{"id":24701,"date":"2020-06-01T07:33:58","date_gmt":"2020-06-01T11:33:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/?p=24701"},"modified":"2020-06-01T07:39:04","modified_gmt":"2020-06-01T11:39:04","slug":"humor-and-honesty-help-fix-a-fractured-relationship-with-mom-and-dad","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/articles\/humor-and-honesty-help-fix-a-fractured-relationship-with-mom-and-dad\/","title":{"rendered":"Humor and Honesty Help Fix a Fractured Relationship with Mom and Dad"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_24702\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-24702\" style=\"width: 410px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/com\/files\/2020\/06\/sopan-deb-400w.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"375\" class=\"size-full wp-image-24702\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-24702\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">As a child, Deb had a fraught relationship with his parents, immigrants from India. They had an unhappy marriage and divorced when Deb was in high school; his father moved to Kolkata in 2007 without telling anyone. Photo by Amy Lombard<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>When Sopan Deb isn\u2019t writing about basketball and culture for the <em>New York Times<\/em>, he moonlights as a stand-up comedian. A few years ago at the <em>Big Brown Comedy Hour<\/em>, which showcases emerging comics of South Asian and Middle Eastern descent, Deb, who is Hindu American, told a joke that went like this:<\/p>\n<p><em>My favorite Christmas tradition growing up was asking my mom what the meaning of Christmas was. Every year, we\u2019d be like, \u201cHey Mom! What\u2019s the meaning of Christmas?\u201d She\u2019d go, \u201cOh, it\u2019s when Jesus died on the cross.\u201d We\u2019d say, \u201cOh, why did Jesus die on the cross?\u201d She\u2019d answer, \u201cIt\u2019s because Jesus became a carpenter instead of a DOCTOR!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Aside from the fact that it confuses Christmas and Easter, the joke plays into the stereotype that Indian moms want their children to become rich and powerful. The bigger issue was that the conversation never happened: Deb\u2019s childhood in a New Jersey suburb with his brother and their immigrant parents didn\u2019t have many traditions or warm, fuzzy moments. What Deb (COM\u201910) was unwilling to joke about that night was his fraught relationship with his parents, who had a miserable arranged marriage and divorced when Deb was in high school. He and his brother, Sattik, who was 10 years older, had a warm relationship, but because of the age difference, Sattik  wasn\u2019t around much during Deb\u2019s formative high school years.<\/p>\n<p>Read the full article in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/articles\/2020\/sopan-deb-missed-translations\/\">Bostonia<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When Sopan Deb isn\u2019t writing about basketball and culture for the New York Times, he moonlights as a stand-up comedian.&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1654,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"bu_prepress_billboard":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term_manual":""},"categories":[962],"tags":[984],"bu-publication":[],"discipline-type":[],"bu_edition":[],"media_type":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/24701"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/bu-article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1654"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/24701\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24706,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/24701\/revisions\/24706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24701"},{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=24701"},{"taxonomy":"discipline-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/discipline-type?post=24701"},{"taxonomy":"bu_edition","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu_edition?post=24701"},{"taxonomy":"media_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media_type?post=24701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}