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Kaushik
Dr. Choudhuri is Kaushik’s father, a reserved and practical man who relocated his family to America from India in pursuit of a better life. His pragmatic approach reflects his preference for control and structure, traits that also manifest in his somewhat distant relationship with Kaushik. A couple years after his wife Parul’s death, Dr. Choudhuri remarries to a younger Bengali widow named Chitra, an action that Kaushik deeply resents, as it symbolically distances him from his mother’s memory. Though well-meaning and caring, Dr. Choudhuri’s decisions reveal his struggle to understand and respond to his son’s emotional needs, instead prioritizing his personal stability and companionship.
Dr. Choudhuri/Kaushik’s Father Quotes in Unaccustomed Earth
The Unaccustomed Earth quotes below are all either spoken by Dr. Choudhuri/Kaushik’s Father or refer to Dr. Choudhuri/Kaushik’s Father. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
6. Hema and Kaushik: Once in a Lifetime
Quotes
“They should have known it’s impossible to go back,” they said to their friends, condemning your parents for having failed at both ends. We had stuck it out as immigrants while you had fled; had we been the ones to go back to India, my parents seemed to suggest, we would have stuck it out there as well.
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7. Hema and Kaushik: Year’s End
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I was suddenly sickened by her, by the sight of her standing in our kitchen. I had no memories of my mother cooking there, but the space still retained her presence more than any other part of the house.
They would recall all of this, perhaps not as clearly as I remember those first months at your parents’ home, but nevertheless they would remember. Like them I had lost a parent and was now being asked to accept a replacement. I wondered how well they remembered their father; Piu would only have been five at the time.
But there were too many pictures, and after a few I, like my father, could no longer bear their sight. A slight lessening in the pressure of my fingertips and the ones I was holding would have blown away into that wild sea, scattering down to where my mother’s ashes already resided. [...] so I put them back in the box and began to break the hardened ground.
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Dr. Choudhuri/Kaushik’s Father Quotes in Unaccustomed Earth
The Unaccustomed Earth quotes below are all either spoken by Dr. Choudhuri/Kaushik’s Father or refer to Dr. Choudhuri/Kaushik’s Father. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
6. Hema and Kaushik: Once in a Lifetime
Quotes
“They should have known it’s impossible to go back,” they said to their friends, condemning your parents for having failed at both ends. We had stuck it out as immigrants while you had fled; had we been the ones to go back to India, my parents seemed to suggest, we would have stuck it out there as well.
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7. Hema and Kaushik: Year’s End
Quotes
I was suddenly sickened by her, by the sight of her standing in our kitchen. I had no memories of my mother cooking there, but the space still retained her presence more than any other part of the house.
They would recall all of this, perhaps not as clearly as I remember those first months at your parents’ home, but nevertheless they would remember. Like them I had lost a parent and was now being asked to accept a replacement. I wondered how well they remembered their father; Piu would only have been five at the time.
But there were too many pictures, and after a few I, like my father, could no longer bear their sight. A slight lessening in the pressure of my fingertips and the ones I was holding would have blown away into that wild sea, scattering down to where my mother’s ashes already resided. [...] so I put them back in the box and began to break the hardened ground.
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