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Austrian-Indian student studying America, with its foods and freedoms (including choice of mates) By
Tamma Burningham "It was a scandal." Why? Because they had been dating before. In the culture Braganza's parents were raised in, arranged marriages are the norm. They are from India. Dating never happens there, except maybe after the engagement has been confirmed. Only then might the couple spend some time getting to know each other before meeting over the alter as others do. The insinuation of Branganza's cousin's marriage being a scandal was because everyone assumed the couple must have been doing things before since they had been dating. Braganza shakes her head and rolls her eyes up as if disgusted with the suggestion. "They would not do anything before," Braganza says emphatically. Braganza's own parents have an arranged marriage. According to her, the technical school her father had intended to enroll at was never built in Goa, a town near his home, so he left for Austria. A Jesuit clergyman had told him there was a monastery in Innsbruck where he could stay while attending school. After a time, his mother, or Braganza's grandmother, started pressuring him to get married. Braganza's father finally complied. "When his mother said, 'Ttell me who you want to marry and I will go arrange it,' he told her, 'Well there is this one girl.'" Braganza says. After being married in India, the Braganzas returned and settled in Hall, Austria, Innsbruck's neighboring town. There Mr. Braganza works "preserving corpses." "It's creepy," Braganza says of her father's work. Braganza's mother on the other hand teaches the art of cooking Indian cuisine. Their family often throws big parties to share this unique food with friends. Braganza says the whole family will dress up in traditional formal wear on these occasions, and she will wear a silk sari. The daily routine of the family, though, is very simple. "On a normal day," Braganza says, "we have dinner together." This is because Braganza's father has always stressed the importance of his family. "My dad never liked it when I went out on the weekend. ėThis is time for the family,' he would say." Braganza also tells how her father hates interruptions during family time at home. "He gets mad when the telephone rings during dinner," says Braganza as her voice gets higher with laughter. Yet, inspite of her traditional homelife, Braganza is as she says, "Westernized." "I'm a European woman," Braganza states. She's glad her parents understand this fact. They have told her that because of how she was raised, they would never make her live with an arranged marriage. "I can pick," Braganza says gleefully as her entire face smiles, making her teal eyes light up. Sitting on the TSC lounge couches, her caramel colored smooth skin seems accented by her shoulder-length molasses hair that frames her feminine face with its curls. She is quite stunning -- even in her American jeans and navy-hooded sweatshirt with a USU logo. Actually it was the jeans that got this ethnic beauty into "trouble" the other day. Invited to attend a social with USU exchange students from India, Braganza went. She walked in wearing her denim, while everyone else was in their traditional dress. Reliving the moment, Braganza exclaims, "Oh my God. I feel so bad." She explains, "I was in jeans -- the only one in pants. I could see how their eyes nearly popped out saying 'How could she do this?' I was the alien there." As if on cue, an Indian girl walks by in the hall. "Look," Braganza says, "she is wearing the traditional dress. They were all wearing that. I walked in -- oh, I felt so stupid." The girl comes over and talks awhile with Braganza. Her white linen shawl swoops over her shoulders. The fabric is very sheer and delicate, but with lots of body, which linen is famous for. A gray patterned tunic covers the rest of her torso and glides over her white pants. As the girl leaves, Branganza says, "The Indian students stick together. They don't eat any food they don't know. They even brought their own pans, utensils, glasses, spices, and rice for the whole year. They don't speak English, but their native tongue when they are together." Braganza shakes her head again as she adds, " I can't understand." These differences are what make Braganza say, "I could never marry an Indian. It would never work for me." Her dress and lack of fear for the unknown aren't the only things differences Braganza sees between herself and the Indian natives. "They have totally different concepts on how to talk to people, be polite," says Braganza. A smile she tries to stop hints that she is thinking of a particular example. After a little nudging Braganza grins and the whole story comes out. "I invited an Indian guy over to my apartment. He had lived with his mom and dad since he was bornónever exposed to female association," Maria pauses. In an exasperated tone she continues, "He talked to my roommate about her pimples. You do not talk to a girl about her pimples." Again she says, "I could never marry an Indian." Because she is not married, Braganza lives in Aggie Village with two roommates who are "nice girls." This hands-on experience with Americans has brought some cultural differences to the forefront. With her strict code of civility, Braganza cannot understand why her roommate insists on setting her alarm clock for 5:30 a.m. to go jogging although she comes home and goes back to bed afterward. "It wakes me up of course," says Braganza in a reasonable and sympathetic tone. One might wonder about Braganza's sincerity to get along with her roommate, but the fact that she doesn't reset the alarm-clock every night attests to her politeness. She even complies with her roommates temperature desires, although they are extreme. The roommate is what Braganza calls a "cold-maniac." "She has to sleep with the windows wide open, and I am sleeping with four blankets. The fan is also on all night because she cannot breath," Braganza says. The temperature confusion is only the beginning of what Braganza wonders about when it comes to Americans' normalness, as exemplified by her roommate. The eating habits seem like escargot (French snail cuisine) to a Utahn. But then her roommates' diet selections aren't the usual American meal. "She has toast with mustard and honey," says Braganza. The other gastro-decision Braganza questions is the dipping of celery in peanut-butter. "'That's where I get my proteins from,' my roommate says as she holds her celery." Braganza's face gets an expression of being puzzled and dubious thinking of the statement. It seems her mom never made her ants on a log. The fast-food industry seems nouveau too. She tells about going to get a milkshake at Winger's and how they brought it to the car when she pushed the button. That kind of service definitely does not happen in Austria where worker's rights are heralded before customer service. Braganza doesn't dislike all American food, though. In fact, she loves most everything she has tried. "I actually went out to Dee's," she says. "It was soooo good. I sat on the counter and watched them make my foodóa buffalo chicken burger. It was really hot, really nice." She loves homemade cookie dough, too. Her roommate brings bags back from home. However, it was cheesecake that redeemed the roommate in Braganza's eyes. "I'd never had cheesecake before," Braganza says. The other American delicacy besides cheesecake, namely "mac and cheese" in a box, leaves something to be desired in Braganza's eyes. She is concerned that her roommate eats it. "Instant food is bad for you," she says. "My roommate only eats instant food-macoroni and cheese, Campbell soup, and freezer waffles." The alarm grows in her voice as she says, "Yesterday I learned, in America, companies are not obliged to mark the use of G.M.O. s (genetically modified organisms). In Austria you can't do that. People expect the government to ban what seems suspicious." Braganza's special attention to American food is because she is analyzing the ritual and culture of food, especially during athletic events, for her American studies course. She is really excited about an invitation this weekend to a football game party. Surprises and analyzing new things are just part of the fun Braganza has being here in America. Beyond academics she learns cultural things, too. For instance upon coming to Utah, Braganza was very surprised to find her Mormon roommate was so pious. "She reads her scriptures every day," Braganza declares. Is this unusual to Braganza because she is a Catholic? "No, it is strange to me as an Austrian. I didn't know she as a Mormon would do that, too." Too. Braganza like many devout Mormons reads her scriptures everyday. But she says regular study of religious works is not the norm in Europe, even amongst devout Catholics. Boyd Newman, a Utahn who has lived in Austria twice, said that Catholics have even been discouraged from reading their scriptures. "The first time I was there during the 1950s, Catholics had to confess to their priest, if they had been reading their scriptures. It was considered a sin for anyone besides the priest to read the scriptures because he was the only one who was supposed to interpret them." While Braganza might be in the minority in her home country as a Bible-reading Austrian, she is not in the minority there religiously as she is in Utah. According to CIA statistics, Roman Catholics make up 98 percent of the Austrian population. The "Others" make up the remaining 2 percent. This slight group of the citizenry includes the 30 practicing LDS members in Braganza's home state of Tiral, who worship every Sunday morning in the white chapel near the end stop of Innsbruck's number three trolley. Many in this LDS congregation are Tirolean and proud of it. This means they grew up in the Austrian Alp region known for its rugged steep mountains, little towns of white cottages, and strong often stubborn farming natives. They are very proud of their heritage and share the stories of their past. According to Newman, Tiroleans often told him about when their forefathers came out in their rough linen armed with only pitchforks and defeated the invading Napoleon forces three times. It was the fourth, however, that they lost. But (there is always a but) that was because the Viennese would not support them having bartered an arranged marriage between the royal family and Napoleon's child for the price of Vienna's allegiance. To this day, Tiroleans will run Vienna licensed cars off the road. As this suggests, Tirol is a region centered in family and traditions. Just as the people pass on a hatred for the French and Viennese, they also hold onto the Catholic Church. "Tirol is called the Holy Land," says Doris Schuss, a native Tirolean and active Catholic until two years ago when she converted to the LDS Church. "It is the most Catholic area anywhere in Europe." Although Schuss might not be completely right in this statement, her words do illustrate the deeply imbedded culture of Catholicism in the province. Nearly every two weeks a miracle recorded in the Bible is celebrated and receives the honor of ėstate holiday' in Tirol. These "Freiertags," as the Austrians call them, also bring the nuisance of alternate and less frequent bus schedules as well as the closing of all commercial trade. The unknowing tourist can easily be caught in Innsbruck without food, not knowing the only place open is Chili's, the American Restaurant at Bozner Platz Braganza and American students are so fond of. Braganza doesn't talk about this though. She is a native. She never had to worry about forgetting to buy her milk a day early. But in America she is learning the unspoken truths tourists don't ever learn. "In the mall," Braganza says, " I bought this face wash in the men's section. I asked, ėCan you tell me how to get downstairs to the women's section?' The clerk said, ėThere is no other floor.' In Austria there always is." After the interview is over and Maria is just conversing generally rather than answering questions, the story of her dancing career comes out. Like a good Austrian, she does not brag. It merely escapes when she talks about her visit to Skyline Club last week. She relates dancing with a Hispanic young man who didn't speak English and danced all night with her to Latin American music. Her enthusiasm boils over as she tells of her experience, which sheds light on her expertise. After being asked she says, yes she had danced quite seriously and had even competed. After a little more prodding and discarding of interview materials, the real truth comes out. "My partner and I won the Austrian championship in Latin dancing." According to Braganza, they practiced two to three hours a day and even went to England for a while where the best teachers in the world are. She said, however, he dumped her to dance with his girlfriend, which shocked Braganza. But Braganza overcame this disappointment that gave brought a new focus to her life. It was that week she applied for the Utah exchange she is now completing. Braganza just smiles and says, "It all worked out."
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