All Chinese are Buddhists-a?
People ask me a lot of questions about China - standard of living, religion, lifestyle, culture - so many things. What most people don't know, I think, is that China is huge. I mean HUGE. Its like asking someone from Finland staying in New Delhi for a couple of months about intricacies of India. I am not sure how representative is it of the whole of India. Anyway, I cannot say this as an answer to almost any of my uncles or aunts. So, I say - "Vegetarian food very difficult Aunty. No Uncle, they don't speak a word of English. I know Uncle, they are not better than even our villagers. Yes Aunty, I get Indian groceries there and I cook, though very difficult Aunty. Yeah Aunty, everyone is a Buddhist there. Yeah Aunty, they are all communists. I am not sure if they are arrested for it Uncle, I mean, they don't look like naxalites." and so on. To be honest, I am not sure I know the right answers to any of these questions! I just answer them based on my mood! Tricky and annoying.
Note to self: Start compiling a "Book of myths on China".
4 comments:
Haha.. I remember bombing you with the same questions when you came back... But your answers seemed convincing enough... Not bad !
I liked the title :) Kannadizing the English words... aah.. welcome back to Bangaloru :D
Aye! You are a great writer. I didn't think you can write this standard. Great. Keep it up. Your reaction to questions on CHINA... is really natural, harmless and humourous.
@Gagan - That's OK. You remind of an Indian aunt anyway :P
@Karthik - Sure Sure. I do that for official meeting titles and get cribbed upon. What do _they_ know? :)
@Sudarshan - Thanks! I think it runs in the genes ;)
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