Do Indians Smile At Other Indians?

I realised what you mean when I came to an European country last year, and this question bugged me for a while. Why dont we smile at each other in India?

I concluded that we meet so many souls on the street(A lonely street is an oxymoron in India) that by the time I reached back home in the evening I might get a facial muscle pain ;))

My friend has this theory - if you try and smile at people in India, especially of the opposite sex they will think you are "forward".

Parents visiting family abroad will sometimes stare, size you up from head to toe. Some of them will shyly smile.
gg

Bapsi Sidhwa (Pakistani but still counts) once wrote that her biggest challenge when she moved to the states was learning to respond to people who smiled at her/said something to her as something normal/polite rather than a threat. We've all been there.

Amrita's responses to this article, and GG's response to one in which i wrote on the confusion over size of servings, suggest that I will get used to these things if i live abroad long enough.

But why? Why should I conform from prolonged exposure to one form of stupidity or the other?

I have spent a few decades on the planet and continue to be a rebel; and for over a year in London and still feel like protesting!

We coined the following phrase when some of us Indians visited Chicago after a two-year stint at a remote little town in Upper Michigan where everyone smiled at each other (including dastard Indians ;-).

In Chicago, we realized that no Indians would greet each other or smile at each other, and in fact, they would start sizing you up using their looks or completely ignore you.

We came up with this explanation:

When two Indians see each other in a foreign country, they look at each other and this is what goes on in each mind:
Saala! Tu bhi idhar hain!

(Saala! You are here too!)

Above explanation sounds correct. We see so many souls on street in India; we just can not afford to smile at each person.
However I have found American Born Desis smile at each other (even at Indians) without fail. So this is problem with desis who were brought up back there and have recently moved here. My advise, do in Rome as Romans do. Learn to smile and extend courtesy to each other.

one other factor could also be at play... when in a new land, foreigners tend to want to blend in with the locals as much as possible and distance themselves from their native groups. for some reason there is an innate want to blend in, even if physically speaking, you never will. It is a mostly subconscious act. I find myself doing it often here... I see another firang and instead of exchanging knowing smiles or a kind look, we usually look away from each other. happens all the time.

The above explanation sounds right !! I am in USA currently and had this experience several times. Whenever i come across indians in USA i always smile and say hello if they are near, but most of them hardly responded to me. The other fact that i have noticed is that elderly indian people who live in USA are more likely to smile at you or say hello to you, but the young people, i mean those who are students or working on an H1B visa are less likely to respond. This is some kind of an attitude problem.

Well, I'm not sure why is it so much a fuss. Its just cultural for us to not smile at strangers unless you a particular stranger regularly. What's wrong in that? Why do you have to imitate the west here. This is just cultural?

And yeah, has anybody been to Italy. Strangers don't smile at each other there. So don't gimme the crap that everywhere on earth strangers smile at each other but Indians don't.

Hmmm. Interesting lively debate around that. I dont see too many disagreeing with the observation, except Harshal. OK Harshal: we share another common characteristic with Italy. (The first being the mother thing!) There are other commonalities but I wont go there......

harshal.. sorry mate but I am not sure that's the case. well it's not the case with me in italy anyway. but I am interested in your experience. I will say that having immigrants is new to italy, and they are getting used to it, albeit slowly and begrudgingly... could that be what you are sensing???

II... am very interested to know what you think all the commonalities are. In the end, Indian men and Italian men are very much alike, IMHO.

Stayed in Italy for 3 months..
In Italy, I guess they do smile at you in offices, schools etc... but i guess on the street, you are mistaken to be some Bangladeshi (who work always in lowly jobs).. got nothing against them.. but that maybe the reason why they dont smile at you..
but they do smile at you in other european countries :)

prasanth... yeah, see I think that is the issue. I will go ahead and out my own people on that one. italians are simply not used to immigrants and are not taking it very well. the economy in italy is bad (worse, in fact, than almost all the other european nations). and so they see immigrants as taking away jobs that they want and need (right or wrong... just stating facts). they are really just getting used to a society that is a little more blended, because for as long as I can remember, italy has not had much immigration. maybe that is why people do not smile so much at you. my apologies. it is not right and I am not not not defending it, just explaining.

SS - well wait until more and more firangs come to work in India. I suspect it'll take us a while to adjust too :)

TIIndian - (how do you prefer to be addressed btw?) You don't HAVE to conform as long as you're ok being thought of as rude or creepy depending on which country you find yourself in. :) It really is a case of when in Rome.

But about the Indians not smiling at other Indians - you know what they do instead? Stare. All the time. Even if you smile at them nine out of ten they'll just stare at you. The tenth will take your smile as a come on and follow you for a block asking you your name, telling you theirs, asking you if you have a boyfriend, telling you they don't have a girlfriend and then asking you out. Sigh.

I think it's culture shock. Indian immigrants migrate from a country where people dont smile at each other to countries where they find complete strangers smiling at them. They stare as they find it very odd because back in India, when a person smiles at you, he's either making a silent proposal (if it is to the opposite sex) or being silly.

And most Indian females (and their husbands or other family members if they're around) get very suspicious if a male guy smiles at them. If a male smiles at another male, the second male thinks "Abe ye kyon has raha hain mujhe dekh ke!" (why's this guy smiling at me!) and most likely will ask "bhaisaap kuch problem hain?" (is there any problem dude?) An insecure person will silently think "why's he smiling? is there something wrong with me?) :)

After growing up in such an atmosphere, obviously an immigrant Indian will find it odd if a complete stranger smiles at him/her abroad.

Amrita: Call me what you like! Hopefully a good short name will emerge through a process of iteration.

In re: CONFORMING: I said that with reference to the idea that once you "Get used" to one culture or the other, you will stop observing. I dont want to get used to anything. I dont want to stop observing.

Smallsquirrel: Common features between India and Italy merit a blog by itself! Here are some: On the positives: mother, family, food, flavors. On the negatives: disorganised, stretchable concept of time, laidback.

II, I wholly concur on your list. and yep, there are a lot of them... which has often led my parents to wonder why I steadfastly refused to marry an Italian then turned around and married an Indian. LOOOL.

Hmmm. Every one of us goes home and finds the proverbial indian dulhan. It is a well documented fact. I have a cousin who is in Italy. I thought it an oddity. Didnt think there were so many indians there....

I don't think there are that many, although certainly numbers are increasing. there are now quite a few passable (north) indian restaurants in rome and florence. I also saw a huge amount of desi tourists there the last time I went.

BTW, not familiar with that expression... what is an indian dulhan?

dulhan= bride. Hindi word. My cuz runs a travel related biz in milan.

oh, OK, sorry... barely know a word of Hindi. :)
hmmm, Milan... don't like that city, but I am a Roman, so that is to be expected! (we have the name North/South issues you have in India... there's another thing to add to the list)

I have noticed it in the US too. In fact I remember, once when I was visiting some touristy place, there was this desi who wanted a photograph taken. He waited for me to pass, and then handed over the camera to a local. That made me wonder...

I have also observed that it desis smile more often in Phoenix (which is where I live) and not at all in Denver. SF Bay area is so flooded with desis that it is hard to make a generalization.

Ravi Kulkarni

Harshal,

You talk about imitating western culture, I would like to ask you few questions.

Are you completely being Indian, in where you are living right now ?

Are you wearing only indian traditional clothes there ? ( Dhoti and pyjamas )

Are you eating only Indian food over there ?

Infact there are a lot to point to, but remember "It doesnot matter where you are, where you are from and what you do, Good things are Good world over". Smiling at others indians or saying Hello!! when you come face to face is not Imitation, Infact its a feeling to be happy of seeing how INDIA or INDIANS have become Global and are coming up in their lives and also making lives better in INDIA.

I hope you would smile next time you see an other Indian in your country.

SMILE --- It costs nothing !!

Since this commentary went up, i started noticing again and trying again - to smile. Nope. Not yet working. I try; but then again depends on my own state of mind. Sometimes - too blue to try

I have noticed this too and I had written about it last year - http://dineshblogbuster.blogspot.com/2006/01/whats-with-some-of-us-not-to.html

Its ridiculous just to stare at some1 smiles at you!

In the Bay Area where I used to live, I would get extremely suspicious of any strange desi guy who goes out of his way to smile at me and exchange pleasantries.

In 99% of the cases, he would be from Amway, and would aggressively try to enrol you. Like leeches, they are a bit hard to get rid of once they latch on.

Smiling or not Indians run away from each other in the U.S. This is some complex at work. Doctor type Indians only talk to each other. The odd thing is they miss out on life this way. They should all say Namaste or Hello. As mostly we don't need anything material from each other.

Smiling or not Indians run away from each other in the U.S. This is some complex at work. Doctor type Indians only talk to each other. The odd thing is they miss out on life this way. They should all say Namaste or Hello. As mostly we don't need anything material from each other.

smile or not, this article certainly made me smile:D
Here, in the bay area, we encounter a lot of desis. Smiling can be an open, genuine one or a closed, I would like to know you better kind too. An open smile can never be construed as something else! So just go ahead and SMILE! We lose nothing really. So keep smiling Tii- it brightens up some people's lives.

there is certainly a very complex and complex matrix of repulsion and attraction between desis in non-desilands. i have never been able to figure it out. the worst is the interaction at indian restaurants abroad: between indian waiters and indian customers. usually a combination of the following:

1. some indian patrons feel it is their birthright to insult the waiters, shout at them etc.

2. some waiters feel it is best to ignore indian customers until the non-indian customers have been completely taken care of.

3. some of it might be triggered off by those tacky plastic "roses" plonked in tackier brass vases, all probably supplied by the same desi entrepreneur.

Interesting debate.. there are many layers to it.

Here in in US, esp. in east coast where there are desis by the dozen, I agree, 9 out of 10 times a desi will not smile at you but will definitely size you up. I don't mind someone not smiling at me, but I hate to be sized up.

I travel by bus to work and most people on our bus stop are desis and meet everyday, yet there are only a few people who actually get down to talking to each other. Most of them just stand on the bus stop and stare into infinity :)

The thing is in India we are taught to be wary of strangers. We take time to trust people because you can be taken for a ride. I guess we carry the same feeling here.

But, another interesting observation came from my brother who lives in Hong Kong, when he was visiting the US. He was quite befuddled on this trend. He says desis in HK tend to be quite glad to see another desi.

I should also talk about my parent's experience in the 70s. They travelled and lived over Europe and Africa for a bit and my mom would always stand out in her saree. In Gambia, she actually had people coming and talking to her in a department store and upon discovering she was a vegetarian surving on boiled beans and carrots, insisted on having food delivered to the hotel immediatialy. After that encounter, we did not eat in the hotel at all. The 10-15 Indian families there would make sure they got home cooked food. In the past, because fewer Indians travelled, Indians were usually very happy to see fellow Indians.

I am sure even in the US, in remote places where there are fewer Indians they would still be smiling at each other!

The comments make interesting reading. Does there exist the 'smile' merely as an acknowledgement of the existence of the other - that's the question. Like what the namaste is...

From many of the comments I have read here, the answer seems implicit: there is trepidation about what happens next - after the smile!

Freeloaders, busy-bodies, spongers-on, Amway creep-a-way.... that appears to the real issue.

Indians do not smile and walk away.

For the last year I have been operating in the homeland. There are just too many people to smile at!

Not a bad thing, actually.... have a smile on your face all day long?

And yet: there are two families in the apartment wing where i stay. When I smile at another occupant in the lift - clearly a member of the neighbour family upstairs - he appeared completely nonplussed and panicked at having been trapped with me in the elevator car!

No we dont. Indians dont smile at one another. We are just too suspicous of one another.

Indians Abroad tend to open up to other Indians only in certain settings. I have noticed them look down upon overtures from strangers with mental smirk - what is this desi doing here, dude thinks he is still in India.

I usually respond with smile, hi-hello or small talk if somebody goes out of his/her way but I feel no reason to interact with total strangers just because they are Indians. If a total stranger smiles at you for no reason and make overtures of familiarity at malls or public places, I found in more than few occasions, they were networking for MLM.