Gori Girl

The Real Stuff that Indians (Mostly in America) Like

If you’ve never checked out the oktrends blog, you’re in for a treat. The company behind the blog, OKCupid, is an online dating site with a fun vibe and an extremely extensive, mostly young, cross-cultural group of users. Like any other dating site, OKCupid is sitting on a virtual treasure trove of social data – but OKCupid isn’t afraid to use it. The blog’s most recent post focuses on some of the biggest cross-cultural questions out there, in fact, and uses some decent statistics to answer ‘em.

Germany and Leaves: Social Norms

The autumn season is upon us here in Virginia – the leaves have turned bright yellow, orange, red, and cover our yard and front walk in a multicolored carpet.

All I can think is that I’m so glad I don’t live in Germany anymore.

Words on Hindostan – Part Three

We return to crotchety old Mrs. Mortimer’s Victorian children’s stories on India (a country Mrs. Mortimer unfortunately never had a chance to actually visit). Today’s lessons from the 1850′s focus on animals, thugs, and women – and why Mrs. Mortimer chose to group her subjects in such a manner, well, I’ll leave that to all of you to ponder. As always, I do think there are some interesting details in Mrs. Mortimer’s account of India; reading between the lines, you can get a both an account of India and an idea of how the British viewed their colonies. And if that doesn’t draw you in, how about learning the etymology of the word thug? (For those of you just tuning in, here are the links to Part One and Part Two

Looking for a Few Good Blogs on Relationships, India, and All Things Intercultural?

I’ve been sick the past few days – the sort where you just sit in bed and alternate between sleeping & reading. So, not a lot of blog posts here, but I’ve had a chance to catch up with a few new blogs that have come to my attention recently. A few of them have been added to the blogroll recently, but without much ado. So now it’s time to make a bit of an ado – here’s some of the best posts I’ve found.

Confluence on the Roads: Thoughts about American, Indian, and German Traffic

Yesterday Aditya and I made the trek to the holy queen of all box stores, IKEA. It was the first day of the Preview Summer Sale, so of course we were there, battle plan mapped out, lists made, room measurements at hand, and stomaches ready for meatballs. The plan was that I would arrive mid-afternoon with the U-Haul rental van (the better to transport our loot – we take IKEA seriously in this household), and Aditya would come directly from the office once he was off work at 7. Once there, my orders were to make one reconnaissance sweep, then head to the ground floor to secure the bed we’ve been trying to purchase for the past year. Yes, we’ve been sleeping with a mattress on the floor for a year rather than give up on our dream cheapo bed just because of little things like it always being out of stock.

We plan, and God laughs. I think it was when the third firetruck passed me, sirens blaring, and traffic ground to a complete standstill that I realized I would not be reaching IKEA at 1300 hours. There I sat, stalled on the highway, surveying the baking asphalt meadows around. To pass the time, I started observing the cooperation of the other drivers in responding to the emergency vehicles and the on-going traffic jam, and thinking about how other car cultures I’m familiar with cooperate in their own ways.

A Cougar in the Backyard: Dispatches from My First Indian Wedding

In this guest post, NeoKalypso of Doings & Undoings give us her thoughts on the first Indian wedding she attended.

Igniting the fear and fascination of city dwellers, a cougar recently turned up roaming around my highly metropolitan area. The cat was a fairly big dude, about 5 feet in length 150lbs, and eventually made its way into the tiny backyard of a resident who described seeing the animal roam by his window as “surreal.” When the police came they tried to contain the beast, but when it lunged at a policeman it was shot and killed. Turns out, shooting the cougar was really the only option given how ill fitted the city is for large, wild animals. The cougar could have killed someone, and there was no easy access to vets or tranquilizers to entertain any other safe idea. This is an example of an ecotone: when two different ecosystems collide and cause tension. The cougar and the city dwellers were just doing what they knew to survive, unfortunately both could not survive together.

Fortunately, I made it out of my first Indian wedding alive, and though my experience isn’t as dramatic as the poor cougar’s fate, I certainly felt out of my element. After having traveled plenty of strange places, visiting Buddhist Mongolian homes, sleeping in $3 hostels, and not to mention my general love for Indian culture, one would think I could handle any kind of situation, any kind of pressure… right? In almost any other contexts and as a seasoned, brave explorer, I think I would have found The Indian Wedding a smörgåsbord of fascination and wonder. However, let me tell you, The Indian Wedding is a much different experience when you are dating one of their own.

I’m a Rock Star in India!

Read through to see a video with excited schoolchildren…

India’s Delicious Products – Or, Why Can’t We Get That Here?

Possibly the best thing about being in an intercultural relationship, at least for the curious mind, is the in-depth, nitty-gritty exposure you get to a different group’s culture. Be prepared for the flood of new customs, food, clothes, vocabulary, entertainment and so forth that’ll be coming your way. The only thing I can compare it to is living in a foreign country with a roommate or family from that country – of course, then you’re still in an intercultural relationship, just not a romantic one.

While a number of problems can arise from having two or more cultures operating in the same house, today’s focus is on the unadulterated good things that come from sharing a culture. The things that will remain perfect in my mind forever. Even if Aditya were to run off the squirrel that hangs out near the bedroom window (they were eying each other this morning) and break my heart, or declare a hatred for IKEA (and break my heart), I will appreciate our time together because of these three things:

Christmas Wedding Gifts

Indians rock at the wedding gift-giving thing. In fact, I think the Indian version of giving wedding presents is far superior to the typical American way. This belief of mine is based on the one Indian wedding I’ve attended – my own – so it’s not exactly statistically sound. But I think my experience is enlightening, nonetheless, and I’m told it’s fairly typical.

Last Christmas, exactly a year and four days after our civil ceremony in the US, Aditya and I had our Hindu wedding in India. The date was picked for a combination of reasons: it was auspicious according to the astrologer Maa (Aditya’s mother) consulted; the weather in Calcutta would be near perfect for anyone not from Calcutta; and, most importantly, the groom and I could get time off of our jobs in D.C. to fly halfway around the world.

Of course, the timing also meant that I couldn’t spend the holidays with my culturally-Christian family in California, exchanging gift cards (Best Buy for Aditya, Borders for me), and watching various younger cousins, nieces, and nephews play with the cardboard boxes their toys came in. Still, I consented to go to India. We get out to the West Coast every season anyways, and I was told there’d be presents for me in India. (Sure, it also meant I could finally meet Aditya’s sister and his extended family, perform important Hindu marriage rites, see his homeland, etc, etc, whatever – today’s focus is on presents.)

Shall I start with the reasons why Indian wedding gifts are excellent?