Analysis Of If You Eat, Then What Am I By Geeta Kothari

I have my point of view of living on the border between two cultures. Unlike Geeta Kothari, my cultures are not vastly opposite Kothari uses the title of her writing, “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I” to express growing up and living in two different cultures and how she experienced it through foods. Kothari begins her story as a nine-year-old child curiously wanting to eat the same foods as the other children her age: tuna fish salad sandwiches, hot dogs and such. She does not have the guidance from her mother in the twists and turns or the ins and outs of the American food and culture like her mom can give in the Indian food and culture. Kothari’s mom tries to curb the curiosity by letting her daughter indulge in a can of tuna fish. The can was opened, and Kothari described it as “pink and shiny, like

The way she describes the American food is with such disgust and almost a loathing for it. It makes the reader think twice about it. Through her very gross description of American food and her natural reaction to it, Kothari has adapted her mother’s view of it, “repugnant… pork and meat byproducts, crushed bone and hair glued together by chemicals and fat” (947). Whether intentional or not she only uses negative imagery to describe the American side of her story. She also points out the vast differences in her and her American husband's looks and tastes. On page 950 Kothari finds the untouchable American meats in her soon-to-be -husband’s freezer as she continues to describe the way he smells and looks foreign and different; how she wants to turn away in a discussed smell when she smells these meats on him, not wanting to kiss him. Eventually, an authentic Indian restaurant moves to her neighborhood, and they are soon driven out by the Americanized Indian type restaurants. Kothari observed her friends as unsure of the true Indian foods, as they did not understand