Over the
past couple of years that I have been outside India, I have come across many
people from different countries and cultures. It was great to find out how
people across the globe know Shah Rukh Khan, and Modi and the 3 Idiots movie.
All izz well…. It was indeed heartening to know that I come from a famous
country, but it was also disheartening to find that there are a lot of
preconceived (and mostly untrue) notions about India and
Indians. Some of them are ‘harmless’, but some of them are quite annoying.
So here goes the list of common myths about India.
#Dark
skin doesn’t imply you are from the South, and fair skin doesn’t imply you are
from the North. There are fair skinned people all over India, and the same goes
for dark skinned people.
I have
had countless people ask me if I am from the South and if my roomie who is also
a Mallu(Malayali), is from the North. But the worst came from a Gujju(Gujarati)
friend who commented on my neighbor that she was way too good looking to be a
Mallu! :-|
#Not
all Indian men are rapists. Yes, from the insane number of rape incidents that
make headlines everyday, rape seems to be a favorite pastime for Indian men,
but decent and respectable men still exist in the country.
I have
friends who have been asked how come they haven’t been raped after staying in
India for so long!
#This one
is especially to Singaporeans and Malaysians: Tamil is not the national
language of India. I know that majority of the Indian population in Singapore
is Tamil, but in India, Tamil is spoken by less than 6% of the population. We do
not have a national language, probably because of the hundreds of native
languages we have in different parts of the country.
#Hindi is
the language. Hindu(ism) is the religion.
Please
don’t ask an Indian if he/she speaks Hindu.
#Speaking
of Hinduism, not all Indians are Hindus. There are Muslims, Christians, Sikhs,
Buddhists, Jains, Zoroastrians, Jews and Free Thinkers.
#Not all
Malayalis get drunk everyday.
(Interestingly,
one of the most disciplined and lengthy queuing systems in India can be found
in front of liquour shops in Kerala:P)
