Here are the following rookie NRI faux pas I committed:
- As soon as I landed, I commented on the noise levels in the city at 1 am in the morning
- Almost threw up in the vehicle after being treated to road-rash style driving
- Visited the temple – in traditional garb, not sparing Pickwick either
- Managed to infest kid with virus
- Managed to catch the aforementioned virus myself
- Was surprised that the country has not frozen in time and has managed to move on in the years that we were missing
- Commented on how expensive things had become and started sentences with ‘I remember back in my days when…’
- Clicked photographs of absolutely arbit. things which I now found hilarious (a key chain advertising ‘steel balls’ and a billboard for ‘sham publicity’)
- Had the junk food off the streets and marvelled at it, swore it was nothing short of gourmet
- However, did drink only mineral water, in case I caught something
- Caught something anyways
- Accidentally let the accent slip to a friend – and didn’t hear the end of it for the rest of the trip.
- Thoroughly enjoyed the rickshaw ride, and pooh-poohed at the natives who were sputtering at the pollution levels – and went giddy breathing in the concentrated levels of carbon monoxide.
- Caught with the 159 relatives who live in the city, mostly on a single day. Had Pickwick thoroughly confused on the number of tatas and pattis he has. He didn’t mind much though – his equation is simple: the number of relatives are directly proportional to the number if goodies you get. (‘pwesents!’)
- Went to relatives houses with chocolate, and got desi sweets in the bargain - and wondered for the nth time, why on earth they preferred the chocolates.
- Stacked up on the DVDs of our traditional mythological heroes (Hanuman and Ganesha) despite Pickwick not watching more than 60 seconds of anything, unless it’s a song and dance sequence
- Refused to move around in anything but tops, capris and cut-offs, and worked on my ‘tan’
- Went overboard with sending off clothes to the ‘ironwallah’ since I wasn’t the one doing the ironing
- Had to be frequently reminded by relatives to ‘just leave the dishes’ after a meal, I didn’t need to wash up afterwards *bliss*
Future visits will possibly iron out these quirks… although I’m rather hoping I can just get back to being the desi who’s visited by the NR relative.
