Emotional and sexual wants are at once very personal needs in a person’s life and at the same time are colored and qualified by the social and cultural mores prevalent in one’s environment. In the backdrop of diasporic life, such entanglements gain an extra dimension that give an insight into ‘acculturation, which concerns the acquisition of the values, attitudes, beliefs, language, and behaviours of the host society’ (Peter Kivisto. Multiculturalism in a Global Society, Blackwell Publishing Limited, UK, 2002, p. 28). In a multicultural global society that strives to preserve discrete ethnic identities, the case of second generation non-resident Indians is a peculiar one. They take pride in their cultural heritage yet are at odds with its stereotypical beliefs and in distancing themselves from cultural stereotypes they partake of selective acculturation. It is an ambivalent position but it is the only position they can reconcile themselves to despite facing a crisis of identity in doing so. Especially with relation to love, sex, marriage and other personal needs the second generation NRIs do not want themselves to be straitjacketed by Indian value system. Being brought up in the liberal atmosphere of the West, albeit as representatives of an ethnic minority, they have a sense of claustrophobia when their ethnic identity curbs their Western lifestyle. At the same time breaking sexual taboos and inhibitions differentiates physical wants from emotional wants as well as shows the interdependence of the body and the mind.

The lifestyles of first generation Indian immigrants and their progeny are radically different when emotional and sexual issues are considered. The first generation NRIs have an emotional investment in the country of their origin but the second generation NRIs have no direct contact with their ethnic roots; they identify themselves with their ethnicity via their parentage. This distancing effect helps them in identifying themselves also as citizens of the Western world. It is as Westerners that they are most potent in expressing their angst against the duality of their identity. It is a constant process of switching on and off from one mode of living to the other that they have to go through. In this state of simultaneously living in two worlds, the sense of rootlessness creeps in. Wracked by such a condition the second generation NRIs seek refuge in the sense of freedom that the Western world affords – liberties of thought, speech, expression, lifestyle, sexuality and so on. It is especially the sexual liberation of the West that provides a ready lifeline as an emotional succor from the distress of being in exile.

It is not to be confused that the second generation NRIs use their sexual freedom just as an instrument to dispel their sense of rootlessness and loneliness. The primary purpose of sex is to satisfy a bodily want but in the diasporic context it satisfies an added want just like the main purpose of spices is to give flavor to the food but in certain preparations they have the added purpose of being medicinal. Jhumpa Lahiri in her short story, Interpreter of Maladies, depicts the NRI character Mina Das’s sexual infidelity towards her husband, Raj:

It was the novelty of the intimate experience amidst the boredom of Mrs. Das’s lonely life that allowed her to succumb to it. She definitely got pleasure from the act, both physical and from the awareness of the fact that she was breaking the monotony of her life. Nothing is more exciting than doing what is forbidden either by society or by morality.

The cause of Mrs. Das’s infidelity was boredom, which arose from loneliness that was a product of her diasporic condition. But to infer that diasporic condition begets infidelity would be a preposterous statement. The real pangs of the diasporic condition arises in Mrs. Das’s next eight years of guilt-ridden existence, where she could not even confide her secret to anyone. Mrs. Das needs as a confidante, someone who is close as well as distant at the same time, just like the country of her origin. She is emotionally so close to India that its value system smothers her by giving her an intense sense of guilt for what she has done and yet the country is so far off that it takes her eight long years to reach out to it. At last she confides in Mr. Kapasi, an Indian, in India; giving back to the source of her sense of guilt her confession. Mr. Kapasi is the tour guide; he is also an ‘interpreter of maladies’ in a doctor’s chamber, but for Mrs. Das he is symbolic of India – close enough not to keep any contact with. The slip of paper with Mr. Kapasi’s address slipping out of Mrs. Das’s bag and flying away unnoticed by the Das family bears testimony to the fact.

Mrs. Das’s confession does not imply any lasting imprint of emotional contact but rather precisely the reverse. No doubt Lahiri mentions, not Mr. Kapasi’s wish, but ‘his dream, of serving as an interpreter between nations’ while corresponding with Mrs. Das. ‘Dream’ is too vague a word to be fulfilled. Lahiri also makes a number of metaphorical allusions to the dichotomy of the propinquity of India’s distant cultural past. Near the dried-up Chandrabhaga river the Das family along with Mr. Kapasi observe the cradle of India’s cultural past at the Konarak temple. The medallions in the spokes on the wheel of life bore-

When Mrs. Das stops to look at the carved ‘topless female musicians beating on two-sided drums’, Mr. Kapasi sees them anew with Mrs. Das’s perspective and it occurs to him ‘that he had never seen his own wife fully naked. Even when she made love she kept the panels of her blouse hooked together, the strings of her petticoat knotted around her waist’. India has transgressed from the ancient culture and has become a land of closed closets. It is closet-mentality inherited by Mrs. Das that gives her the sense of guilt. The second generation non-resident Indians in giving way to the sexual liberties of the West are actually, though unconsciously, retracing their way back to their forgotten cultural lineage. Benedict Anderson’s ‘imagined community’ is conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship and no doubt, socio-cultural movements are linear but if a bird’s eye view is taken then the linear pattern under historio-cultural perspective is found to be cyclic.

In the short story, The Third and Final Continent, Lahiri’s NRI protagonist is the narrator of the story. He was in London when his marriage was arranged and at the same time he was offered a job in America. So,

Later when his wife, Mala, arrives in Boston he realizes how little he knew of her. One day he takes her to meet Mrs. Croft, a hundred and three years old woman, landlady of the place where he resided when he first came to Boston. The woman born in 1866 inspects Mala who is wrapped in a sari from top to toe with ‘a dot painted on her forehead and bracelets stacked on her wrists’, and remarks –

"She is a perfect lady!" (Interpreter of Maladies, HarperCollins, India, 1999, p. 195)

In the presence of Mrs. Croft they share conspiratorial looks and smiles with each other and the narrator declares:

For the tradition-bound first generation NRIs, the Western culture is like an assault on their feelings and convictions but the acquaintance of Mrs. Croft consoles them. They are not as ‘ancient and alone’ as Mrs. Croft whose Victorian mindset cannot conceive of the fact that astronauts have landed on the moon. Hence becoming ‘quickly bold’.

The sexual wants and experiences of first generation NRIs are not much different from those of Indians in India but their conventionality is not stereotypical. Though their sexuality is only one-dimensional – as a manifestation of love – they at least do not have to conform to the laws of what a couple should or should not do in bed behind closed doors. The second generation NRIs discover the other dimension of sexuality – a craving of the flesh that can be satisfied without feeling guilty of doing so. The intrinsic link between sex and love is traditional; sex as a bodily want is universal; but sex as a refuge from loneliness, from crisis of identity, from emotional conflict is perhaps a special quality of the diasporic experience. The second generation NRI couple, Shukumar and Shoba, in the short story, A Temporary Matter, by Jhumpa Lahiri, are ones who reach ‘for each other’s bodies before sleeping’. During happy days Shoba used to whisper Shukumar’s name in such moments of intimacy but after their baby is born dead, thei moments of intimacy do not have that tenderness. Previously they had sex because of love but now it is just to satisfy their carnal want. In their Western lifestyle, Shoba and Shukumar have recognized the dual function of sex. In their hour of grief, Shukumar and Shoba, despite having a number of Western acquaintances, find themselves lonely, because they cannot relate to those acquaintances. As members of the diasporic community they find themselves in exile at their moment of sorrow and hence their loneliness. Their reactions to the situation are contrasting – Shukumar cannot concentrate in his work whereas Shoba immerses herself in her work. At a time of crisis, living Western lives aggravates their want of emotional support. On the fourth night of their confessions in the dark they make love,

…with a desperation they had forgotten. She wept without sound, and whispered his name…

Shoba whispers Shukumar’s name but also cries because this time sex satisfies an additional purpose – it acts as a succor from their diasporic condition. The intimacy that sex offers has the potential to cure the maladies of exile, albeit temporarily. Shoba’s and Shukumar’s want of emotional comfort is allayed temporarily by their sexuality. Even if such relationships are not between spouses or between persons who belong to the same diasporic community, like the adulterous Bengali NRI, Dev, and the Midwestern, Miranda, in Jhumpa Lahiri’s short story, Sexy, the arguments still hold good. Sexual wants and emotional wants get entwined with each other in the diasporic life.

Jhumpa Lahiri depicts in her novel, The Namesake, how the sexual wants of first generation NRIs differ from those of the second generation and in general how the sexual wants of the Indian diaspora is distinct from those of the native Western population. Ashoke and Ashima are first generation NRIs in Boston. When Ashima is pregnant with Gogol she is admitted to a hospital where she finds herself –

When she hears a husband consoling his wife by saying, "I love you, sweetheart", she realizes that these words she ‘has neither heard nor expects to hear from her own husband; that is how they are.’

Ashoke and Ashima’s relationship is intimate yet not explicit. The closest thing that Ashima had ever experienced ‘to the touch of a man’ before her marriage was when she secretly stepped into her would-be husband’s shoes and the ‘lingering sweat from the owner’s feet mingled with hers, causing her heart to race’. When Gogol observes Maxine’s parents, Gerald and Lydia, ‘kissing openly, going for walks through the city, or to dinner, just as Gogol and Maxine do’, he is reminded –

When Maxine says that that was so depressing, Gogol is upset at her reaction but he cannot help but agree as a Westerner. Gogol since childhood has identified himself more as an American than as an Indian but through his number of sexual liaisons he comes to realize that he simply cannot have a single identity. As a representative of a diaspora, he is forever exiled.

Gogol’s first sexual urges come when he is in high school where ‘he suffers quiet crushes, which he admits to no one, on this girl or that girl with whom he is already friends’.

But Gogol cannot be what his parents are. So,

In the party he meets a girl called Kim to whom he introduces himself by his other name, Nikhil. It is as Nikhil he kisses her; ‘the first time he’s kissed anyone, the first time he’s felt a girl’s face and body and breath so close to his own’. ‘Gogol’ becomes his Indian self while ‘Nikhil’ his American other and thus he is initiated into the sexual mores of the Western world.

By the time Gogol is inn the middle of his sophomore year, he has already lost his virginity and is involved with Ruth. He keeps it a secret from his parents, confiding only in his sister, Sonia, who herself has a secret boyfriend. The progeny of the first generation NRIs keep their sexual preferences secret from them because they know that their parents would be ‘not in the least bit proud or pleased’ of their sexual accomplishments. When Gogol’s parents come to know about Ruth,

Ashima and Ashoke tell Gogol instances of Bengali men, whom they have known, who married Americans and ended up divorcing. But when Gogol answers that marriage ‘is the last thing on his mind’ it makes matters worse. What Gogol and his parents cannot understand is that their experiences of being young and in love are different because of their upbringing.

After graduating, Gogol starts living and working in New York where he gets involved in a relationship with Maxine. He admires the sexual liberalism of Maxine’s parents, Gerald and Lydia, and even her grandparents, Hank and Edith. In comparison his parents’ sexual conservatism seems as a hindrance to him in recognizing himself as an American. Gogol knows his mother will never put on a bathing suit and swim as Maxine’s mother does. But a change occurs in Gogol after the sudden death of his father. His Indian self starts gaining prominence over his American self. Maxine tolerated initially,

Maxine admits that she felt jealous of Gogol’s mother and sister, Gogol finds the accusation absurd and walks out of the relationship. After his break-up with Maxine, Gogol has a brief affair with a married woman called Bridget but it is he who starts feeling guilty. Gogol’s sexual preferences are undergoing a change and ultimately he agrees with his mother’s proposal to meet a Bengali NRI girl, Moushumi Mazoomdar.

Like Gogol, Moushumi also grew up in a conservative Indian home amidst a liberal Western populace. Like Gogol she ‘had always been admonished not to marry an American’. But unlike Gogol, Moushumi being a girl, since her adolescent years ‘she’d been subjected to a series unsuccessful schemes’ of arranged marriage.

A rebellion was brewing in her to dispel her loneliness. While she majored in chemistry she secretly pursued a double major in French and then moved to Paris against her parents’ wishes, where –

Moushumi’s reaction is a bit extreme because she could not discover her convincing other self like Gogol. After the period of sexual excesses, Moushumi falls in love with Graham and back in America she impulsively asks him to marry her. Graham accepts her proposal and even agrees to a Hindu wedding and goes to Calcutta to meet her extended family. On returning to New York, a few weeks before their marriage they go out to dinner with friends and Graham after getting drunk starts complaining about his time in Calcutta,

…commenting that he found it taxing, found the culture repressed…

They argue, they fight, and separate in bitterness. Both Gogol’s and Moushumi’s sexual relationships end because of their subconscious emotional leanings towards their culture and ethnicity. It is as a kickback of their individual situation that they start loving each other and have an arranged marriage.

After a year of their marriage Moushumi wonders ‘how long she will live her life with the trappings of studenthood’, when will she get a ‘real full-time tenure track job’. She wants to make a fresh start in a new place but Gogol cannot leave New York because of his job. It is in such a situation when boredom and loneliness is creeping into her life that Dimitri, the first man to touch her when she was only seventeen, turns up in her life. She calls him and they start having their clandestine rendezvous on Mondays and Wednesdays. Dimitri ‘regards their time together as perfectly normal, as destined, and she begins to see how easy it is’. If Gogol is a victim of Moushumi’s cuckoldry, Moushumi is also a victim – of repressive diasporic adolescence, especially because of her gender.

Gogol’s relationship even with an NRI, despite marriage, ends in failure. It is not Gogol who has failed in any way but rather the circumstances and the dilemma of being a second generation NRI is what that have failed him. The sexual and emotional wants in diasporic life are challenging and it needs fortitude to overcome the challenge. Perhaps Sonia is best placed to make the transition. Sonia’s relationship is with Ben and they are engaged to get married in India. Ben is half-Jewish, half-Chinese.