Friday, May 05, 2006

Namaste

As WE were walking on the streets of Chinatown talking in Hindi , suddenly someone from behind says "Namaste!" ,I also reply back with "Namaste" (with a nice smile) .
*Namaste :Its a Hindi word commonly used in Northen Part of India to greet .

And then the conversation

He : I recently went to India !!
We : Oh! Okay [ Just to hear the word India from a foreigner in a foreign country makes you feel so great! ]
He : I went to Gujarat for a wedding [Gujarat is a state in the western part of India !!]
We: Okay
He : What a wedding !!!!![ *Excited* ] . So colorful. We went for a Patel's wedding. One of my daughter's friend's wedding.
We: Ya. So you enjoyed the dancing in the wedding?[With no doubt ,Indian weddings are so colorful ]
He: [Starts Singing a folk song in Gujarathi] We had a very nice time!!
We: :o )[ A sheepish smile after listening to his Gujrathi song! ]
He : I went Kerala .One of my daughter is getting married to an Indian.
We: You went to backwaters and all ?
He: I went to Thekkadi and Munaaaaar [Munnar in his english Accent]
We: Munnar is a hill station, Beautiful place !!
He: India is so rich !! [ I realized this after i have stayed outside India for almost an year now! ]
We: [Smiles all over our face with proud] :o)
He: But Traffic Jam is a major problem
We: [Oh! No . Again a sheepish smile.] Ya ,too much of a traffic jam
He: Nobody follows any rules .
We :[Interrupting in between] There are no rules ;-)
He: Hmmm.... Ya

One lady taps him from behind asking him to board the bus
He: Okay.Bye Bye
We: [Shaking his hands] Nice meeting you .
He: Jai Shri Krishna !!! [ Its again a common greeting in Gujarat .Its like Praising Lord Krishna]
We: Jai Sri Krishna !!!

We :Myself and Ashish who were roaming around China Town photographing. It was supposed to be a photoblogger's meet ,but other cudn't make it so it was only two of us.
He was a foreigner who has recently visited India and was very much impressed by its culture ,except for the Traffic part of it .We were really proud to hear him praise our country .Its really a nice feeling to hear about our country but yes its sad to hear something bad about our country too. I wish i could do something about the Traffic system in our country !!!
After staying outside India for almost an year i have realized that Indian culture is so rich and there is so much importance to famliy values !
India is great and i have another 4 days to go my own country :o) ,INDIA here i come after 361 days !!!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

enjoy maadi.. :)

Anonymous said...

enjoy maadi.. :)

Anonymous said...

enjoy maadi.. :)

Anonymous said...

my bad... i guess i truly want you to enjoy... ;)
Cannot delete them myselves - please do..

Anonymous said...

gujarat is in the west:p

Anonymous said...

Traffic system... No doubt! so worse in India. I too was thinking of what to do about the Traffic senselessness of India sometimes back and even wrote a post in one of the blogs I write. You may peek at it sometimes...Here