Cultures Clashing and People laughing!

As I already told you, the end of the year 2004 and the beginning of 2005 were months in which I did not only recover from my knee surgery but during which we also had many visitors at the Ashram. It was Europeans, Australians and also some visitors from New Zealand and Fiji with whom I had stayed during my travels. Our Ashram has always been an open place and that is how it started in that time that people of different nations were sitting together here. I remember several funny incidents that were results of cultures clashing – and that especially in between western and Indian culture.

When we had some visitors from Germany for example, where I had been travelling a long time, such an incident occurred. Our German guest was sitting in the Ashram hall, just watching the life around her when one of our neighbours walked up the Ashram path. He had come to invite us to a celebration that he was organizing. While he waited for my brother to come out for a talk, he turned to the German woman. The exchanged a welcoming smile and a ‘Namaste!’ after which he asked ‘Where are you from?’ – probably the most commonly asked question for foreigners in India. She replied ‘From Germany’ and with a smile and enthusiasm that he knew something about her country he said ‘Oh, Hitler’s country!’ I had just walked by and had heard this small conversation. Now I turned and saw how our friend looked at him, fully baffled and unsure what to reply to such a thing. She was surprised, maybe a little bit offended and at the same time amused. This was the only thing this man knew about Germany and that is how he tried to make conversation – let’s just say, it was a try with no ill intention! It definitely made many people laugh whom we told the story afterwards.

Such situations also happen with people of Indian origin who grew up in other countries – because their culture is actually not truly Indian anymore. One of my friends from England, whose forefathers had emigrated from India, had come to visit us once. At the same time some pilgrims came to the Ashram to visit and talk to my father. One of them met my friend on the way and started a conversation – or rather an interrogation:

‘Where are you from?’
‘From the UK.’
‘What do you do?’
‘I work’
‘What do you work?’
‘I am an accountant.’
‘How much do you earn?’

My friend stared at him with open mouth. How can you just ask a complete stranger about his income? In that moment he saw me talking to someone else nearby, mumbled someone like ‘Let’s talk about this later’ and politely turned away from his interrogator to come to me.

On another occasion, we had a celebration at the Ashram and had invited both Indian and western friends. Everybody had gathered and it seemed as though people soon formed one Indian group and one western group. In order to mix this up a little bit we started introducing individual persons to each other so that they could not but overcome their shyness and start conversations. I was witness of one of these conversations, between one Swiss woman and an Indian woman. They were introduced to each other and told that they both were teachers which led them to telling each other that they liked their job. It was a pleasant conversation until our Swiss friend innocently touched the – admittedly voluminous – belly of our Indian friend and said ‘But I guess you won’t teach long anymore! How far are you, six or seven months?’ She was not pregnant at all – which caused a slight embarrassment for one person but big amusement for all others. We are just happy that our Indian friend has a realistic view on her body size, said ‘No, I am just big!’ and laughed along which made our Swiss friend feel better again!

It is always great to have people of other cultures around you and we learned, not only in 2004 but also in the years after that until today, that the most important thing is to act with love and laugh about such situations – and if you laugh together, cultural differences won’t matter anymore.

With such and similar thoughts, the year 2004 ended.