May 13th 2011: I believe if job demands dedication, hard work and lots of time then I should be excused for not posting anything in the last few days. I want to make this very clear to the readers that this blog is my day to day emotions I am writing about.
Todays blog will somehow reflect on the amount of work necessary by the Sikh community in order to win some hearts and minds of fellow Americans. I earned my combat patch today after having boots on ground for more than 30 days in theatre. Everyday is a mixed feelings of roller-coaster, it took me a long time to win hearts and minds of individuals working with and around me but unfortunately in theatre people rotate and soldiers change. It is overwhelming sometimes to see new faces and their reaction towards my existence as a fellow soldier. The feelings range from “What The Fuck” to whispers of “Is this guy legitimate”. Some refers to my existence in the military as the guy with relaxed grooming standards.
Let me take a step back, I do run into handful of soldiers who are very well read and they are excited to meet me as one of the only practicing Sikhs in the Army. It is very hard to control and I consider myself as “A master of Patience by being in theatre”. I think of my beautiful wife and my parents and keep my mouth shut if any remarks are passed towards me.
As an American I believe our current strategy “COIN” is not very effective. We are trying to win the hearts and minds of local nationals. I kind of want to laugh about that because if the military is having hard time with a Sikh who is working his tale of to spread goodwill, how in the world are we going to be successful in winning the hearts and minds of Afghanis.
I will definitely blame my own community for this problem. A few days ago yahoo released a story out of Queens, NY regarding the fighting in the Sikh Temple. I believe I am one of the only people who can feel the heat of that news because while spreading a good name for the Sikhs, many question were raised. I spend a lot of energy trying to explain a lot of things I had no clue about.
How can I explain to the people the golden history of Sikhs being a martial race when there are stories of fights in the temple published on the front page. I send out an open warning to my community out there that we still have time to spread the word. It has to be done in a very strategic manner where a few people need to put their heads together possibly the younger generation and start living our lives with a Code of Conduct.
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