Middle class Indians have been shipping their sons and daughters to foreign universities for a hundred years – first to the UK, then to America, then to Australia. Usually, they form a quiet, hardworking, industrious community that prefers not to make waves abroad.
So what’s with the violence in Melbourne? Too many Indian students coming in too suddenly, I’ve heard in a vague response to the question. And I have to say, that as an Indian growing up in Australia, I’ve never personally been burned by the racism that’s always burbled just below the surface along with all that uranium and gold in that big red heart of Down Under.
So now what happens? Education, which has been one of Australia’s biggest national money earners has had a big kick in the kidneys – and this in the middle of a financial crisis. 4000 less students which means Aus$78 million less in the country’s coffers.
And on the other side of the water, the idiotic groups who just need more xenophobic fuel for their particular fires, such as the Hindu fascists, the Shiv Sena are threatening the safety of visiting Australians during the Commonwealth Games, and future cricket matches.
But one woman’s initiative may be a great counterbalance to all the craziness. Eat to prove your friendship.
I like it.
Go to an Indian restaurant on Wednesday night, 24 February, to show your solidarity with the Indian community. Mia Northrop from Melbourne, came up with the idea first as a little thing to do with her friends, but the notion has gone viral and vindaloo against violence has had responses from around the world.
At time of writing the movement had 9,000 Facebook attendees and 17,000 petitioned protestors. The world of twitter is also all atwitter about it.
Go Australia. Eat for peace.
Think of the future possibilities for menus and movements this could inspire:
Goat curry and rice for peace in Afghanistan
Tandoori against the Taliban in Pakistan
La moimbe (chicken in peanut sauce) for conflict resolution in Congo
Curry for democracy in Sri Lanka
If you have any more suggestions for menus for movements, send ‘em in, I’d be intrigued.
on Feb 22nd, 2010 at 5:27 pm
Wow Dheera, you were quick to label Shiv Sena as idiotic groups and Hindu Fascists, but fogot to coin a name for the racist Aussies who have assaulted and even killed Indian students in the past some months! Well, in your view, we should let our students be assaulted in Australia, and then the Hindu Fascist idiotic group, Shiv Sena should heartily welcome Australians on the Indian soil, and also the Taliban and also the militants from Pakistan. We should give them a traditional Indian welcome and lovely food….I marvel at your views about India, and Indians!
on Feb 23rd, 2010 at 10:45 am
So what’s with the violence in Melbourne? Read this news..
Melbourne not safe for Indians: Australian opposition leader
Tue, Feb 23 08:03 AM
Melbourne, Feb 23 (IANS) Streets of Melbourne were not safe for Indians and the government should spend money on policing and preventing racial attacks to improve relationship, Australia’s Opposition Leader Tony Abott said Tuesday.
The remarks came in the wake of government’s move to arrange accommodation for a team of Indian journalists touring Down Under.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is spending $250,000 on flights and five-star accommodation for the journalists in a bid to clear up a diplomatic row over a series of attacks on Indians, the AAP reported quoting Herald Sun.
During their visit, the team of 25 reporters will tour the Melbourne Cricket Ground and see the concerts of Bollywood composer AR Rahman scheduled to be held in Sydney and Melbourne.
Abbott said the money would be better spent preventing the bashing which was the basic ‘PR problem’ between India and Australia.
‘I think it would be much better spending the money on better policing of our streets because that’s the basic problem,’ Abbott told Fairfax Radio Network.
‘Our streets aren’t safe, particularly the streets of Melbourne, which appear to have been pretty seriously under-policed.
‘If you didn’t have these racially motivated bashings in unsafe streets we wouldn’t have the PR problem, so let’s go to the heart of the matter.’
According to the DFAT, about $10,000 would be spent on each of the visiting reporters.
Spokesman of the Federation of Indian Students in Australia Gautum Gupta said that the visits were ‘just marketing junkets paid for by the taxpayer’, tightly scheduled and designed to gloss over problems.
Indo Asian News Service
on Feb 25th, 2010 at 6:11 am
Eating for peace, what an idea Sirji! Well and truly, this is an intriguing idea. Seems it’s someone’s business idea working over here selling Indian curries, Ha! Indeed, it’s deeply disturbing to see people grow more and more intolerant to each other over race, region & colour of skin, in the, so called, civilized world. They kick and punch and poke screwdrivers and burn people to death. The aborigine know it better! That’s a historical truth. The section of society with these ingrained xenophobic feelings will only feel the sting of the curry in their mind and get more agitated! The Shiv Sena in India is another of that lot. They first started out to cleanse Bombay of South Indians and now they are hell bent to cleanse Mumbai (Bombay) of North Indians. Their mindset is not so much different from those intolerant lot in Australia. But what is more painful is that, they are doing it to their own countrymen! Their threat to visiting Australians are hollow and hypocritical! Do they have any moral stature to issue such a threat? They thrash their own countrymen in Mumbai (Bombay) based on petty regionalism?!! We Indians must welcome Australians with a hearty smile & a friendly handshake. Sure not all of them feel yucky touching a friendly Indian hand! This is an opportunity for us to show once again how much more tolerant and cultured we are rather than stooping low to that level of intolerance of some xenophobic goons over there! Eating for peace or starving for it, intolerance based on race, region & colour of skin MUST get a big NO!!!