“Please Dad! Can we please go!” I said as I pleaded to go to India again as a hopeful 7 year old. Almost my entire family lives in India, yet we only go every couple years and I take every chance to beg my parents if we can go again. Whenever we go, we usually spend the entire summer there and come back about two weeks before school starts.

Some of my best summers have been spent with my cousins in India. When we were kids, my dad always had the video camera out and ready to capture sweet moments. Through those videos and little snippets of my own memories, I remember going to an amusement park called Mount Opera. That day was one of my best days from my 2010 trip to India. A day full of rollercoasters and water rides with my cousins. That day, I felt like this was the most fun I would ever have. As if I had reached the maximum. At the end of the day we went home unrecognizably tan smiling from ear to ear. I am always eager to take another trip and make more memories like this.                                                

For most people, this may seem odd. Why would someone spend the entire summer in a different country away from their home? Well, my family is my home and I rarely ever get to see them. In a typical American household, the grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins all live relatively close or at least on the same continent. They probably get together once a year for some extravagant family reunion or maybe even more often.

Gallery • 5 Photos

Family at the Ramoji Film city in Hyderabad (2005).

Most of my family lives in India, so I can only see them every few years. Although when I do get to see them, I always have so much fun. I would much rather spend every summer in India than be bored out of my mind in Michigan for three months.

Although I was born in India, I only lived there for a year, so I don’t really know my family. I see them every 3 or 4 years to spend the summer together. Alas, then we must bid each other farewell. Everytime I see my cousins, so much has changed. It’s almost like meeting a new person that you already knew. Now that we are older, we try to be closer by Facetiming.

In my 15 years of life, I have visited India 5 times. Of those 5, I can only remember 2 trips and the rest of them are just small fragments saved through pictures and videos.

Even though I rarely see my family I still love them and miss them endlessly but that makes it hard to imagine what it is like for my parents. They left everything and everyone they grew up with behind. I can’t expect to understand how much harder it is for them.

Distance will never break the bond between family. I love every aspect of going to India. From waking up to the sweet sound of traffic outside my window, smelling breakfast simmering in the kitchen, days in the sweltering sun, and eating at the stands on the side of the road to watching the sun set behind the dust settle down for the day. India is my home and it will always be a part of me.