Findingmyway ji,
Guru Fateh.
It is a lot more than that then meets the eye. There are a lot of intricacies involved. There is a stigma in the Indian culture. The adopted child feels that he/she was unwanted in our value system when he/she comes to know about that.
I have an example in my own family. My dad-Papa ji's cousin could not conceive and Ami ji had 3 kids already. My Mata ji, who ruled the household although she was bedridden decided that the next child of Ami ji would be given for adoption to my Bhua ji. It so happened that the next child who was born 2 years before me, a girl was given as told. Unfortunately, they were not as well off as we were. However, despite that she was sent to the best boarding school in Dehradun. After sometime, when she came to know that she was adopted, she had a big fight with both Papa ji and Ami ji and was not very happy because she thought she was unwanted. She became a kind of rebel and married a Marathi guy who is a gem of a person by the way. I was not in India when all this took place. I saw her in 1985 when Papa ji passed away but the things had been patched up long before as her parents came to stay at our house and she realised the wonderful nature of my parents.
Adoption is common in Christianity because of the proselytization. In Sikhi, it is not possible unless the adopted child is from a Sikhi background. Mormons love to adopt in order to spread their cult and because of the mandatory missionary system which helps them in adoption.
It is a common thing among the Scandinavians to adopt even when they have their own kids and religion is not a factor. I know lots of them who have done that for some generations.
Allow me to share my own story of Brasil. I was living with my Brazilian brother David in Sao Paulo. The year was 1976. Most of the apartment buildings have two entrances in Brasil. One is called the social entry where there is a security and one has to write the name and the resident is informed via inter-phone about the guest. The other one is the service one through which all the maids/groceries go to the apartment. Its entrance is from the kitchen's back door. Next to the kitchen there is a studio with a bathroom for the maids. In some places including ours, I had to fight with my security guy to let my black friends in through the social lifts. There is a hidden kind of racism there but things are changing.
We were looking for a new maid. One night, the bell rings from the service elevator. There was this young lady in her early 20's with a 10 day old baby boy with her.She had been fired from her previous job for having a baby. She was a single mom. She came to know that we were looking for a maid. We took her in. Needless to say she was very happy about it. We sort of adopted Roberto, the boy. We used to baby sit him when she went out with our encouragement because of her young age. Many a times I spent all nighters with him walking around while he was crying. It was a great experience which can not be expressed in words.
When the time came for him to go to school. I adopted him officially and took him to the neighbourhood Catholic School. The priest was shockingly impressed to see a guy with a black turban adopting his maid's son, not a common thing in Brasil. I taught him English. I had flexi hours so I was more with him than David. I used to take him to the weekend lunches at my friends' houses over the weekends. As a result, I did lose quite a few of Gopis because I was giving more attention to him.
I had to leave Brasil in Feb, 1985 all of a sudden because of a serious car accident that Ami ji had suffered and sadly Papa ji passed away on the 10th of the same month due to stroke.
I had Roberto's picture in my wallet and used to send his mom the money for his school. This practice continued and he was the first in her mom's family to go graduate from college. He is a manager at Deloitte,a high paying job and was sent to the US- San Diego and New York to study English last year. He arranged his mum to come to the US to see him but she only wanted to come if she could see me. They both came to Las Vegas and it was nice to see him as a grown man after so many years. I picked Trimaan from his school and it was wonderful for them to meet each other. They are FB friends now. After 1985, I visited Brasil a couple of times till 1988. Whenever she used to see me, her tears were unstoppable, even here in Vegas. She told me that without me, Roberto would not have gone to school and would be working as a janitor which I disagree with because I was just a mean not the end. Roberto deserves all the credit. I was just a lucky person to have met him.
Now, let me get back to the Indian stigma. In 1985, I was 30 and ripe low hanging fruit for marriage who had many offers without my knowledge. I proudly showed Roberto's picture to everyone whom I had not seen for 15 years. One day, my Masar and Mama (both deceased now) took me to the corner and told me that they had some matches for me but they wanted to know about Roberto if he was my real son or not. I started laughing. Mind you, I left India at 15 and had very little contact with the culture till I got back at 30. Lucky for me, I was brave enough to say no to all and met Harsimran in late 88 in Los Angeles.
I wish Sikhi encouraged adoptions but for that to happen, we have to change the culture of stigma which seems almost impossible.
I apologise for the long post.
Regards
Tejwant Singh
