Life of an Indian Teenage Girl

What being a NRI kid really means

If you are an NRI you are going to relate to this, sadly. If you know people who are NRIs then you're gonna want to read this.

What is an NRI? Non-residential Indian. Basically, any Indian citizen that does not live in India.

Seriously everyone have this feeling that NRI children are really spoilt, pampered and don't know how to do anything and that they have a very luxurious life.

I wanted to tell you all that this is not the reality. I am in no way comparing our life with the students in India....well, actually to some extent I am.

This is not a competition to a know whose life is worse ok? We've all excelled in that field way back in the-year-that-shall-not-be-named.

I don't know if you guys know this but, children abroad actually have to study more, if not double, of what actual Indians do. Not all schools though. Only the schools that follow the Indian curriculum abroad. So, basically what happens is that we have to study those subjects as well as the language of the country we live in. We have to follow both the boards. It doesn't really feel like a burden or anything to be honest since we've been doing it from the beginning, but just saying.

Then there is homesickness. Oh my god, the homesickness. Although I was not born or brought up in India I still miss it. I don't like the insects that follow us home but I still miss the greenery. I'm an introvert, but I still miss my cousins.

I usually visit India during the vacations, once every year, but thanks to the-one-that-shall-not-be-named I was not able to go to India much like most of my friends.

Life goes by like that, we get many amazing friends and we feel really at home and just when we get too comfortable, we have to leave. This is not the case of everyone. This is the story of almost everyone that lives where I live and studies where I study. Why do we have to go back to India? Because in India we have more chance of a better higher education, apparently.

Then there is also the judgement. When we go to India, there is always at least 3 people you'll meet every time you visit that says, "Oh wow, you got so fat! Sitting simply at home all day, right. Maybe that's why. You should exercise more and eat less." or "Oh wow, you got so thin! Your mother is not feeding you anything? Poor child, look at her condition!"

This is so annoying. So annoying. I mean, if the person that was saying this had a perfect body or was a health freak or at least a person that is just healthy then I would have been ok with it. I would call it advising and that would have been ok. It would have been relevant.

Body shaming is wrong. It's not funny. You can't insult someone's looks and then when the person gets angry you can't just pass it of by saying," I was just joking."

In conclusion, all I wanted to say was that everyone is suffering ok? People that live abroad are not living fancy lives in fancy homes with fancy food and all. Trust me when I say that many live in apartments that are really small. So small that it would make you just uncomfortable and claustrophobic.

Thank you for reading. Please stop comparing your lives to others. The reasons I gave above might sound stupid, but....well I don't have any explanation for that. Don't wish that you could have been born somewhere else. I have done that even though I literally love the place I live in and don't ever want to leave, but that's the problem. At some point I might have to.

Just a reminder: This is the 46th chapter and I decided to end this book with 50 chapters. I have 4 more chapters to go!