Indians say the darndest things

Here are some quotes I've collected over the past week alone. I am constantly amazed by how different our cultures are and nothing is as eye opening as daily conversation to make the case in point. Niceities such as political correctness and conciousness of generalizations are not even considered. People are matter of fact and I'd go so far as to say insensitive -- not only the speaker but the receiver. Or perhaps a better way of putting it is that america and parts of the west are so hyper sensitive that the truth isn't even truth anymore. I think that we could learn a little from India and they could learn a little from us. And I think both would be better for it.

Without further delay, here are my favs:

“So you don’t have a lot of vegetarians in America do you?”
“Eh, we have some. And vegans.”
“What’s a vegan, they don’t eat fish?”
“Or cheese.”
“Why the hell would someone do that?”

“Northern Kerala is different than the south. In the south people are short, dark-skinned and ugly.”

“You’ll learn about the different parts of India as you go along. For instance no one in Bengal does anything, they just talk.”
“Everyone? Not one person does a thing?”
“That’s correct.”

“She’s such a cool girl -- so sweet. Not pretty, but nice.”

“Indian men are such gentlemen. Then they get married and go crazy.”

I try not to eat bread which is difficult in India. First it’s SO GOOD. Second, bread is a staple here and not eating it does not seem to be an option. The following two things happened to me in the past 2 days:

@ restaurant: Said, “No Chapati!” so they took it away. 1 minute later a basket of Roti was brought to the table. I said “no” but they said, “No chapati…Roti!” Gave up and stuffed myself.
@ home: In an effort to stop being fed plates of carbs I told Anand “bread makes me fat.” And he replied with, "go to gym” and dumped chapatis on my plate.