appalachian’s current students had been slighted because they had not been represented on the committee. (The truth is that two positions had been slotted for student representatives, but their government never sent a delegate in spite of the committee’s repeated pleas.) Moreover, the student leaders argued that high school seniors deserved a well-earned rest before starting college; and they added that they didn’t see how a Summer Reading Program would benefit the academic community.

I found their opposition mystifying. Didn’t they realize that reading plays a key role in making us educated persons? And, as a teacher, the questions that most alarmed me were: what did this reluctance say about the future of reading? And, had books fallen in disfavor with younger generations?

Luckily, Vanessa Urruela, a student in my class—who also happened to be the Editor-in-Chief of The Appalachian, the student newspaper—wrote a piece defending both the program and In the Time of the Butterflies. Thanks to her editorial, the dissenting voices ceased to be strident and became mere whispers.

Julia Alvarez was invited to deliver Appalachian’s Convocation Address. And during her visit a considerable segment of the university community united around her novel. Over three-thousand persons—students, staff, and faculty—attended her presentation. The hero’s welcome stunned Julia.

The following morning, after she gave a reading from ¡Yo!, which at the time was her most recent novel, a long line of autograph seekers formed in the Student Union. It took Julia more than three hours to sign every outstretched copy of In the Time of the Butterflies.

In mine, which is something I still treasure, she wrote: For Silvio, who has given me wings! Mil gracias—de tu amiga, siempre, Julia.

The experience of spending several days with Julia Alvarez—as well as with Dedé, the surviving Mirabal sister and the event’s most honored guest—is one of the most memorable of my life. And I’ll remain forever proud of the small role I played in the birth of an admirable ritual that involves reading.

Since then, the Summer Reading Program has become a highly successful tradition. Notable authors such as Elie Wiesel, Ernest Gaines, Lee Smith, Barbara Ehrenreich, Ron Suskind, Tim O’Brien, and Rodney Barker have followed Julia’s footsteps—having their works selected and then speaking at Appalachian State’s Convocation. What’s more, many of the upperclassmen, who’ve been exposed to the program since their freshmen year, now participate willingly alongside the new arrivals.

Recently, on the internet, I stumbled across Ms. Urruela’s editorial, the one that helped quell student concerns. I’d like to share it with you.

Required reading can be beneficial
Vanessa Urruela
Editor-in-Chief
The Appalachian

"The fear is the worst part. Every time I hear footsteps coming down the hall, or the clink of the key turning in the lock, I'm tempted to curl up in one corner like a hurt animal, whimpering, wanting to be safe. But I know if I do that, I'll be giving in to a low part of myself, and I'll feel even less human. And that is what they want to do, yes, that is what they want to do." -From Maria Teresa's prison diary in the novel, In the Time of the Butterflies.

In the publicity photo of Julia Alvarez a thin gold chain peeks out from behind her collar. The way it hangs suggests that there is something dangling from it. She looks like an author, simple haircut, sparkly scarf and far away gaze. The picture got me wondering what was hanging from the chain.

When I met the author a few weeks ago I got to ask her.

"My honey designed this and gave it to me when I finished Butterflies," she said, letting the gold butterfly charm perch on her fingertips as she held it out. The butterfly had an emerald body and diamond encrusted wings. Her husband, sitting nearby, beamed at the gift's mention.

The novel she was referring to is her 1994 novel In the Time of the Butterflies. It chronicles the lives of four real-life sisters who experienced political revolution in the Dominican Republic during the 1950s. Three of the sisters, Patria, Maria Teresa and Minerva were killed by the dictator.

Though Alvarez fictionalized their true story, the novel rings with truth as she researched actual events with the help of the surviving sister Dede.

To require, or not to require...

There is much controversy on this campus about whether or not an entire incoming class of freshmen should be required to read a single novel. I sincerely believe that if any novel should be chosen, In the Time of the Butterflies is it.

This novel is based upon actual events which brought the face of democracy to the Dominican Republic. In a country where we all take our freedoms for granted, In the Time of the Butterflies offers American readers a different point of view.

There is much to be learned about political systems and theory from reading this book. The characters put a face upon revolution, something that history classes and texts don't always do. It's not fun to memorize dates or geography, but it is interesting to read about how Dominicans struggled to infiltrate the enemy and communicate without being caught.

The structure of the novel is conducive to easy reading though the topics covered aren't always easy to deal with. Alvarez writes periodically from the point of view of each of the sisters. Each passage is clearly labeled so as not to confuse the reader.

The novel begins as Dede remembers what her family was like before the revolution began. This sets up the reader's love for the characters. In The Time of the Butterflies ends with the three sisters being killed, with Dede left alone to carry on their story and their spirit.

The purpose of having the freshman class read a common text is to create a unifying thematic experience which will be incorporated into many classes and most importantly, that will be the theme for convocation.

It is important for freshmen to have some sort of unifying experience. Because I was in the Watauga College program, I was lucky enough to have such a comfortable introduction into college and the body of my peers. Most freshmen don't have that advantage. They enter college blindsided by newfound freedom and academic confusion. Having books to talk about helps people get to know one another and to better understand how they fit into their class. Reading books doesn't just provide a person with a story, it opens them up to a new framework of experience which they can ponder over and grow with.

Who is this Julia Alvarez anyway?

Silvio Sirias, my professor, arranged for our Chicana/Latina Novel class to meet with Alvarez after her recent book signing in Chapel Hill. During that meeting, she expressed her delight over the Summer Reading Program and agreed to be next year's Convocation speaker.

Though I could go on and on about how thrilled I was to meet Alvarez, I'll simply say that she is a dynamic woman who captures a reader's attention with her lively commentary and introspection. In the reading she gave, she definitely inspired the audience. Her own family fled the Dominican Republic in 1960 fearing that her father's involvement in the revolution would be discovered.

Anyone who objects to the required reading program should read the novel before they make a final decision. This text approaches many serious subjects including religion, sexuality, personal growth, politics, family dynamics and identity with grace, truth and wisdom. There is no better way to prepare incoming students for their academic, social and mental journey than in the discussions and lectures that will be held on this novel.