Random curious facts

In my country, if someone accidentally hits you, he will say sorry. In the UK, both people will say sorry (which I always found very funny). In India, people will touch you with their right hand and then take their hand to their chest, and sometimes even touch their eyes. I’ve been explained that this gesture means asking sorry both to you and to God for having hit you… wow! Also, as a sign of respect towards someone older, like a grandparent, people will touch the feet of the person and then take their hand to their chest and forehead. I was shocked the first time I saw it but I now find amazing how differently respect is shown here.

While women must have shoulders and legs covered (but not their belly, which is not covered by the sari), men have no problem taking off their shirt if they are doing some hard work and they often wear the dhoti, a sort of long piece of clothe that they often fold as a very (sometimes too) short skirt. Moreover, I’ve seen quite a lot of guys peeing at the side of the street, bah! Also, when going to the beach, guys take bath wearing shorts and sometimes a t-shirt (but mostly they go bare-chested) while women have to enter the sea fully dressed. I tried once to go in wearing leggings and I felt so impeded by my clothes!

Generosity. I once shared a sweet between two little girls (I only had 1 sweet in my bag) and they both managed to cut out a piece from the two tiny halves to give it to me!! I was so amazed! Also, it is very common to see older kids helping out younger kids, and younger kids taking things to the older. For example, during weekends children attend free classes of skating and surfing at the school or at the nearby beach. Since sometimes the teachers are not enough to take care of all the children, the older students often help the younger ones, and they do this without even being asked to or complaining. Also, often older students ask the younger ones to bring them a glass of water or more food, and the young ones obey straight away. I tried to picture these situations in Europe and I could only see children replying “No way” or “Do it yourself” when asked to take a glass of water to their older friends!

Women are considered frail. If I’m seen standing for more than 5 minutes at the school, I’m always offered a chair, either by a student or a member of the staff. If I need to carry anything heavier than a book, I’m straight away stopped and a student will be called to help (I dared carrying a chair from a room to another a couple of times and I was promptly stopped and helped).

Religion is easily displayed. Christians often wear a rosary around their necks and Hindu paint a colorful dot on their forehead, which means that they have prayed or visited a temple. Muslims or Protestants are a bit more difficult to recognize because they mostly don’t wear ornaments.

Talking about ornaments, I wonder how long do women take here to get ready in the morning: not only they wear saris or long skirts and shawls, but every female I’ve seen here, from a little girl to an elderly woman, has her hair neatly tied or braided, earrings, bangles and bindi (a little colorful circle worn between the eyebrows) matching to the color of the dress and at least one necklace. I was often “reproached” by female students for not wearing well-matched clothes or earrings!

Some students are now studying a story where “autumn” is mentioned. I then noticed that they didn’t know seasons very well. Then I understood: in Kerala (and in South India) it is warm all year long. The only variations are the amount of rain, humidity and degrees, which are anyway always above 20° C. How can you explain to people who have only experienced “summer”, that during autumn it is cold and you need to wear a scarf and a jacket, that the leaves of the trees go orange and fall down, that days get shorter and nights longer, that then streets freeze, that noses get red and that snow falls from the sky?! Not such an easy task, I’d feel like I came from the moon!

Everyone is family in India. It is common to call friends “brother” or “sister” and elder people “auntie” or “uncle”. If an Indian tells you he has 10 sisters, don’t worry, he probably has 2 real sisters and 8 cousins or relatives.