9 Thursday, May 28, 2020 The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com MICHIGAN IN COLOR ‘Never Have I Ever’ gone into an introspective spiral SUNITHA PALAT MiC Staff Writer Recently, I binged Season 1 of Mindy Kaling’s “Never Have I Ever,” a classic com- ing-of-age teen rom-com revolving around the life of a 15-year old Indian American, Devi Vishwakumar. At first I was uninter- ested in another heartfelt yet cringey Netflix series, but the show’s mixed reviews sparked my curiosity: While a few of my friends told me the show perpetuated stereotypical tropes of South Asian Americans — a sight I did not need to see — “NHIE” has also been acclaimed as “a watershed moment for the representation of South Asians in Hol- lywood.” Curious, but more so bored out of my mind during quarantine, I gave the ten- episode show a try. In summary, the plot revolves around Devi’s standard trials and tribulations as a 15-year-old girl. She navigates the ups and downs of relationships with her best friends, her mother and of course, the boy she’s been crushing on. Yet, her adolescence and search for a different, newer and cooler identity is what made it a bit more complex when she loses her father to cardiac arrest. The show — as expected — is heartfelt, cringey and cute, but is also filled with vulnerable moments relating to her grief and her Indian heritage. Among all of these, my favorite trait of the show was that it made me feel represented. When I think of Indian Americans in the shows I watched growing up, I think of Ravi from “Jessie,” Baljeet from “Phineas and Ferb,” Raj from “The Big Bang Theory” and a few other often socially awkward, teased, overly studious characters who did not represent me. Devi, on the other hand, does. She has a full American accent, cares about school while also caring about social goals (popularity, her crush, fitting in) like any normal teenager, hangs out with white friends, likes cheeseburgers and doesn’t outwardly exert her Indian identity. Watch- ing her character — particularly how she Immigrant Parents: An unspoken love language AAKASH RAY MiC Staff Writer ANURIMA KUMAR My mother called me to her room late at night. The house was eerily quiet as it was every night, my father already fast asleep downstairs and the rest of the house void of sound except for the dripping of a leaky fau- cet. I sighed as I climbed down from my bed and shuffled towards her room, predicting that the subsequent conversation would be of little significance. I knew she noticed I was upset earlier today and would ask if anything happened, and I would of course deflect and tell her everything was okay. It was difficult for me to express my concerns with either of my parents, as it often resulted in me explaining my worries with little applicable, almost surface level feedback. Perhaps it was the language barrier. While we both speak our mother tongue, Bangla, my thoughts and ideas were always expressed better in Eng- lish. This was how it had always been. Yet, tonight seemed a little different. I sat down on her bed, and my mother didn’t say a word. Time seemed to stand still for a moment. Mother and son just waiting for one another to speak. Impatiently I asked, “What?” My mother just shook her head and said, “Nothing,” in Bangla. For a few more seconds, I sat down and then slowly, as if there was a gravitational force pulling me towards her, I rested my head next to her. I felt a weight off my shoul- ders retract and my muscles began to relax as I let my body go. I felt my mother’s hand on my head, small but strong. My ever present headache gradually receded as she massaged my head, and I felt a small bit of relief after a long day. No more words were spoken that night. And so, this slowly became a part of my interaction with my mother. Rather than speaking about what happened throughout the day, good or bad, we would sit in silence together, her often watching a movie on Net- flix, and I scrolling on my phone. Some days I would watch a movie by her side and other days we would both read next to each other. This became our time together. It’s commonly known that there are five main “love languages,” five ways to express and experience love: words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of service and physical touch, as described by Gary Chapman in his book The Five Love Lan- guages. Quality time refers to time set aside for paying full and undivided attention to a person or matter at hand. While I can make a case that my interactions with my mother are quality time or physical touch, I believe that there is an unspoken love language that many parents utilize. One where our worlds are different but unwavering faith and sup- port are never absent. Often at the dinner tables of my Cauca- sian friends, I would see their parents light up about the stories they told from their col- lege days. They spoke endlessly about “how it was back in the day,” and my friends would spoon it up with the rest of their meal with the utter satisfaction of truly getting to know their parents even more. It all came full cir- cle for them as they now find themselves in the same position their parents were in 25 years ago. In my case, it’s different. My par- ents don’t go into the details of their teenage years. It’s sometimes frustrating since I feel my relationship with my parents will never be as strong because the lives they led back home are too foreign for me to ever connect with. As I grew older, I realized my parents showed their love and enthusiasm in other ways. Although not so evident, the feeling of faith endowed upon another can be one of the most heartfelt yet subtle in nature. Read more at michigandaily.com navigates her heritage — reminded me of my young self. The painfully honest and genuine depiction of her uncomfortableness, slight disdain and forced acceptance of her Indian- ness triggered some unexpected introspec- tion within myself while watching the show, especially during episode 4, “Never Have I Ever...Felt Super Indian.” A hit Hindi song from the 1970s, “Dum Maro Dum,” kicks this episode off while Devi is being dressed up by her cousin. She is adorned with jhumka earrings, a thick set of gold necklaces and a bright blue and gold half sari. The look on her face is so recognizable; it’s a sense of claustrophobia in a seemingly foreign (and itchy) outfit, an expression I’ve held every time my mom gets me ready for an Indian wedding, religious event or family party. In this episode, Devi attends Ganesh Puja (a Hindu holiday) put on by the Hindu Association of Southern California. I smiled as I saw my own personal experiences in many parts of the show, like weird conver- sations with Aunties. But a huge moment of truth came out when Devi interacted with Harish, a family friend who came back from Stanford to attend the event. After asking why he would ever come to this “lame fest,” he replies: “My roommate Nick is Native American, and he’s so into being Native American. At first, I was like, ‘You’re away from your parents. You don’t have to pretend to care about your ancestry or whatever.’ But then he took me to their campus powwow. No one was standing in the corner making fun of it. They were dancing and chanting, and having a great time, and it made me think, why do I think it’s so weird and embarrassing to be Indian?” The juxtaposition of the two characters on my screen represented the chasm I’ve been stuck between for the past five years of my life. Read more at michigandaily.com NETFLIX