Review of 'Can you hear the nightbird call?' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
when you heard about (or see a movie about) partition, you always hear about the muslims and the hindus, but not much about the sikhs. coming from brampton, i should already have a good cultural understanding of the sikhs, but i don't.
so i was glad to read this book and learn about the punjab, and it's splitting in 2, and the attack within the golden temple, and the tragedy that happened in new delhi after indira gandhi was shot... the plot may have moved to obvious places, and the characters may have become too one-sided, but the author did a great job of giving a pan-view: from before partition up to the air india bombing.
i've also recently reflected on the insult-du-jour when i was in highschool: paki.
now i wonder if it was hate-based in a faith (muslim) rather than ethnicity (indian. well, really, pakistani but it was …
when you heard about (or see a movie about) partition, you always hear about the muslims and the hindus, but not much about the sikhs. coming from brampton, i should already have a good cultural understanding of the sikhs, but i don't.
so i was glad to read this book and learn about the punjab, and it's splitting in 2, and the attack within the golden temple, and the tragedy that happened in new delhi after indira gandhi was shot... the plot may have moved to obvious places, and the characters may have become too one-sided, but the author did a great job of giving a pan-view: from before partition up to the air india bombing.
i've also recently reflected on the insult-du-jour when i was in highschool: paki.
now i wonder if it was hate-based in a faith (muslim) rather than ethnicity (indian. well, really, pakistani but it was applied to any east indian you wanted to jeer). numerous insults could have been chosen - but this was the choice of many