The alpha numeric identity

Today, after a very long time, I read an Assamese novel. The story by Anuradha Sharma, is about a woman’s experience in a university girls’ hostel and it took me down the memory lane as well.

I was thinking about how a number associated with your temporary stay in an academic campus becomes an integral part of your memory of that time.  The street address of my childhood home or my previous apartment does not come to mind when I remember the times spent there. But following two alpha-numeric numbers are etched in my mind along with the memories of two special phases in my life.

F212 – It was the room number in Indira Gandhi hall in IIT Kharagpur(KGP), which was my address for 1 & 1/2 years. I remember how I had to struggle to get this particular room allotted to myself so that I could be in the same floor with my two best friends in KGP. The room, next to the stairs near the bathroom, was not the best location in the building. But being strategically located at the junction of two wings, this room became the center of most gossip sessions. Some would call me the resident of “F212″ rather than calling “F212″ my room. The news paper guy would leave the papers subscribed by individual girls, in the foyer and my papers would be tagged “F212″. The mess-duty girl would check my preference in the menu everyday, and I would be identified in the list as “F212″. This number became my identity during my short but blissful stay in KGP.

E2079 - It was the apartment number in Chapin Apartment complex in SUNY Stony Brook, which was again my address for 1 & 1/2 years. Here again I had to go through some struggle to get allotted to this apartment where already three other Indian  girls were staying. I even lied to the campus residence office that I was a vegetarian and preferred an apartment with other vegetarian Indian girls. Eventually we became a gang of 5, living in the house. Chores like cooking and cleaning became fun group activities. How many complains we had to endure for high noise level, but we never stopped our out-of-tune singing sessions and mid-night laughing sessions. Slowly people started recognizing us as residents of “E2079″, rather than our names or departments. Surely this became our unique identity in the Stony Brook campus.

No matter how many years pass by, these two alpha-numeric numbers will always remain parts of my identity.

Namesake

Jhumpa Lahiri’s famous book “Namesake” touched upon something which was so natural to me that I never thought of it as an issue.  Everyone from north-east India has at least two names – one by which he or she is called in the family (the “pet name”) and the other by which he or she is known to the world (the “good name”).

Everyone from that region is so accustomed to the tradition that there has never been any confusion about a person’s identity based on the name. As a child when I was introduced to a guest visiting for the first time, my parents would decide which name to give out depending on their relation with the visitor. And depending on which name was used, I would understand whether the visitor is in the close family circle or just an acquaintance. So my father’s cousin would know me as “Monmi”, my pet name. But if he ever happens to call my office or contact any of my college friends, he would make sure to find out my good name and refer to me as “Aparajita”. Now I represent an extreme case of this multi-name system as I have more than one pet names in different family circles. I know exactly how to introduce myself to an extended family member depending on which circle he or she extends from.

There is no problem as long as the people in all your “family circles” is part of the same system. Problem occurs when you get someone outside the system to these circles. My husband was the first one in my life to raise this as an issue. He has been quite comfortable with various names that I have in different circles. But he had signed up for this with only one person – not everyone in the family!! Since he was considered a part of each of my family circles, everyone else was introduced to him with their pet names. This would work fine as long as he had to speak to them in person or over phone. But now there are emails and Orkut. (Yes, I forgot to mention that we prefer to keep our “good names” in the internet.)  So my poor husband now has to associate all the “good names” in his Orkut friends list to the respective “pet names” he has known !!

Initially I was not able to understand at all why he should be so bugged about it. But it dawned upon me when I compared this with my frustration over my husbands multiple sur-names – something from the naming system in south India.

Now we both realize that a complicated “namesake” is an Indian thing that we both share !!