After successfully surviving more than a month, here are some observations.
Walking
With 2K plus per month on my odometer, I was a hardcore driver back home. The only road rule I ever followed is the red light, that is till 9pm. I treated pedestrians like shit. They are like ants – insignificant, irritating idiots who disturb traffic, they are petty aberrations on roads. I hated them. In fact I think I ran over one or two feet, anyways that’s a different story. Here, whenever I’m crossing the road and see those scores of cars waiting for me to safely cross the road I’m like, with few specs of tears in my eyes exactly like ramamurthy in English Vinglish when Sri devi gives him some idlis “ammaaa idlis”.
Drinking water
How do Indians drink water from tap?, simple, We keep our palm like a cup underneath the tap, water first falls into the palm and then like a dog we lick or drink from the palm, that is the standard protocol. Back here, overrated hygienic experts feel that our own hands are dirty. So, they thought why not drink directly!, so they created the so called water fountains. Few years back I remember a Bollywood movie where there was a heroine intro scene where she bends forward and then tilts her head sideways, opens her voluptuous mouth (in slow motion) and this thing called water fountain releases water (I never had a clue how that happened, there is a switch btw, I realized after coming here). Cut the sexy scene and imagine a fully grown ogre man doing that – nasty. Its so embarrassing. Whenever I use that bloody fountain I make sure no one is around me, especially girls. And the worst part is I feel that nothing has ever gone into my mouth, nothing, like ever. There is a scene in the movie “Kalapani” where Britishers force Mohanlal to lick their boots as shoe polish. Same feeling whenever I use that thing, disgusting.
Venus
If we do a simple regression analysis (I am very much into machine learning these days, bear with me), I am pretty sure that average desi girl here is much hotter than average girl back home. Wait, don’t judge me now. I will tell myself, yes, I am anti feminist, sexist and a proud male chauvinist. Coming back to the story, desi girls here are like above average, like consistent above 7’s. I was like why, how?. Then I realized the obvious truth. Ofcourse, I am not going to discuss here, aasa dosa appadam vada!
Thanks!!!
I never said thanks to anybody in my life. Not to my teacher, not to my parents, not to god, not to anyone, ever. Like never ever. I think there is no word for thanks in my native language. Oh ya, there is one, “Danyavadamulu”. If I accidentally use that word on someone, they will treat me like crack. Here, saying thanks is a bloody norm. First time when I heard a passenger saying thanks to the bus driver when leaving, I was like laughing hysterically. Now I am being forced to do that to get along. Whatever people do to you, they expect a thanks, or atleast we are expected to say thanks. Once a girl offered food for me, “do you want some biscuits”, I said “No”. She kept a face as if she is crying. Later I realized that’s the worst way to decline something. We are supposed to say “No” …wait, and then “Thank you for asking”. I was like Acchaa. And then its my turn to kept a sobbing face. Anyways, this is an ongoing sad story.
Ni Hao
Desis here think they are super smart. For everything, they do some jugaad and feel good about themselves. We feel as if we know everything. We know the best deals out here, where to go for what, which place to shop for cheapest fares. Which items to buy, whatever. But I realized that we come a far second, to none other than who, Chinese of course. These days whenever I enter any shopping space, or for that matter anywhere, anyplace and if I don’t see Chinese, I know that I am doing something terribly wrong. I go to Costco, they are there and I am happy. I go to Wal-Mart, they are there, I am happy. I go to Sprouts, they are NOT there, I know I made a mistake. I go to a scenic tourist spot, I don’t see any Chinese, and I know, for sure, at that very moment, I made a blunder going there. I definitely must have missed something, somewhere which I have no clue about.
