An Excerpt From The Diary Of A Teenager: “I Wish I Was Born Outside India”

The following is an excerpt from the diary of a teenager who I often meet. And while reading this I really felt that “Is it only him who feels this way or do we have others too?”

I am an Indian and I am really proud of the fact. Despite all its flaws India remains the country where I will plan my retirement, if only I succeed to live long enough to see that age. Okay, so this teenager was really depressed, not because he had a breakup or he got rejected but because he has desires to become successful and become an entrepreneur rather than working for others. I don’t know if he’s qualified or not, or is he a capable man or not, these are the things we will only know when he gets the chance. And, this is not what we will be discussing today.

Let’s start with a question, what do you plan to be as soon as you pass out from your school?

In the decreasing order of priority, the answers of 98% Indian students will be this: An engineer, a doctor, an IAS officer, an astronaut, and if you’re a resident of Delhi you can expect a very straightforward answer, “A government job”. Ask all these people who want to be a doctor or an engineer, Is it their own dreams or are they trying to live up the dreams of their parents? Half of the answer will be related to passion and half of them to the desires of parents.

Out of all the problems in India, this is the worst one, Parents get to choose the career of their children. It’s not like they shouldn’t but at least the child should have a say in it. Indian parents try to live up their dreams through their children and this is why I feel despite being more mature compared to other countries, we still lack something.

In a western culture which lets their child do what they want as soon as they grow adults, I really feel we need a full-fledged implication of the same over here. Like every mother says, “Bacha Kitna Bhi Bada Ho Jaye, Maa Baap Ke Liye Woh Bacha Hi Rehta Hai” (no matter your age, you will always be a child in your parents' eyes) and this is true, if you continue to make your decisions concerning your mom and dad, you’ll never grow up. If you don’t taste the dust, you won’t know what it feels like to make a home out of dust.

Thanks to Aamir Khan, Rajkumar Hirani, and Vidhu Vinod Chopra for making the great film named ‘3 idiots’. I am sure almost all who could watch the film and really appreciated it but why is it so that we don’t learn anything from them? (Exceptions are always there, so, those who got offended, please I wasn’t talking about you).

My own father appreciates the film very much but seriously didn’t learn anything from it. I remember an episode that happened a month ago which successfully verifies it. My younger sister is really bad in academics but believe me she can be a good chef or a singer and while my father was appreciating the film one night, she took her chance to express her desires. She asked if she can join a singing class side by side so she can know if she is really good or she should try her luck somewhere else. The expected thing happened and she got a NO. One irritating thing that Indian parent do is, they will talk about many things when they don’t want you to do something to discourage you but ironically will keep criticizing you for your failure.

Parents really need to stop this and let their children do what they want in terms of their career, at least we won’t blame you for our failures.



Written by Vatsa