Of questions and answers- part one

Recently a young girl visiting my flat to ask me for donations for SOS village and Helpage etc. asked me a question that sent me off on a tangent of thought which has been pickling in my mind for weeks. The question was simple enough: Where are you from? The answer ought to be simple enough. Only it wasn't. Because I didn't know. I thought long and hard after she left about it. The reason for my ambiguity was that I was an army officer's daughter and I had lived all over India at different times of my life. By birth I was Bengali but I had only lived in Kolkata for a couple of years. I had settled down In U.P. having spent my adult years in Delhi cantonment. We had lived in Assam, Jabalpur, Chennai, Jhansi before that. So to be completely honest I didn't know where I was from. I did not feel any special affinity to Kolkata as such, my few visits there over the years being more a form of duty than anything else. I did not belong there. No umbilical connection there. The only connection I felt was to army. To those green lush cantonments,  to order and discipline, to organization in its myriad forms. Apart from that where was I from? Would you think me an absolute douche bag if I said- India? Come to think of it I've never been unduly patriotic. Not the flags and banners kind. But I do have something to say about the recent trend( or has it always been so) of making little pockets where you lay claim to your piece of territory. Telangana. Kashmir. Everyone wants a piece for himself. Independence from independence. And the fighting. My god. Everyone wants to live free. Irony isn't it in a democracy? We are free. So why are we clamoring for our little pockets and hidey holes? Search me. I racked my brains and couldn't come up with an answer. If you do let me know. It's your country man. Why do you need a pocket to crawl into? Demarcate territories? Put up fences and barriers? Large signs saying: This is mine. Keep out. Why are we so threatened? 

I may speak Bengali eat Bengali food but may feel at home just about anywhere. Why do I have to limit myself to a region or state? So I gave her the only answer I could. "Everywhere." I said. "I'm from everywhere." It's how I feel. What about you? What do you feel? What do you think? A pocket to crawl into or the whole damn country? Where are you from? India or Assam, Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai, Punjab? Hey only you have the answer to that question.