by | Sep 1, 2018 | Uncategorized
In Punjab, it was normal for girls to be married at 18, but I wasn’t ready for it. One day, I came home from college at noon, and by 5 o’clock the same day I was married. That was a huge shock for me. I don’t know why my parents gave me away. It was the tradition at...
by | Jul 17, 2018 | Uncategorized
My parents migrated to Saudi Arabia from India for a better life. As a result I was born there, and grew up through the Gulf War. When I was 9, we moved to Canada, and I remember feeling angry because I didn’t understand why we had to leave our extended family and our...
by nhoa | Dec 13, 2017 | Uncategorized
People often ask me where I’m from, but it’s not always easy for me to answer. My great grandfather moved to Fiji from India in the early 1900s to serve as a labourer on the sugar plantations. Fiji at that time was a British colony, so my grandfather had a British...
by nhoa | Feb 10, 2017 | Uncategorized
Growing up in Calcutta was a lot of fun. Of course it was very crowded, but there were many communities living together – Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, Chinese, Armenian, and we young people would all join in whatever festival was happening, whether that was Chinese New Year...
by nhoa | Nov 8, 2016 | Uncategorized
For the past few months, a Facebook ad has repeatedly popped up in my feed, in Bengali. It is a picture of a boat on the ocean, and above it, a map of Australia with a red slash across it, saying ‘No way. Australia will never ever relax its border control laws.’ I...
