Senator Kamala Harris has been declared the Democratic candidate for the Vice President post of the United States. Her mixed ancestry – African-American and South Asian-American meant that Indians were immediately a lot more interested in the upcoming US elections than they would otherwise have been. While Harris is proudly black she has also repeatedly claimed her Indian roots. Now suddenly we have trends such as #YoKamalaSoIndian trending on Indian Twitter and trends such as #Chithi on American and Indian Twitter.
This video shows Kamala Harris and Mindy Kaling doing some South Indian cooking and speaking about their Indian heritage.
Talking about reusing jars for masala seemed to spark of this trend: people thought of many ways Kamala is ‘Indian’ in the stereotypical sense.
She supposedly does what every Indian does – simply because waste is anathema to us.
Why buy a box with there are so many others lying around that will do just as well.
One neighbour of mine still hasn’t removed the plastic from his car seats – he was owned his car for five years now.
Because sanskar!
…That she uses the hygiene faucet instead of toilet paper as every sensible desi does.
Buying milk direct from the ‘gwala’ out of tin cans – it doesn’t get any more Indian than that!
Maybe be this is what it means to her, thinks this Twitter user.
Indians will use up every last bit of paste in the tube – as everyone should!
There is a reason why that fare calculator faces us.
She used the world Chithi (meaning auntie) in a Democratic National Convention
So this term started to trend in India and in the United States. People started to share the picture of Radikaa Sarathkumar in the popular Tamil serial called Chithi.
Some such as TV host, model and author Padma Lakshmi seemed to be very moved by Harris’s mention of the word chithi.
To be clear, Rajini played a robot called Chitti, in the film; different from ‘chithi’.
There are many who question Harris’s use of the Tamil word 'chithi' in her speech. While some were moved, others were delighted at what they saw as Harris claiming her Indian or rather Tamil heritage. Some thought that the use of the word ‘chithi’ is just manipulation; an identitarian’s attempt to attract the substantial Indian-American vote. Maybe it’s all those things.
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