My name is Sara, I say. I’m from India. Never met an Indian with that name, they say. Is it short for something? No, that’s my first name. I say. It’s from the Quran. No way! It’s a Biblical name, they say. Are there Muslims in India? Yes, 200 million, I say. We thought every Indian was Hindi, they say. A majority are Hin-du, but there are Muslims, Christians, and others, too, I say. Hin-di is a language, my mother tongue. How’s your English this good? they say. We were a British colony, I say. As were we, they say.
Sara Siddiqui Chansarkar is an Indian American writer. Born to a middle-class family in India, she later migrated to the USA. Her stories and poems have appeared in many publications, in print and online. She is the winner of the ELJ Creative Micro Non-Fiction Prize, has been shortlisted in Bath Flash Fiction Contest. She is currently a prose editor at Janus Literary and a submissions editor at SmokeLong Quarterly. Her debut flash fiction collection Morsels of Purple is available for purchase on Amazon.com. Her chapbook will be released later this year. More at https://saraspunyfingers.com. Reach her @PunyFingers
Photo Credit: Ahdieh Ashrafi
My name is Sara, I say. I’m from India. Never met an Indian with that name, they say. Is it short for something? No, that’s my first name. I say. It’s from the Quran. No way! It’s a Biblical name, they say. Are there Muslims in India? Yes, 200 million, I say. We thought every Indian was Hindi, they say. A majority are Hin-du, but there are Muslims, Christians, and others, too, I say. Hin-di is a language, my mother tongue. How’s your English this good? they say. We were a British colony, I say. As were we, they say.
Thank you for sharing.
Beautiful. Finding common ground through dialogue.
This works so well in dialogue. The unsaid hovering beneath the words. Beautiful. A novel in 100 words?
Love this!