Home Away From Home: What It Means to Be a Fijian Indian in USA

Home Away From Home: What It Means to Be a Fijian Indian in USA – The Quint

(This article first appeared in The Quint on July 25, 2021)

Sanjay Sen fondly reminisces his dadi as he croons, ‘… kaise khelen jaiyo sawaan ma, kajaria badariya ghir aayi nandi…,’ – a Bhojpuri song he heard his grandmother sing often as a child in Laukuto city in Fiji. Sanjay’s ancestors made Fiji their home, a picture perfect archipelago of over 330 islands in the South Pacific. Four generations back, his great grandfather Mewababu Sen reached Fiji by the first labour transport ship ‘Leonidas’ that brought Indian indentured workers to Fiji, then a British colony. On 14 May 1879 Mewababu set foot in Levuka, Fiji after a long sea journey of three months, having left Calcutta on 28 January 1879…

 

Share with