Once again frustrated by the limited information I had about my ancestors, I longed to be connected to my culture. So there I was, January of 2017, in my studio apartment which overlooked the main street of Cortland, NY. And, since marriage was not legalized for Indians in Trinidad until 1945,marriage certificates did not exist. There were no documents or written records as my grandparents and their parents could not read or write. My maternal grandfather’s first and last name had been switched and no one knew the real names of his parents, as people referred to elders (and still do) as nana, nani, mousey and so on. First, I didn’t know my grandparents’ or great-grandparents’ real names. I wanted to know something, anything about them, but there were unique roadblocks that stopped my progression. It wasn’t until I was in college when I really questioned why I did so and tried to trace our family to India. By the time I entered the school system we had moved to Long Island and I spent most of my teenage years claiming only half of my identity, branding myself as Caribbean over Indian. They spent the holidays slipping and sliding in the only boots they owned, cowboy boots. It was their first real winter and the worst NYC had seen in years. My parents immigrated to the United States during the winter of 1994. Of those 144,000 Indians, four were my great grandparents.

My own grandfather still has an identification number on this forearm. Many were illiterate, signing their papers with their thumbprints and some, bearing their assigned numbers, tattooed on their bodies. Under British rule, they worked at the sugar cane plantations following the abolishment of slavery. I spent hours until I called it quits, convinced that there was no way to trace my ancestry to India.īetween the years of 18, 144,000 Indian indentured laborers were brought to the Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Tobago. I researched, in a repetitive action that now occurs around every six months of my life: Indian indentured laborers in Trinidad, Indian immigration ships and Indian indenture ship recorders.

I wrapped myself in three layers of blankets, eyes glued to my laptop screen. It was snowing for what felt like the millionth time of my senior year of college in upstate, New York. The heat of the once frozen pizza emanated steadily onto my lap.

Legacy of ashes