What is the main theme of the story ‘Swimming Lessons’?

THEME OF SWIMMING LESSONS –

The story deals with the problems of adjustment and acceptability for migrants. Immigrants living in their adopted country face a typical dilemma about their sense of belonging. The chasm between the two cultures leads to a sense of alienation. In ‘Swimming Lessons’, as you must have already noticed, Mistry portrays the superficial existence of the immigrants, who live in Canada without actually knowing the Canadians.

The tension between wanting to belong and wanting to retain one’s identity is very well delineated in this story. The narrator’s present is continuously affected by the narrator’s past, between his memory of his parents and the present life of loneliness. This life in Canada becomes more meaningful when compared or contrasted with his life in Bombay.