Daughter of the Ganges: A Memoir

by Asha Miró

An Indian woman recounts her 1960s adoption by a Catalan family and her 2003 visit to her home country to uncover her native roots, a personal journey during which she discovered her rural home town and a sister she never knew. 30,000 first printing.

Genres: Nonfiction, Adoption, India, Memoir, Biography, Parenting, Biography Memoir

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Asha Miró nació un 7 de noviembre de 1967 en la India, y allí vivió hasta los seis años , hasta que la adoptaron los que son sus padres hoy día.

Sus primeros años de vida transcurrieron en un orfanato de Bombay, concretamente desde los tres hasta los seis años de edad. En la actualidad Asha vive en Barcelona desde 1974, donde ha ejercido como maestra y donde actualmente trabaja en el departamento de comunicación del Fórum de Barcelona 2004.

Ahora, gracias a la editorial Lumen y La Magrana en su versión en catalán, tenemos la oportunidad de leer la intensa historia de su vida y las dificultades de adopción, de una pequeña que en las escaleras del orfanato de Bombay insistía en que quería unos padres.

Asha creció junto a sus padres adoptivos y a una hermana, otra niña india que le había precedido en la adopción. Estudió magisterio y piano. Sin embargo, la ilusión por visitar su país la llevó a dar el gran paso en 1995, cuando acababa de cumplir 27 años.

"La hija del Ganges" es el hermoso testimonio de una experiencia insólita, que significó el reencuentro de esta mujer con una tierra dura y sorprendente. Junto a las palabras, a modo de diario, de Asha, el libro intercala las notas emitidas por la madre de la autora del libro. En estas notas se reflejan los temores, las dudas y el amor de unos padres que aquí en España esperaban a una niña como llegada del cielo, y que luego tuvieron que guiar sus primeros pasos en un mundo y una cultura totalmente nuevos para ellas.

El libro de Asha Miró son unas memorias llenas de ternura que hablan de una experiencia tan importante como la adopción y un viaje al pasado, para entender el verdadero valor de una mujer que verdaderamente sabe cuanto puede costar conseguir la felicidad y mirar la vida con una sonrisa.

Reviews

[MaSuMeH · Rating 3 out of 5]

دختری از گنگ را می خوانم و همراه آشا قدم در دالان های تاریک و پیچ در پیچ گذشته می گذارم. با او بر خاک هنودستان قدم می نهم. روی زمین های خاکی اش راه می روم . از هوای گرم و مرطوبش تنفس می کنم و چشمانم را به دیدن زیبایی اعجاب انگیز شرق فرا می خوانم. مقابل در یتیم خانه می ایستم. و همراه دخترکی میشوم که روزهای اول زندگی اش را در تلاش برای رهایی از این نوع زندگی گذرانده. که به این سهم از زندگی راضی نبوده است و بیشتر می خواسته است. معجزه وار با او به بارسلونا می روم و شاهد عکس های خندان دخترک در کنار والدین جدیدش میشوم. آدم های شادی که ، بلد بوده اند به دیگران شادی ببخشند. سپس به یکباره به ناسیک برمی گردم و خیره به آب های مقدس گنگ،غوطه ور در آرزوهای عجیب و ساده مردم شرق به روایت آشا از گذشته اش گوش می کنم. کتاب اول تمام میشود. مبهم ولی راضی کننده. با آشا به زندگی عادی برمیگردم. به حال. تا زمانی که یکباره دیگر جادوی ریشه ها دوباره مرا خواب کند. حالا دیگر حتی اگر ما گذشته را رها کنیم او ما را رها نخواهد کرد. بار دیگر هندوستان است که آشا را فرا می خواند و من باز با او در گذر زمان غرق میشوم. با هر قدم او من هم پیش می روم و با هر دری که باز می کنم چهره ی دیگری از خودم می بینم. تا زمانی که رویا ما را دریابد و من نظاره گر دیدار دو امید* باشم. آشایی که می ماند و آشایی که به سرنوشت سپرده میشود و برای اینکه یادگاری از عزیزان داشته باشد نام خواهر بزرگتر بدو بخشیده میشود. از این همه پیچ و تاب قصه در عین سادگی به وجد می آیم. و از آنجا که قصه نیست و سرگذشت واقعی یک نفر دیگر است نمی توانم چشم از کتاب بردارم. ورای مکان و زمان می توانم در قالب آشا دربیایم و قلبم از شوق از جا کنده شود. قصه/واقعیت تمام میشود. در صفحه آخر کتاب عکس دو آشا را تماشا می کنم که عمیق می خندند. سر خوشانه می خندم. و این لذت بازیافتن گذشته است که خنده را اینگونه بی دریغ به من می بخشد


1. آشا یعنی امید
2. ترجمه کتاب فوق العاده روان و خوش خوان است. سپاس از خانم نازنین نوذری


دی ماه 94/ژانویه 2016

[Andrea Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of the way through this book, it felt like I was taking the journey with Ms. Miro. Her emotional and physical journey to find her beginnings and any biological family she might have left are inspirational and an account I'm glad I took the time to read. I'm certain I'll read this book again down the road.

Content:
* Indian gods and ceremonies celebrating these gods (only mentioned a few times; not a main focus of the book)
* tobacco products
* prostitution, child prostitution, AIDs (only mentioned a time or two; not condoned)
* one crude analogy
* a couple of awkward/crude moments that reflect reality in some Indian villages

I was not compensated for my honest review.

[Anae · Rating 5 out of 5]

Emotiva historia personal narrada con sencillez pero con mucho sentimiento. Una preciosidad muy bien escrita, narrada en dos tiempos, en la actualidad y en el momento de la adopción. Una historia para disfrutarla.

[Ana · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5
La autora, de origen hindú, narra la historia de su adopción por una familia española con la que crece plena y feliz. Veinte años después, con el apoyo de su familia regresa a la India a conocer sus raíces y tratar de descubrir su origen.

[Kumari de Silva · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book completely absorbed me. I read it in two sittings. This English translation was originally published in Catalan as a pair of books, which I read each in one sitting.

I am not adopted, however I have experienced losing my family culture/history/language within one generation. After my parents moved to the West they chose to raise us mono-lingual (English only.) When visiting my parents' relatives as a child I did not experience any of the love nor acceptance that Asha received from her long lost relatives, a fact I find curious. Her Indian family is so poor compared to how she grew up and yet there was unwavering acceptance of her by both blood relatives and relatives by marriage.

My father's relatives are solidly middle-class within their society, as I am in mine. Yet as a child I was forced to be the one to make allowances. I understood from the first time I met them they live differently from me. My father's family, however, constantly and consistently made no effort to understand that I am different from them. I am, to them, such a poor excuse for a Sri Lankan!

Unrepentant shaming and questioning. I.e. why I won't I speak my "mother tongue?" Head shaking and clucking. I'm frickin' 4 years old. How is it my fault? They won't understand why I can't stomach their food. What's up with my gym shoes? My t-shirts? Why can't I wear sandals and a "frock"? It does no good to explain my "mother tongue" is English. That I self-identify as Western. That I embarrass my relatives is reiterated in two subsequent trips back to my father's family's home. Such a poor excuse for a SriLankan. . .They refuse to accept me as I am. Asha is so lucky her family is not like that.

Like Asha I grew up a different color from everyone around me. It's a weird reality to be odd here and odd there and fit in no where. If you can't imagine, read this book!

[Itziar D. · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Quiero unos padres", insistía Asha con sólo cinco años, sentada en las escaleras del orfanato de Bombay, que hasta entonces había sido su casa...

Bonita historia real de una adopción, y del viaje de Asha de vuelta a India, años después, para reconectar con sus orígenes y su propia identidad

[Ririn Marina · Rating 4 out of 5]

This copy consists of 2 separate books bind into 1.
Book 1 talks about Asha, the Indian girl who was adopted by Catalan parents from an orphanage in India. She was flown to Barcelona after all her adoption process was finalised. She was given a new life after years and years of begging the nuns in the orphanage that she had wanted "some parents". After 20 years being adopted, Asha decided to find her roots and origin. And she began to travel back to India to meet the nuns that had brought her up in the last orphanage she had stayed. From thete, she began to find the lost pieces of puzzles that she needed to fix about her roots, which was a recollection from mouth to mouth She documented what she was told and wrote a book about it.
In Book 2, Asha was told that there were some incorrect details about her documentations in her first book. She then travelled back to India to trace the real truth. Then she met with a man whose father was responsible for her "new life". The man helped a lot by tracing and interviewing the people that were possible to be Asha's living family members. From there, Asha found the right pieces of her life. She even had the opportunity to travel to the villages that she was born in, lived, nursed after her mother's death, before she was given to the nun of a convent who later sent her to an orphanage in Bombay for a "better hope" and future.

[Shalini M · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Daughter of the Ganges" is one of the few non-fiction books I have read, and liked. It is a memoir of Asha, who is adopted from an christian orphange in Bombay at the age of six, by Miro couple of Barcelona. Her adoptive parents have adopted another daughter, and chose to retain the given names of both their daughters; the mother maintains a diary for each daughter, describing her thoughts and feelings as they bring up the daughters from another part of the world. The book starts with Asha's memories of the distant past, interspersed with excerpts from her mother's entries.
In her growing-up years, Asha is troubled by the thought why her biological parents abandoned her, while strangers showed her so much love as to make her their daughter. As with many adopted children, her desire to know more about her roots increases with time. She joins a group going to Bombay to work with the poor, to seek answers and discover her past. In the orphanage in Bombay, she meets a nun who remembers her, but could not, or does not, give her much details about her birth parents. She just tells Asha that she is a daughter of the Ganges. Asha returns, unsatisfied, and still a feeling that her father had disowned her (her mother having died in her infancy).
She writes a book on her experiences, and a few years later, returns to Bombay to film a documentary based on it. This time, she is able to trace back her journey much farther, and circumstances of her adoption. After her mother died, her survival became doubtful. Her father, a very poor farmer, unable to look after two young daughters, requests nuns of a Bombay church to take care of her, thinking that they would nurse her back to health, and he will bring her back once she is older. However, nuns agreed to care for her only if he would agree to giver her up to the orphanage. Desperate to save her life, her father consented.
A helpful man from her village tells Asha that her elder sister still lives in their native village. He brings her brother-in-law to meet her, and then they take her to their village. A sentimental reunion of the sisters follows, even though they cannot understand each other's language. Asha is striken by the poor conditions her sister lives in. From her sister, she is able to learn much more of her father and her family. She also meets her half-sister, who had nursed her for quite a while after her mother's death. As Asha prepares to leave, the people from her native village are unable to comprehend that she wants to return even when she has found her family. But Asha's sister wants her to go back to the family she has known for years, to the life she has been living, life that is not full of hardships as her own. All she asks for is Asha to call her up some time, so that she can hear her voice, even if she is not able to understand what she says.

The book is simple, but poignant and touching. Her reunion with her sisters and family is specially moving. As are her experiences in Bombay, where she stays with a poor but caring family...
... she finds that people are amazed to find that she cannot speak their language although she looks like them
... she tries to discover familiarity with her native languages, but is unable to do so
... she tries to look for something, someone in the population of Bombay who might be her family, but not realistically expecting it, yet filled with a longing
There are points when one is surprised by her astonishment at the way of life in India, specially that of the poorer people - the poverty, the warmth of strangers, the oppression of women ... unexpected indifference, as well as unexpected love and sharing .... hey, come one, all of it is "normal" in our "culture". And then you remember, that although the book is a story of an Indian in India, it is through the eyes of a person who is not familiar with it.
A good read, over all.

[Marta · Rating 5 out of 5]

El llibre en sí és molt íntim i emocionant.

Jo li tinc especial carinyo perquè el vaig llegir per primer cop molt petita, amb 8 anys, i em va marcar moltíssim.

Ara que l'he llegit després d'haver estat a la India he entès encara millor les descripcions i sentiments de l'Asha.

[Sely · Rating 4 out of 5]

Questo è il secondo libro che leggo sul tema delle adozioni. L'anno scorso ho letto Sono venuti a prendermi la vita di Barbara Monestier. E nella valutazione dell'uno non posso fare a meno di tenere in considerazione l'altro. Ho trovato i due testi molto simili nella spinta interiore delle protagoniste: entrambe bisognose di tornare a quel passato di cui conservano un vago ricordo. In entrambe ci sono due paesi che si oppongono, il mondo occidentale che è il paese di arrivo (la Francia/la Spagna) e il paese di partenza che è una realtà dominata dalla povertà e dalla sofferenza (il Cile/l'India). Le due storie si differenziano per il modo in cui l'esperienza dell'adozione può essere vissuta sia dalle bambine/i sia dalle famiglie. Nella storia di Monestier è vissuta in maniera drammatica, avviene uno scontro col nuovo paese che non sembra lasciare spazio ad una riconciliazione, nella storia di Miro il rapporto col nuovo mondo invece viene vissuto in maniera assai meno problematica, ma anche in questo caso non viene meno l'esigenza di scavare in fondo a sé alla ricerca di quel passato che fa parte della propria identità.

[Pamela_b_lawrencemsn.com · Rating 5 out of 5]

A true adoption love story. In 1974 Asha was adopted from an orphanage in Mumbai at the age of 7 by a Catalan family in Barcelona. The first section of the book is her memoir of her first visit to India since leaving in 1995. She interweaves her descriptions of her internal and external journey with entries from the journal her mother kept prior to and for the month after her arrival in Spain. This tells the story of adoption as it is, potent in the depths of love shared by this family. The book was a bestseller in Spain and in 2003 Asha returned to India with a film crew to make a documentary. The second section of the book describes the amazing almost fairy-tale discovery of a sister and a large extended family who are overjoyed to see her and grateful that she has had a terrific life unburdened by poverty. Asha is candid about her positive and negative feelings and as as adoptive parent I was grateful for that honesty. She is an advocate for adoption in Spain and I hope she writes many books more. I read the book in Spanish as part of my sporadic efforts to maintain my vocabulary but I'm sure it is available in translation..

[Avigail · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed Asha Miro's novel. Her journey and discoveries made for a page turning book that I was unable to put down! This is a book for all Adopted children, those who have adopted, and for those who one day would like to adopt, as well as for those just looking for a very interesting and well written story!
This is a book about trying to find out about oneself, and Asha Miro is the young woman who is trying to piece together her fragmented past, from her life in India until she was six until the day she returned to India from Spain, in the hope of finding out more about her adoption, her birth family and why they had given her up.
A wonderful book that is far from being sentimental, Asha has no illusions about her life, she is European and cannot give up the trappings of her westernised life but she promises herself she will not forget where she has come from and I would like to think that she keeps that promise, not just for herself but for the faily who lost her and then found her again after so many years.

[Montse Terés · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is the story of an adoption. The narrator speaks about how she, after being born and having lived in Mumbai till the age of six, was adopted by a couple from Barcelona in the 70s.
She talks about the details of how she became adopted, and uses fragments of her adoptive mother's diary at the time before and right after the adoption took place to reconstruct the mood and the details of the experience for all the members of the family.
This narration alternates also with the narrator's first trip to India in search of her roots, when she is in her late 20s, and how she finds out about her origins and her first years there.
Very moving book, though told in a simple, straightforward manner. Made me interested in reading Asha's following book, in which she talks about the experience of finding her biological sister.

[Ashlee Nelson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is in between a 4 and a 5. I really didn't know which one to give it, so I just settled on 4. This story was inspiring, intriguing, emotional, and interesting. What Asha Miro did was an amazing thing and created an amazing story. Asha went back to India to find her past and to answer many questions about how and why she was put into an orphanage to later be adopted. This book was very easy to read and the only criticism I have is that I wish she had stuck more diary entries from her mother in the latter part of the book. I absolutely love this memoir and even though I am not adopted it makes me want to find out more about the parts of my family that I know only vaguely and it also makes me want to visit India. I highly recommend this book!

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very interesting memoir of this Indian-born woman who was adopted from a Mumbai orphanage just before her seventh birthday by a couple from Barcelona. The first part of the book is about the author's first trip to India as a volunteer at a school and working with women. She begins exploring her roots with the nuns at the orphanage. The second half of the book chronicles her second trip, where she is able to locate her sister and many other family members, and is able to solve the mystery of her first six years in India. This was a great book. Asha Miro tells her story concisely and with intimacy.

[Grace · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting book; author is adopted daughter of Spanish couple who visits her native India and in 1st part of book talks about 1st visit, experiencing her native country and learning some about her biological family; last half is her 2nd visit where she learns much more about her biological family. Her emotional reactions and insights as an adoptive child/adult in a nurturing family who explores her biological country and meets her family is well told. Perhaps because of adoptions in my family this was of particular interest; I read it in one day.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful book, beautiful and moving. I highly recommend it. Asha was six when she was adopted from an orphanage in India and moved to Spain with her new parents and little sister. At twenty-seven, she journeys back to India to learn about her past. She visits her orphanage, is reunited with several of her caregivers, learns about her family, and meets both her biological sister and the woman who nursed her when she was a baby.

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very simply written, but also very emotional. Yes, it's translated from Spanish (?) to English but don't let that detract. It's a beautiful tale that any adoptee and adoptive parent should read.

I was able to slightly identity with Asha, especially the second half of the book. I never knew my my mother's father's side of the family due to family messiness. He died before I was born. This summer I got to meet them at last and made some discoveries about who I am.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

One thing about belonging to a book club is that I am reading books I probably never would just because they aren't typically books I'd pick for myself.

My eyes have been opened many times to the way the world outside of the United States lives.

This was another interesting and informative book.

[Hardeep · Rating 2 out of 5]

Perhaps I was expecting more, but this book was "so-so". If you are interested in reading about an adoptee who travels back to the land of their birth to trace their birth/roots then this might be of interest to you.

[Shawna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quick read and such an interesting peronal perspective on international adoption. If you are considering adopting from India - it wouldn't hurt to read this memoir. It's quick and easy, and has great insight.

[Christina · Rating 2 out of 5]

Probably because this is a translation, the writing was choppy and uninteresting. The first half of the story was better than the second. A woman adopted from India returns and finds a sister and confronts the "what might have been" in her life.

[Queenbee · Rating 5 out of 5]

it's a great book- great read- totally recommend it- insight view on Indian culture and people and customs- adaption issues of foreign children of race other than once own- enjoyed the book very much.

[Alle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lo he leído antes de la regla y supongo que eso ha tenido que ver (ay, las hormonas...), pero me ha gustado mucho y me parece interesante. También decir que he leído la versión catalana, acostumbrada a leer en español, y aún así me ha parecido una lectura ligera (y curiosa).
Lo recomiendo.

[Cathy Leverkus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Asha Miro takes us on a journey of discovery trying to find her roots in India

[Sangeeta · Rating 5 out of 5]

personal interest here. about a young woman who was adopted from India and goes back to search for her history

very touching. bought a copy for my daughters

[Margo Loflin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great memoir for anyone considering international adoption.

[Carolina · Rating 5 out of 5]

What inspired me to attempt to write a memoir. It is difficult to put down

[Marta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Es de esos libros que me ha hecho sentir que ha llegado en el momento exacto. Me ha encantado.

[Ranja · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice story of a young woman who was adopted from India and raised in Spain going back to find her biological family.