India is a country of extremes- some of the richest people on the planet live in India, as do some of the poorest. There are multi-million dollar high rise buildings right next to neighborhood slums of tarp and cardboard box houses. One minute you are driving down a clean street with center medians filled with tropical flowers and sidewalks with nice benches where you can almost feel you are in Miami, but then you look across the street and there is a broken out building with stray dogs outside and piles of garbage everywhere.
There are also some things unique to India, like religion. As I talked about earlier, India is 80% Hindu. Hindus overall are a peaceful group- very religious, faithful, and dedicated. I think this religion is somewhat misinterpreted, especially by Americans who deal pretty straightforward in facts and science. Most Hindu's worship statues of gods, which off the bat seems pretty strange to most people not familiar. Also, in Hinduism there is some 330 million or so gods- which again seems to be a pretty big contradiction to Catholicism. But when you dig a little deeper you find that Hinduism simply refers to all things created by God as gods- so the god of wealth, the god of the sky, the god of fire, etc. I think most Catholics can agree that these things are created by God, so ultimately can be considered sacred- its just that Hindus get a little more specific. There are 3 main gods in Hinduism:
Brahma- the creator, Vishnu- the protector, and Shiva- the destroyer; also known as the Trimurti (My fellow Catholics: sound familiar?...The Holy Trinity??)
On the recent Hindu holiday Dussehra, one of the days was devoted to worship of all 'tools' meaning anything you use to make your living so people typically decorate their transportation- here are some pics:
yes, apparently this guy's transportation is a buffalo (we know this as a long horned bull- but in India they call this a buffalo)
I personally find this kind of passion about anything very noble.
Here are some more 'Only in India' moments:
Random Cow
Guy who apparently needed a nap
Not a construction site, just an empty lot
Guy on his roof wearing a skirt AND a turban
When they say roadside shopping, they mean literally road-side
Kids are dressed up like this, right next to men in pink shirts and skinny jeans
One of a million roadside shops like mini-Walmarts selling wide variety of products
Back alley where you can have a teenage boy sew you a shirt for less than $5 from scratch (I referred to this area as sketchy-ville...btw, people lived down this alley behind alice in wonderland type small doors)
Family on a motorcycle
More random cows in traffic
There are also some things unique to India, like religion. As I talked about earlier, India is 80% Hindu. Hindus overall are a peaceful group- very religious, faithful, and dedicated. I think this religion is somewhat misinterpreted, especially by Americans who deal pretty straightforward in facts and science. Most Hindu's worship statues of gods, which off the bat seems pretty strange to most people not familiar. Also, in Hinduism there is some 330 million or so gods- which again seems to be a pretty big contradiction to Catholicism. But when you dig a little deeper you find that Hinduism simply refers to all things created by God as gods- so the god of wealth, the god of the sky, the god of fire, etc. I think most Catholics can agree that these things are created by God, so ultimately can be considered sacred- its just that Hindus get a little more specific. There are 3 main gods in Hinduism:
Brahma- the creator, Vishnu- the protector, and Shiva- the destroyer; also known as the Trimurti (My fellow Catholics: sound familiar?...The Holy Trinity??)
On the recent Hindu holiday Dussehra, one of the days was devoted to worship of all 'tools' meaning anything you use to make your living so people typically decorate their transportation- here are some pics:
I personally find this kind of passion about anything very noble.
Here are some more 'Only in India' moments:
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