United Indians of the World ???

Ponder this. Amazing insight.

A very close friend of mine called me yesterday from US of A. During the conversation, she mentioned ->

"Atleast I have 4 Indian families in close vicinity where I live. There is this lovely couple from Maharashtra, an uncle type from Chennai, 1 couple from Bangalore who have been in US for 2o years, and another couple from Hyderabad. All loving and caring people, not like these Goras (read Americans) who dont care for anyone."

Why would this get me thinking ? You ask this of me ? Ok.. Read on and perhaps it will be clearer.

I know this friend of mine since 1995. We were in Eleventh grade in different schools. I was from Faridabad City in Haryana State of India, and she was from the capital New Delhi.

She had categorized the world in the following types --

1. The best - Delhi-ites
2. The not so bad - Foreigners (which is everyone outside India ;-) )
3. The ok ok sort - Haryanvis, UP waala, MP waala etc.
4. The Insufferable - Madrasis ( Now this is interesting as for her, everyone from Mumbai down was a Madrasi, does not matter if that person was from Chennai or Bangalore or Hyderabad or anywhere else).
5. The Intolerable - Pakistanis..

I tried a lot to change this notion but gave up soon. Things changed. She changed in a 4-5 years. She now was living in Bangalore working for a Tech company (didnt they all !! ). Now when we talked it was -

"Yeh madrasi saare pagal hote hain. Inko kuch nahi pata. Hum north waale hi sahi hain (These Madrasis are all mad, they know nothing. We North Indians are the best)".

Here its interesting to know that the so called Northis, now had - 1 Noida girl, 1 jat from Gurgaon, 1 jat from Hisar, 2 girls from Delhi, and 3 from Ranchi. See ? Interesting unity right ?

Ok.. so now the world was 1 category less, all Northis, All foreigners, all Southies, and the Pakis.. and this was 1999.

Fast forward to 2007 and I almost lost touch with her during these 7-8 years. It was quite suprising for me to see her mail one day in an email account I checked only once in a blue moon (IT boom days guys, we all created email accounts like crazy.. after all which true blooded Indian will leave alone anything which was free !! by the way its - thedecentmale@yahoo.com in case u are inclined to right, and i do check it more often now .. he he he)

She wrote to me from US of A, we started communicating again and I was wondering what direction is this all moving into. What would a sophisticated Page 3 type girl , A Delhi-ite to boost, living now in US of A would want from a Faridabadi (what she called me in 1990 -s)... who was still in India.

I was not to wait for long.. And as you know, she called me y'day and one statement jumped out ->

"Atleast I have 4 Indian families in close vicinity where I live. There is this lovely couple from Maharashtra, an uncle type from Chennai, 1 couple from Bangalore who have been in US for 2o years, and another couple from Hyderabad. All loving and caring people, not like these Goras (read Americans) who dont care for anyone."

It took a visit and stay in the land of "Uncle Sam" for her to realize that she was an Indian ? that everyone, whether from Hyderabad, Cochin, Bangalore, Mumbai or Haryana or Hisar.

What is next ? After 2 more years, I wont be the least bit surprized for her to call me and say - "I have this lovely Paki friend who took me shopping." Or "This friend of Mine from Colombo makes the best of the meals", or perhaps ->

"We asians need to unite against these Whites." ???

United in Distance are we ? What will it take for us all to realize that we are all humans ? A posting in Mars or Venus ?

Ponder this.. I am still thinking..