I was sitting at the bus stop waiting for my bus .. when this young indian couple arrives .. they look at the schedule and map posted at the stop .. and started discussing with an american girl sitting there about bus routes / bus passes etc ..

A bus arrives on the scene .. most of the ppl standing on the bus stop gets onto that bus including the american girl whom the indian couple was inquiring ..

few minutes later these words i hear “aee .. abki tumi jigesh korbe .. dekho mey thake – to aami jigesh korle naa !!?? .. tumi hamesha eta hi korche .. aami jaani na .. sheta chele aache .. tumi jigesh kor” .. (sorry for my poor bengali .. this roughly means that .. “hey .. now you would ask .. last time it was a girl so i asked !!?? .. you always do like this .. i dont know anything .. this is a guy .. so u’ll have to ask) ..

hee heee .. these poor people did not know that i have lived four years in bengal and can understand most of bengali ..

i really could not help but smiled and looked at them .. to which both of them smiled back as they understood that i have understood what they were talking about ..

ok .. this is a controversial topic .. but lemme put down my 5 paisas on my blog .. what i saw and what i felt in my first three months at US ..

to start with i think the racial divide is quit visible here .. you see one job profile or some area of life is being dominated by one skin-colured ppl ..

for example i have hardly seen any bus driver other than black ..
even the commuters are also mostly black .. so the impression that i get is all white ppl and no black ppl have cars ..

if i try to list them based on the profiles i think it would like following in decreasing order ..
white collar jobs (managers) – white ppl, brown ppl, black ppl(1)
white collar jobs (engineers) – white ppl, brown ppl, black ppl
bus drivers – black ppl, white ppl, brown ppl
cab drivers – brown ppl, black ppl, white ppl
bus commuters – black ppl, brown ppl, white ppl

when i get on a bus early morning during office going time – it is full of black ppl .. first few days i felt a little comfortable but i think now i have got used to it 🙂

other thing i have noticed is that many of fellow engineers who have come to US on short term fear a lot from black ppl .. i was told many stories of being mugged up .. so was suggested not to travel & all in US !!!! .. and i was a little scared in the beginning .. but now i think that the situation is not that bad .. it is actually not at all bad .. it is as good or as bad as any country .. accident is accident .. so if it is bound to happen it would happen with you regardless of whether u r in US or u r in India or u r on MARS ..

i think black ppl are really cool .. the way they talk & walk (which is exactly like i hv seen the RAPpers & all 🙂 .. yo yo yo yo ) you really cannot think of another word but ‘cool’ to describe them .. this one black manager i know .. when he talks or assigns work he simplifies it a lot using simple & plain enlglish – without any technical/functional jargons which white (& even brown) ppl are quit fond of using … he takes pressures of you asking thousand times that do your work cool-ly and if any roadblocks you get just let me know and I would follow up for them .. he doesnt give you deadline but asks for estimates and accordingly plans the project ..
maybe this has to do with his managerial skills and nothing to do with his skin colour but i feel both has close connection ..

to end this post, you can watch some real hillaaaariiiioousss comedy videos on cross cultural things at following google videos ..

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2579833089500205658&pl=true
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2711169459443771195&q=indian+comedy&pl=true
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-107100689292745836&pl=true