Whitewash

If you say “Indian, and I don’t mean Native American” to the average Westerner, many think of short, dark men with bristly mustaches, a Peter Sellers “Indian” accent and a white skirt.

Or they think of the short, dark man with the bristly mustache and a weird mongrel accent who runs the shop on the street corner. (About the accent, even an Indian finds it startling to have a good Bihari bhaiyya say, “Hi there, howya doing” in an accent that takes the best of Bihar and the worst of America and rolls them together like two curs fighting in the street.)

Anyway, these Westerners are often surprised to find out that Indians, as with other crawling insects, come in a bewildering range of colours and sizes. This can cause some confusion within India as well. Even Malayalis – those much denigrated people – have sons and daughters of the (stereotypically short and dark) South who are tall and startlingly white. How they weren’t burned under the coganut sun to Ban Chip consistency is anybody’s.

If you interact with Indians, the first thing you need to learn is that Indians rarely – if ever – speak “Indian”. This is mostly because Italians, Germans and Swedes, rarely – if ever – speak “European”.

Also remember that most Indians, in addition to English, have a working knowledge of two or more Indian languages, and have the ability to curse in many more. Even I, whose knowledge of languages other than English is shaky, can tell you terrible things about your mother in five distinct Indian languages.

This means that you must be very careful about generalising. Every time you think you've explained the Indian, one who doesn't fit the rule pops up.

With luck, this site will help you generalise with more confidence and stereotype with a sense of fairplay. After all, that's exactly what the site is doing anyway.