The Thing About Being Indian

one: you have way too much family. the other day at an aunt's place, a distant aunt came over with her family for a visit. so we sat over tea, ate, chatted, joked, story-told, then ate some more.

then the infamous indian goodbye. for those of you who don't know, the indian goodbye is when indians say goodbye to someone, but end up actually having more conversations than before. actual departure from the first goodbye, could take an average of half an hour. and this is me being conservatively nice. in that period of time, countless of goodbyes would be bade, but not a step taken towards the door. sometimes, participants head further away from the exit. in that period of time, suddenly there would be a tsunami of topics to be discussed. over and over again. recipes to be shared, numbers to be exchanged, address to be taken, who died, who did not die, family drama, etc etc. i guess standing up and talking would seem less rude and imposing to the host.

anyways, back to topic. after the whole tea-session and family reuniting, the distant aunt comes over to hug me goodbye, then says, "i don't think you even know me right?"

"aunty, i was at your daughter's wedding last year", i reply.

O.o

see. there's just too many of us to know everyone.

*******

two: you get lame jokes.

asked by my uncle, do you know why the airplane takes off with the nose in the air? then he does a motion with his hand similar to a take off, fingers pointing to the air first.

so i say "no" because i've never learnt aerodynamics or about bernoulli's principle in my life.

uncle: because there's always more people in the economic seats in the back, then first-class customers in the front.

principle of flight 101 y'all!