When traveling abroad, no matter how familiar you are with the culture, how well-versed you are in the language, you will still end up embarrassing yourself.
My parents were born and raised in India and I am very much in touch with my native roots. At home, we speak the language, a mixture of Hindi and Urdu, fluently; we dine every night on traditional food and we all wear traditional dress often enough. Most of all, every few years we travel to India and spend the whole summer there, living out of out bags, crashing in people’s living rooms.
Our last trip was the summer before my freshman year. This time, we spent most of the summer in my aunt’s, my mother’s sister in law, house, along with her three kids and my grandmother. Her apartment was tiny to say the least. There were three bedrooms, one of which had been turned into a storage room, a kitchen big one enough to hold only three people and the dining and living room were combined. We ended up cramming eight people into two bedrooms.
Despite the strained accommodations, we had a good time. Our cousins, Shahrukh, 14 Mehraj, 12, Simra, 10, were around our age and we spent most our days exploring their vast complex. It was an apartment complex with a small market at the north end. The area was covered in trees, laden with flowers and fruits, playgrounds, and more people then you can imagine. It didn’t matter the time of day. There was always somebody around, strolling, picking fruit, or watching over their children. But for own safety we could only go outside with either my cousins or my aunt. Apparently, Americans were worth a tidy sum here. Once they returned to school however, we were left to our own devices, cooped up in the house, no one willing to spend the day with us.
We never knew when they left for school, since we always slept late, partly due to summer, and partly due to the time change. But we were always there when they came home. We would anxiously for their return, since only after they came could we eat lunch. After lunch, the adults would all go to sleep and we kid would spend romp around outside, until my cousins had to go their homework. One day, in one of the many playgrounds, we were lounging under a fruit laden tree. Shahrukh began to tell us a story of kid in his class that had eaten, he dramatically paused before reveling this, gum. My brother and I burst out laughing. The other two looked so disgusted; you would think the poor kid had eaten rotten fish mixed with dog piss. The three siblings huddled together and began to mutter to each other Hindi
I didn’t give them much attention, until I heard the words, “Stupid Americans, don’t they know that eating gum will kill him?” Apparently they had forgotten that I spoke Hindi as well as they did. I ignored the comment, but I tuned into their conversation. They were talking abut how the poor kid might have to go to the hospital, get his stomach pumped and what not. I was confused. Had the kid swallowed the gum? How much gum had he swallowed? I piped, wondering since when was gum toxic? My brother snickered, but I only got a glare from Mehraj, a “you don’t know what you’re talking about so stay out this” glare. I quickly scooted away, miffed, but not before I had a very rude phrase. Let’s just say it’s the equivalent of the f-word with my name attached.
I was out of my seat in flash and stalked over to my cousin. He stared up at me, an innocent expression on his face. My “oh no you didn’t” glare told him I had over heard and understood him. He scooted backward, trying to get out of reach of my fists. In his hurry, he fell of the bench and landed rear first in the sand. I grabbed him by the collar and hauled him by the collar to his feet. His was apologizing, the words stumbling out, a mixture of Hindi and English, hoping I would understand him in one language or another. In the background, I could hear his siblings trying to convince my brother to stop me. He couldn’t understand what the big deal was. He was happy to let me beat the stuffing out Mehraj, despite the protest from his siblings. He wasn’t very likeable.
At some point, it occurred to me, that maybe my gum and their gum wasn’t the same thing, But I was too consumed by my rage to give that argument any though. I was about to throw a haymaker at him, when I felt arms, strong, muscular ones, wrap around my stomach and lift me clear of the ground. I held on tight to my cousin, determined to inflict some damage. The mysterious person told me to drop him. I didn’t want but when the grip around my stomach got painfully tight, I let go. He fell to his knees, rubbing his throat, raw, red and with an imprint of his collar on it, and tried to get some air. The voice asked me if I was going to hurt him if he let go. I answered truthfully and said yes. The voice muttered about how violent American girls were. I retorted with Mehraj’s comment. I was promptly dropped and saw one of my many uncles drag my cousin away for a good thrashing. Here in India, guys do not insult girls without some kind of retribution. And boy was he going to get his comeuppance.
Unfortunately, word of our almost-scuffle got home, and we both got an earful. My mom, curious because I wasn’t the type to get into fights asked what the fight had been about. We looked at each other and gave them a completely nonsense answer. If they ever knew the real reason, Mehraj would probably be under house arrest for the rest of his life. Plus, I wasn’t that mean.
My mom knew me better than I though. She pulled me aside later that day and coerced me into telling her the real reason of the fight. When I was done, she burst out laughing. Okay, I was really, really confused. Between giggles she explained to me, that gum in India meant glue, not chewing gum. Thanks to the British ruling India for a while, traces of British culture had remained. Including the word gum. I felt like such an idiot. I had nearly beaten the mickey out of my cousin for no reason at all. Only the sudden arrival of my uncle had saved me from that.
This little incident highlights just some of the confusion that traveling halfway across the world can cause. In fact that whole trip highlights it. I was old to enough to understand but young off to not completely understand. Hopefully on our next trip, something like this doesn’t happen. Actually I hope it does. Because I would really like to get a crack at Mehraj.
