Adabidda (odd-bid-uh)
Resilience, Power, and Nuance as Women “over there”
I was twenty-seven when I realized the terms for girl and boy in my mother tongue of Telugu were not as benign as I thought. The word for baby girl, “Adabidda” translates literally to “there-child”, or the “child who belongs over there”. The word for son, “Magabidda”, translates to “our child”.
The belief that a daughter would grow up and join her husband’s family, and therefore is a liability, goes back centuries in India and other parts of the world. Realizing it was so engrained in language though — in one of MY languages! — shocked me.
Born in Toronto to parents from Bangalore, there are contrasts I’ve tried to wrap my head around in my family, in the diaspora, and through prolonged stays in India. Unspoken beliefs that a woman should be smart but humble; “modern” but not too modern; bold without challenging her husband. And of course, bonus points for women who make tasty Masala Dosa and Idli-Sambar (Okay, this last one is #goals for me!).
I realize these limits are not unique to me or my diaspora, as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie eloquently describes through her essay We should all be feminists:
“We say to girls, you can have ambition, but not too much. You should aim to be successful, but not too successful. Otherwise, you would threaten the man.
Because I am female, I am expected to aspire to marriage… Now marriage can be a source of joy and love and mutual support but why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage and we don’t teach boys the same? We raise girls to see each other as competitors… for the attention of men.”
Beyond our worth in the eyes of men, there remain fundamental tensions when you grow up as a woman in a diaspora. To understand them, reaching back to our ancestors may help.
M y maternal great-grandmother (affectionately called “Ammani”), was technically married at nine years old. Ammani moved to her in-laws’ at age fourteen, and had nine children by the time she was twenty-seven (the same age I would read about adabiddas in grad school). My great grandfather passed prematurely, and Ammani was faced with raising all those children singlehandedly. Ammani survived into her nineties.
My maternal grandmother (Ammamma) was married at fourteen. Ammamma raised six children, suffering quietly with illness while managing a large household. My grandfather (Thatha) was present, but my mother stepped up to help as the eldest daughter, learning how to run a kitchen for the whole family by age thirteen.
When it was time for my mom to get married a decade later, it was bittersweet — she was heartbroken to leave my Ammamma.
My mother moved to Toronto in 1974 after marrying my dad — who had settled in Canada in 1964. It was an arranged marriage, and my parents met a few times before their wedding. My dad was charming, and my mom and her family welcomed him.
My mom boarded the flight with an open ticket in hand in case things went sideways. (My Thatha wanted to make sure his daughter had an out in case my dad’s charm didn’t hold true, and in those days, an open ticket was it.)
My mom faced her share of tensions as she adjusted to her new home. She loved attending college — some of her most treasured memories to this day — but faced racial slurs on her way to class, often about her “Paki dot”.
She also had to deal with my dad’s slow transition from bachelorhood. He enjoyed pool halls and beers with his buddies; she hated alcohol and cigarettes. (Anyone else imagine Paula Abdul’s “Opposites Attract” video?)
My favourite story from this time is one where my mom was so fed up with my dad’s resistance to change, she stormed downstairs with an (empty) suitcase and that open ticket in hand, threatening to head back to India. My dad, stunned, became teary-eyed, and pleaded with her to stay.
This was a turning point in their marriage, the start of compromise on both sides. It’s a story my mom tells with a sly smile. She knows she wouldn’t have left her husband, but was pleased to make her point using simple theatrics!
Like many immigrants in the 70s, my mom relied on shoddy phone connections, telegrams and air mail to connect back home, never able to fully express her joys and struggles with her new life on the other side of the world.
My dad passed away prematurely, succumbing to a battle with cancer in the 90s. My mom was left with three young people to raise, and navigated all sorts of crises. She has built her life in service of everyone around her — first her mom, then her husband, then her kids.
W hen I think of the previous Adabidda generations in my family, I feel for their suffering and struggle, for childhoods that ended too soon, and too abruptly. I can’t imagine how they managed.
I wonder how being deemed “the child over there”, even if only in a literal sense, may have affected the minds and hearts of these young girls. And part of me carries some of their pain, as much as I want to let it go.
Difficult patterns in our family histories are termed “intergenerational trauma” by therapists. I feel we should speak in equal measure about intergenerational resilience, and the power that develops from it.
While the roots of “Adabidda” sadden me, another term granted to women in my family reminds me of their power.
In my mother, in each of my aunts, and in our future children, also lies a Goddess, or “Devi” — the middle name given to them at birth.
The concepts of the divine feminine date back over five thousand years in Indian spirituality. Through qualities of destruction and creation (Durga/Parvati), abundance (Lakshmi), and wisdom (Saraswati), these energies are believed to rule much of the world. In some strands of Hinduism, the male trinity was believed to be birthed out of the female energy (rather than a more patriarchal view of the divine originating with Lord Brahma).
I see qualities of all the Devis in my mom: the strength to make tough decisions, to draw in abundance and nurture others, and to tap into wisdom she has earned over lifetimes.
There is so much joy in my mom, despite all of her struggles, or maybe because of them. I have not seen someone laugh as heartily in such a petite body. (My sister and I like to get her going, with poor but enthusiastic attempts at Telugu or Kannada proverbs. Trust me, there are many great ones about men, pride, and their moustaches!).
N ew stereotypes are emerging for women in my generation and younger: the successful, intelligent women portrayed in sitcoms like Mindy Kaling’s “Never Have I Ever”; the range of (cringey) couples in Netflix’s Indian Matchmaker.
These tropes, although newer, miss out on the depth and nuance I feel in the skin of an Indo-Canadian woman.
They miss experiences of those us who grew up in lower-middle income families: formally educated, but on unconventional paths. Those of us who didn’t “settle” early (read: marriage and kids), but have done our best to support loved ones.
They miss stories of parents who weren’t as privileged as actors on screen; parents who, along with a couple suitcases, brought with them the baggage of fear and hope, obedience and audacity, and a desire for their kids to move up the societal ladder.
All while holding on tight to deeply-held values.
I’m grateful to have been raised as part of a diverse and rogue generation in Toronto, with girlfriends in the South Asian community and other diasporas who share rich, complex identities.
We are part of an odd but important generation: attempting to bridge the dreams of our parents with our own; bridges that span generations, oceans and beliefs.
We have come a long way since my Ammani was married at nine years old. But there is still a long road ahead in improving how girls are treated in India and in the diaspora.
As we move forward, we can choose to see Adabiddas and Magabiddas for who they are regardless of gender: children. Neither “ours” nor “theirs” but big souls in little bodies, here to live lives and dreams we cannot fathom, as Kahlil Gibran so beautifully reminds us in his poem On Children.
We can encourage the light of all the girls to come, knowing they carry the wisdom of ancestors and the power of Goddesses within.
