Being Bong

Rant #1 The Tagore Obsession

A/N: Before I start writing this book I would like to inform you that I've nothing against anyone! I've exaggerated in most of the parts and I'm writing it solely for the purpose of entertainment. It's not a hate rant. And whatever I'm writing is the result of what I've observed over the years and it how I think about certain situations. Most of you might not even agree with my opinions and I perfectly understand that. I do not intent to hurt the sentiments of anyone, but if I have done so, it wasn't intentional and I apologise in advance. 

Before you start reading I suggest that you google Rabindranath Tagore, everything I mentioned about him is based on oral accounts which might not be entirely true and don't depend on that information if you want to know more about him.

I believe that Rabindranath Tagore was a legend and his works are legendary.

Rabindrasangeet  is the term used to represent the songs that have been composed by Tagore.

The Tagore Obsession

The obsession of Benagali people with Tagore is no less as compared to the obsession of vampires, boybands and a certain feminine looking popstar in the west in terms of popularity. His fandom has survived even after 150 years and teenage fangirls didn’t exist back then.

For those who don’t know about Tagore, he was a legend for the people of Bengal and he still is. Rabindranath Tagore (Thakur in Bengali) was the first Indian to receive the Nobel Prize. He won it for his contribution in literature, his work that got him the award was ‘Gitanjali’ a collection of his compositions in Bengali which he translated to English and his work didn’t loose it’s magic with the translation. He is also the composer of our national anthem ‘Jana gana mana’. 

Every child who is a decedent of Bengali parents, no matter where they reside has been spoon-fed the above information by their parents more than n times in their life! If by chance you are a Bengali and it hasn’t happened to you then consider yourself rare. 

It is one of the key factors for the survival of his fandom.

Like any other parents, our parents too want us to be the best all rounder kid in the history of kidsdom! And when the parents get competitive, all hell breaks loose on the child! Well the amount of torture the kid has to go through is slightly affected by the area they are staying in. 

I’ve stayed in two different places in West Bengal and both of them are completely different from each other in almost all aspects! I spent my childhood in a Town called Siliguri. Those of you staying in West Bengal must have herd of this place and it is quite popular among tourists. If you plan to visit the hill stations in Sikkim or you are planning to go to Darjeeling or the nearby local tourist destinations or picnic spots, you’ll have to go there via Siliguri. Apart from that it also happens to be one of those Towns where “everyone knows everyone” and the whenever the moms meet they exaggerate about their children! They enroll their children in every sport and talent club mankind has ever herd of. What does this have to do with Tagore? Well, I’m slowly getting there. But before I go there, I want to explain the contrast of these two places. And it is very much relevant to the topic. So yeah let’s get back to moms exaggerating about their oh-so-perfect children.

Well if you ever listen to the moms talk about their children, it will sound something like this: “You know my child is doing so bad in school nowadays! I can’t believe he got only 92% in his finals, the daughter of Mrs Sen got 95% can you believe it? She even missed school that day and she didn’t even have hundreds of tutors for every subject. But you know my younger daughter has started taking dancing, singing and sports lessons and she’s five, I should have enrolled her when she was younger. Perhaps, enrolling her when was only two days old would have been best. I wished that she will start her musical career learning rabindrasangeet like her older brother but all she does is sing cartoon tunes, nursery rhymes and those tacky bollywood and English songs! You tell me what will I do with her? How can she be a great musician if she doesn’t learn rabindrasangeet?And on top of that she isn’t even focusing on studies you know? She came second on her kinder-garden finals? She only got 99.8% and girl who topped only got 99.9%! Kids these days don’t want to study, you tell me if they don’t score 510% how are going to get a job?” Well, yeah I’ve exaggerated about the whole thing a bit too much but you get the point? Also someone needs to shed light on the superkids issue, but I’ll rant about it in another chapter.