Once upon a time I was in New York, ironically enough with The Mashners, celebrating the New Year. A pretty girl approached me and asked me "Are You Indian?" I quickly replied with "No. I'm Punjabi." "Me Too!" Too easy.
Punjab is a part of India. With its own distinct food, language, culture, dance & music. It is my ancestrial homeland (or as Vinay would say, upna punjab) Last week I returned to Punjab ... well it was more like my homecoming. I'd never been there before.
It was a whirwlind trip. We left Delhi at 5am on Monday and started on our way back at 4am on Tuesday. Our maindestinations where the India/Pakistan border and the Golden Temple (both described below in other posts)
But I couldn't go visit the towns where my grandparents are from because they now resides inside of Pakistan. Unfortunately the political climate of the time doesn't easily allow me to visit. The thing is I dont think there is/was any time that the political climate made it easy to visit. From the moment of Independence, there has been constant tension between the two countries. Thousands of families were forced from there homes at that time, 3 wars between 47-80, nuclear arms race in the 90s, terrorism in the 00's. I wonder if I'll ever get to visit...
yet back state side (and canada-side) you always see Indian/Pakistani restaurants and grocery stores. It's just weird that people need to be half a world away to realize their similarities while focusing on their differences when they are neighbors. That's my public service announcement for the day and I'll stop rambling.
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My freshman year roommate, Farhan, was from Pakistan and I'm pretty sure he was Punjabi - at least his home address was Punjab Lake, Pakistan. His best friend at school was Guarav, who was from India. Even though they hung out all the time, on more than one occassion Farhan told me he couldn't tell his dad his best friend was Indian. It seemed pretty strange. I don't know if it's a fair comparison, but it seemed like it would be us not supposing to be friends with the Jersey kids at school even though we hung out with them all the time.
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