Title: “Peep: a Story of Defiance”

Author: Savan Parikh

Genre: Braided Personal Essay

It has been two years since I’ve last seen my grandparents, though their house is just as I remember it. Wooden statues of Hindu deities frame the foyer. To my left is the prayer room. My grandpa, knelt down on the tile floor in front of an altar of Krishna and Radha, mutters Sanskrit slokas under his breath. Down the hallway lies the pinnacle of every Gujju grandparents’ home: the massive, overly ornate Sankheda swing, occupying an entire half of the living room. The eyes of my dad’s elementary, middle, and high school yearbook pictures follow me as I walk around. I struggle to find a wall that isn’t lined with family portraits. Had it not been for all these pictures, I suspect any random brown kid walking through the door might mistake the house for his own grandparents’.

My grandmother stood in the kitchen. Her head, which barely measured up to my chest, strained up to see me. She pinched my cheeks, told me I had gotten too skinny, and bustled off to find kachoris to feed me. With slow, quiet steps, my grandfather had made it from the prayer room to the kitchen, and was now standing behind me.

“Beta, come with me to my office. I am working on the Bhagavad Gita translation, but I need some help with formatting.”

His words came out in perfect sentences. DhaDha was a man of precision and grit. When he was only 18, he left his village in India on a boat to West Germany with just enough money to last him one night in Europe. He worked three jobs part time, spent hours each night perfecting his German and English, and soon earned his M.D. At the age of 28, he moved his wife and son to the United States, and set up a private cardiology practice. Even in retirement, DhaDha never stopped working. He spent his time poring over ancient Sanskrit scriptures and writing in depth English translations for publication.

“Beta?” I stared back at my grandfather. “Did you hear me, Beta?”

My relatives love to remind me that my favorite word growing up was “no.” Even aunts and uncles whom I was sure I had never met before (though they all claimed to be the “first person in the hospital” when I was born) recalled how stubborn I was as a child. If my parents asked me to do something, there was a good chance I would find every way to do the exact opposite. To my preschool teachers, I was particularly disposed to rebellion.

The day was just like any other; I rolled out my foam mat, and threw my pillow down at its edge, bending down to center it on the bedding.

“Why don’t you go ahead and lie down, Savan,” my teacher, Tony, whispered from behind me.

I didn’t respond. I walked over to the sink, filled a small glass of water, and gulped it down. Tony stood watching me, arms crossed and eyes narrowed. Impatience drummed a rhythm into his foot. Tap, tap, tap. Each step slower than the last, I made my way over to my cubby, grabbed my stuffed penguin, and waddled back to my mat. After my penguin and I had settled down, he walked over.

“Listen, Savan,” he muttered. “I don’t want any disruptions like yesterday, okay? I know you’re not tired, but your friends are trying to sleep, so please be respectful. I don’t want to hear any noises. Not even a peep.”

I didn’t look at him. I just turned my face into my pillow, smiled smugly, and said, “PEEP!”

The “peep” story was a Parikh family classic; I can still hear the laughs of my mom’s audience as she repeated the story to the fourth group of coworkers at a dinner party. Yet I was not always so insubordinate. Despite my love for the word “no,” I had always held respect for one power in my life. Religion had grounded me since I was born; I prayed every night, visited the temple whenever my parents would take me, and spent hours on phone calls with my grandfather to learn about Hindu mythology. As a young child, Hinduism was important to me; it was the one authority figure in my life that I refused to disobey. But in fifth grade, when I was shuttled off to a new school, my relationship with religion took a turn for the worse. I became friends with a group of nerds so intent on studying science that any mention of God seemed absurd. I began to question my entire life: a common case of early-onset-midlife-crisis. As I thought back to my stubborn roots, I realized that my newfound quest to prove that Hinduism was “wrong” was just a reflection of my will to always say “no.” If I believed my teachers had no right to look down on me, why should God?

I decided to follow my friends’ lead, and spent the summer after sixth grade cementing my religious rebellion. Richard Dawkins’ The Magic of Reality, a scathing critique on creationism, lay open in front of me. Sprawled out in my backyard, I began to read. At the time, I was engrossed by a chapter where Dawkins attacked ancient fables that tried to explain the origin of rainbows. I laughed along with him at the absurd tales that humans had forged to explain natural phenomena. Dawkins convinced me that I simply could not continue practicing Hinduism; I was an atheist, through and through. With my family’s summer trip to India looming, I plotted my big reveal. The plan was set for the next family meeting: my uncle’s birthday. As a true disciple of Dawkins, I would proudly announce my conversion to atheism, followed up by a careful intervention (based only on science, of course) to dismantle my entire family’s beliefs.

A few days into the trip, while staying at my auntie’s farm in Kanuvaipalayam, my plan was put on hold; I had been infected with mycobacterium bovis. Apparently, drinking milk straight from the utter of Indian cattle wasn’t a great idea. I laid huddled in the living room. Sweat dripped down my forehead. The rickety pedestal fan spun around me. I counted the seconds. Five seconds of sweltering heat. One second of breezy freedom. Five seconds of heat. One second of freedom. Again and again. My grandmother sat down beside me, and placed a little brass Ganesha statue on a stool just above my head. Eyes closed, she began muttering a prayer under her breath, asking God that I recover soon from my sickness. I shook my head and scoffed, knowing her words were useless.

I recovered quickly, no thanks to Ganesha. A few days later, I was back on my feet. The ornate gopuram of the Brihadeshwara temple towered before us. The Indian sun beat down on my long, black hair. I was on my dad's shoulders and could feel the sweat from my legs soaking into the straps on his backpack. From my now eight-foot perspective, I felt confident. I looked down at my mom and dad, and decided at that moment to scrap my reveal plan. It was time.

“I’m an atheist now. I don’t believe in God.”

My dad quickly dropped me from his shoulders. My confidence evaporated, and I felt small in his shadow as he pulled me by my shirt to face him.

“You have no idea what you are talking about.”

He didn’t say much, but I could read between the lines. Condescension was etched into the stern creases of his face. He did not respect me. He thought me too ignorant to make such an important decision. I tried my best to regain my confidence. I straightened my posture, puffed out my chest, and walked on without a word. When my family members bent down in front of the deities to say their prayers, I remained standing. I wanted everybody around me to know I didn’t believe in their foolish religion.

I stood up to survey the scene. I was back in America, at my uncle’s wedding. A kaleidoscope of vibrant saris and kurtas swirled around me. Huddled in the corner, away from the loud tangs of the dhol drum, sat my grandpa and a group of my little cousins. They formed a colorful Target bullseye, with everyone focused towards the center as DhaDha told the old Hindu tale of baby Krishna stealing butter. The sparkle in their eyes as they listened outshone the glossiest bangles on their wrists. I walked towards them in my dull tan kurta, a lonely dot meandering towards a target. DhaDha told the story the same he had years ago, when it was me who lay at his feet and listened with innocent eyes. With slow suspense and a slight smile, he described baby Krishna: sweet ghee smeared across his chubby blue cheeks, hanging from the rafters as he fed the monkeys around him. The kids giggled, clapping their little hands together with glee. A couple minutes later, their giggles had turned to serious nods of understanding, as my grandfather reached the story’s (altogether unsurprising) moral: never steal. I told myself I should be mad at DhaDha for forcing these myths into the minds of my cousins at such a young age. But there was no force in his words, no malicious attempt to inflict control. Instead, there was a warm invitation into the world of Hinduism, a world that taught to you to chase your dreams of being a doctor in postwar Germany, that gave you hope as you watch a grandson push through illness, that birthed a vibrant culture of elaborate temples and colorful dresses and ornate jewelry. The wedding ceremonies passed by; prayers were prayed, vows vowed, dances danced. Whether my stubborn mind wanted to admit it, I missed the sense of strength that religion had given me. I felt weak for the first time. I sat down.

Five years have passed since the day at the temple. I am healthy (thankfully, I’ve avoided any more raw milk incidents) and more mature. I find that to satisfy my need for volition, I have to listen to myself instead of simply acting out against authority. To resist a higher power in my life simply because of their status as such is ignorant. I’ve watched as my family finds connection through Hinduism, and miss the days when I too felt that connection. I have not lost my love for science; rather I’ve embraced, contrary to everything Dawkins preached about religion being an antithesis to science, my identity as a Hindu scientist. Hinduism is not about the little brass elephant god who could magically save me from my infection. It is about forming a relationship with someone, or something, whose faculty is beyond your own, and welcoming the community that has been brave enough to form that same connection. Trusting that relationship makes me much stronger than acting as if I was above it.

“Beta, you’re just a child… don’t tell me you’re already losing your hearing! Are you coming to help?”

I paused for a moment.

“Yes.”