Before Gandhi left for England and when he was a child, he vowed he would not touch meat. During the three weeks it took to arrive in England, Gandhi stayed away from the other travelers on the boat and the dining room; instead he ate fruits and sweets from home. Upon arriving in England, Indian friends helped him find a home. They brought dinners full of meat, yet Gandhi stuck to his vow and never ate meat. Gandhi wanted to fit in with the English community. He bought new clothes, new suits, combed his hair each day to look like an Englishman and took dance lessons. After three months of following the same routine to become an Englishman, he decided that the items were a waste of time and money. He focused on the education that he was getting and spending less money.
Gandhi passed the law exams and also passed the bar on June 10, 1891 and sailed home to India two days later. He did not want to spend any more time in England. On his voyage home, Gandhi became depressed and sad. He had gone to England to study law. Even though he studied law, he was not a lawyer and did not understand the Indian law; he only knew the English laws. Upon arriving home, Gandhi practiced law, but became discouraged and quit his law career in India. In April of 1893, Gandhi sailed to South Africa to see how he would do practicing law there. Little did he know that would be the place he found his philosophy and his following.
When Gandhi arrived in South Africa, it was divided into four different areas. Natal and Cape Colony were British and Orange Free State and Transvaal were Dutch and known as Boers. At the end of the nineteenth century, there were sixty five thousand Indians working or living there. After a week in South Africa, Gandhi was asked to take a business trip from Natal to Transvaal. He bought a first class ticket for the train and when he arrived, he was asked to sit in the lower class portion of the train. Since he bought a first class ticket, Gandhi refused to move. He was thrown off the trains and spent the night in the train station’s waiting room. This is when Gandhi made the decision to fight for his rights.
Gandhi not only fought for the Indians’ civil right in South Africa, but he also created a type of fighting back by staying calm. The biography above is the beginning of Gandhi’s history and what he was put through to find out who he was and what he wanted to do with his life. He fought hard to liberate the Indian culture and make the world equal among each nation.
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Gandhi is known as father of the nation