Is a weekend call from your geographically distant children, the highest point of your entire week? Chances are you are an NRI-parent. Often considered the worst hit by the- empty-nest syndrome -because the children are now good seven seas away. You will never admit to the vague feeling of being alone, which has crept up unawares.
The children have really been gone for quite a while now. They turn into International students, at 18 or 21, depending on whether they are leaving for their Baccalaureate or Advanced degrees. 'Undergrads' or 'Grad students' as they are referred to in the US, they often taste success quite early. This is, of course, thanks to an upbringing where a high value was placed on education and discipline. It is quite easy to broaden interests and make a whole base of friends from people with varied backgrounds at 'School'. Yes, reputed Universities are referred to as 'Schools', as you know. They move on to jobs, buy houses and become parents themselves. Soon they are ready to be 'naturalised'. You take pride in their achievements, as you always have.
Meanwhile you have retired, come back to your 'home-town'. In most cases, working for the government services has made you something of a nomad. Moving from place to place has been good in terms of learning languages and enriching yourself culturally but it has also made it easier to lose the friends you made along the way. Blame it on the prohibitively high cost of STD calls or a lack of the letter-writing habit or whatever, you now have to bank on this community of relatives and neighbors, who lead full, busy lives. Most people of your generation are blessed with at least half-a -dozen siblings, in many cases, unfortunately, just more people to squabble with. The unbearable pettiness, the politics, of a large extended family, finally begin to get to you.
In their collective wisdom, a group of parents in Bangalore, who found themselves in this boat, charted a new course, by forming NRIPA. Non Resident Indians Parents Association (NRIPA) is a support group for parents whose one or more children are in foreign countries. This is a non-profit voluntary membership group in the age group of 50 plus, with a cosmopolitan outlook. Inaugurated on New Year's day, 1998, and registered under KSR Act 1960, NRIPA has grown steadily with approximately 250 members in the millennium year. The profile of NRIPA reads as "friendly, educated, professionally experienced and widely traveled".
And what excellent credentials, these are! A cursory glance at the daily newspapers elicits a regular comment, "Enna Saar, the country has gone to the dogs!" This thought brings a vague solace because the children are in a country where there are much better prospects for the future. It is the same country where you toiled, long and hard and will probably breathe your last. But a strange inertia prevents you from trying to change anything around you. If things can be changed, why is no change happening? Most people prefer not to answer this question and in any case, why is putting the house in order the duty of the ones who left? There is a curious confusion of cause-and-effect and a pleasure in this pretended powerlessness. If people from this support group can mobilise their collective professional experience what or who exactly is to stop them from becoming a local action group for economic and social development?
NRIPA meets are held as General membership (an annual fee of Rs.600 for both Parents category) meets at central locations and area meets hosted by members in their houses. They are held at least once a month to discuss common concerns, hopes and desires of the members. A program of specialists guest speakers on topics of common interest like travel, insurance, stress management, law of wills, health-awareness, etc are given floor time during such meetings. They are aimed at developing closer fellowship of members. Apart from these meetings NRIPA also arranges picnics, travels/tours from time to time.
"Lot of thought has gone in since 1994 before I made it bold to actually launch it", says Mrs.Ambuja Narayan, a principal founder of NRIPA. To pull out a 50 plus age group, to actually energize is a tough job. "In making the Association a grand success, group work with dedicated committee members has been the key and we are well on our way. We will be pleased to launch our Chennai chapter if someone actually approaches us," she says. All visiting NRI kids and grandkids are invited to participate in all the NRIPA events.
Annual visits, happen once a year during 2 or 3-week vacations, but in their minds the 'striders' make uncountable 'guilt-trips' home. The visiting parents also get a chuckle out of Ramesh Mahadevan's, brilliant parody on the web, "The Taxonomy of Daddies". Perhaps we should be getting together to write a primer titled "A gentle introduction to the art of being an NRI parent". This idea of a support group is going to be a hard sell in the city, which lives by the dictum 'Blood is thicker than water'. But consider this, over the years, the water might have just become value-added!
Vijaysree Venkataraman
