How does Syal show that their Punjabi heritage is important to the Kumar family?

Throughout Anita and Me, clothes are used as a representation of culture and identity, used to separate communities, and later to create community. For Meena, the sari, a traditional South Asian garment, becomes a symbol of her Indian heritage. The sari is used as a literal marker, helping Meena to pinpoint her mother amongst the surrounding scenery: “I could see my mother, even at this distance her brown skin glowed like a burnished planet drifting amongst the off-white bedsheets of her neighbours […] with one motion [she] shook out a peacock-blue sari” (p. 12). Later, the sari is used as a metaphorical marker of Meena’s Indian community, when Meena describes her Aunties: “whose communal contempt was a curse wrapped up in sweet sari-shaped packages” (p. 33). So, when Anita dines with the Kumars, and Anita is confronted for the first time with Meena’s Indian customs, there is a symbolic importance to Meena and Anita spending the evening exploring Meena’s wardrobe, trying “every suit and dupatta on” (p. 256). In sharing clothes, the two are symbolically sharing culture and creating community.