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DO NOT PEE HERE

10 ways an Indian can piss you off

India is a country that has both amazed and intimidated travellers and at the same time. Forever, buzzing with life, magic, apathy and colours, it is a seductive concoction that you must handle with care and enjoy at your own risk. A friend asked “how is an Indian to be pissed?” I laughed. I laughed so hard it hurt my stomach. Really, we have the patience of the steel and determination of the Iron Man. We never lose our cool. It is impossible to piss us off. But I can easily think of a 100 ways an Indian can piss you off! Okay wait you can’t handle that. Let me give you just 10 reasons how an Indian can piss you and how we are a bunch of special 1.2 billion.

1.      By peeing in public and not being apologetic about it – Come on where else does one pee. If you are going from office to work or work to office. The bus stations, empty private buildings, stairways of office buildings, outside gardens, parks, public places of all sorts or just about anywhere you see a wall is where you pee. If you see a man facing the wall with his hands invisible, you should know what he is up to and don’t be pissed, just let him piss in peace.

2.      By burping – Our food is amazing and we know that the ultimate expression of appreciation of a meal cooked well is a giant loud noisy smelly burp. So if you invite me over and I leave without offending your olfactory senses that would clearly mean you need to work culinary skills. Because it was not out of politeness that I didn’t burp, I meant to offend you.

3.      By slurping the chai – Yes, we love our chai. Not the latte style coffee chain muck but the over boiled, strong, milky , sweet Chai. Chai is what India country runs on. From the teacher lecturing in a class to a babu working in the bank, to the netaji in the parliament, we don’t go three hours without a cup of tea. But we like it hot, baby. Very hot. Our chai is served super hot and we must take it in, excuse me, slurp it in immediately. The hotter the tea, the louder the slurp, the louder the slurp, the better it is. Wait, that noise pisses you? Well, you need a cuppa chai then.

4.      By jumping the queues – You may continue being polite as you work on your smile but we are a country of 1.2 billion and if we let everybody else line up before us or even wait our turn like disciplined people simply out of politeness then we may just be waiting forever.

5.      By fitting in two other people on your seat – Yes, this is a seat for a single person. Yes, you got here first. Yes, you also booked it by paying an extra bit of money. But there are more people who want to get on the bus and the conductor doesn’t want to offer no for an answer. Please adjust, that’s what we do and that is how we keep going. What? You are pissed, stressed, upset, mad – so are all of us. Frankly my dear no one gives a damn.

6.      By asking you everything you know about you and judging on you for it– Are you married yet? If not why? If yes to whom? Where are your kids? What? No kids! Why no kids? Kids are a God gift. What you don’t believe in God! What kind of a person are you. Frankly, you are pissing me now!

7.      By getting royally drunk – We don’t know what casual drinking for leisure means. We were told alcohol is a taboo all our lives so when we grew up and started to drink we didn’t realise that there was a way to drink without getting what we call “royally drunk” and hell yes I will smack that bottle before I leave the pub.

8.      By gushing about Bollywood – You thought you would offend us by telling us how you saw an Indian movie and thought it was so funny for the lady to dance in the mountains, on the street, in the bus or on top of a train complete with a troupe and music in the background. You think in your head it’s silly. Don’t you? We would agree with you. But you would be darn pissed to realise that we love our movies, see nothing wrong in its pelvic thrusting dance moves and can talk about for ages about our favourite stars, their lives and how our bucket list includes ten thousand and one places where they have been and shot and also teach you a few dance moves along the way.

9.      By the rampant corruption – Come to India and you will see how everything works with a little green grease. Without it everything stops, nothing moves. Files upon files gather in pile upon piles. God forbid you get into trouble here in India. No rules in the book will step up to your side except for a little grease. It will piss you but hey you said you didn’t know the language and we respect the universal language of money.

10.     By managing a smile anyways – “You are deep in shit right now brother,” you will think when you walk around our cities where half the people live in slums and other half couldn’t care less. But that man with amputated arm in the subway, the woman with the malnourished child in her lap and even the rickshawwala bhaiya can still manage to pass a smile and that’s why we are a happier country than you realise. It will make you wonder and look at your own life and see that you may have everything but yet you stand alone without a smile as genuine as ours.

About Empty Ruck Sack

Empty Rucksack travelers is an attempt to bring together many wonderful stories of career breaks, long term vacations and great travel destinations together at one place. The posts authored by Empty Rucksack Travelers are put together by Vikram and Ishwinder, an Indian couple out on a long term travel to find that perfect place in the world where they may want to stay forever.

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29 comments

  1. Interesting article. Well, who is this ‘you’ in the heading – anybody from outside India? or the ‘well behaving’ Indians?

  2. Lol !Liked the list.. but what about our love for honking on the roads and our road sense..

  3. Reading this article and imagining all the trouble any one of these ten would get you into if done in Australia nearly cracked me up. Great info that I will keep in mind next year.

    • One Dusty Camel,

      You can take an Indian out of India,but you cannot take the India out of him.

      I would like to believe that Australia has enough Indians already, at least UK does and there a lot of the british folks, have gotten used to these traits and if you don’t exhibit them they start wondering.

      Indians are very adaptive people, so if we cant pee on the streets outside India, we will curb it, but whatever we can do, we will never miss out.

      When you are in India next time, you will notice these things more than before.

      BTW, We are planning on moving to Austalia sometime next year.

      -Empty Rucksack

  4. Sona would definitely agree with you on #1. We went on a bus ride to Srinagar and stopped at the side of the road, where all the men started peeing on the outside of the bus. She’s a notoriously loud chai drinker though . . . .

    • Navdeep,

      When we were in Laos, we saw something we had not seen anywhere else.
      The bus journeys were very long and the country is deserted.

      forget toilets, there weren’t places to eat. When the bus stopped, not just the men but the women also started peeing along the road, in a little secluded areas though.

      what does Sona say about your Chai drinking?

      -Empty rucksack

  5. Spot on! 😀
    #4 and #6 are particularly annoying.
    As a gora spending a lot of time in India I have learnt to stick really close to the person ahead of me in line so that no one else can go ahead… but the judging thing still gets to met a lot. Plus a lot of people think that just because you are white, you are the same as people from the UK or US.. as if white people where all the same!! Imagine I assumed all brown people are the same (culturally, religious wise, tastes..) then THAT would be the end of me in this country! 😉
    Zara @ Backpack ME recently posted…Top 13 Travel Experiences of 2013My Profile

    • Zara,

      So you do regard yourself as a Gora, or Gori you mean?

      The very term Gora got everything muddled up, Gora became synonymous with Firang meaning outsider.

      I am sure people in the west have such traits as well, at least the movie Dictator seemed to Stereo Type them.

      I remember reading you stayed in Delhi for a while, Did you stay longterm at any other places in India?

      -Empty Rucksack
      Empty Ruck Sack recently posted…Rajasthan Road Trip Leg 1 Delhi PushkarMy Profile

  6. You seriously crack me up; this is so funny. You guys are good; very good. Don’t ever stop. You are now permanently bookmarked.

  7. So funny guys :)! Gotta love them the Indians ;)! Cheers! Manouk

  8. Thanks for the last one.

  9. I definitely do get pissed off when I have to share a seat I’ve paid for with someone else (esp when they haven’t paid “tourist price”), but after 1.5 years here, I think i’m the best queue jumper ever- the other westerners give me looks of disgust lol! But another thing I hate is timing- when I they say 5 minutes but it’ll probably be 30, or better yet if I ask for something they don’t have “Hi veg seller, do you have carrots today?” and if he doesnt he just ignores me because he won’t want to say no! haha I love crazy india!

    • Rachel,

      1.5 years will turn you into a more authentic indian than most Indians.

      India is a traveler’s dream but can be hell too.

      Where have you been spending most of your time in the 1.5yrs.

      My personal favourite is how people we Indians ask so many questions. The westerners love it and hate it.

      -Empty Rucksack

  10. Hey, nice one guys!
    This could very well be a blog of its own.
    You know, like the Stuff White People Like or something like that.
    Keep up the great work!

  11. loved the posts..this one too..hilarious. and interesting! keep it up !!

  12. All the ten points are true.

  13. I loved this post! What a great site, you are now permanently favourited!
    I’m in India for 10 days working at the end of June. Currently finishing my bike licence so I can rent a bike for a few days in Uttarakhand. You have given me inspiration!

  14. Great information that you are listed i really agree with all points such great and amazing post keep sharing thanks keep writing information like this

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