ANGREZI:This is you. Whether you are Spanish or Norwegian or Australian, once you step foot on Mother India, you will become Angrezi. If you are Japanese, Chinese or Korean you will become Japa-knee for the duration of your stay.
BLACK: Black is not beautiful in India. Black is inauspicious and represents the left hand of God. The dreaded goddess Kali, bringer of death and destruction is Black. The Indian people did not invent the saying The Blacker the Berry the Sweeter the juice.
CAMELS: Camel is camel. Camel is not jet plane. Camels travel at around four kilometres an hour, an estimated ten percent of the national speed limit. If you chose to have a camel safari and have breasts please refer to the SBT and ask your camel boy to walk beside the camel rather than to sit behind you lest he try the Sudden Gallop Technique.
COWS AND WHY THEY ARE HOLY: The cow was the first rising star from the churning of the cosmic ocean. She represents generosity and kindness. Hindu people prefer to use the cow for milk and company rather than to eat them. There are two million cows in India, all of whom are holy. Cows have the absolute right of way on Indian roads and railway lines. To feed a cow is considered auspicious. To pat a cow is to bring good luck.
HOLY COW INDICATORS: A cow will indicate by flicking her horns in the direction of the flies that are bothering her. Please leave ample horn room should you need to pass one on the street. Should you find yourself confronted by a pair of cow horns aimed at your belly then grip the horns with both hands, using the weight of the cows head as a stabilizer, lift off from your feet and flip neatly to safety.
HOW TO OVERTAKE A COW: To overtake a cow, keep your hand ready to wave near the cow’s eye, blocking its vision. The cow immediately close its eyes, stalling it long enough for you to pass.
WHAT TO DO WHEN BLOCKED BY A COW’S BEHIND: If a cow’s behind blocks you then grab the tail just below where it reaches the body of the cow and use this grip to drive the animal forward.
CELL PHONES: No other device has liberated and modernized liberate India so well since the rail and roads to all villages program as the cell phone. The cell phone market increases by 2.5 billion consumers every month. They are used as music machines, GPS locators and for making telephone calls. Indian people prefer to make “missed calls”, dialing a number and then disconnecting before you answer. There are a corresponding number of meanings for this, the most popular one being, “Call me back, I am too cheap to spend one rupee to call you.”
COW CHAPATTI: Flattened discs of cow shit mixed with fuel such as woodchips, dried in the sun and used as cooking fuel.
CHILD LABOUR: For those who wish to abolish child labor through boycott, here is a list of services to avoid. Chai shops, restaurants, guesthouses, incense shops, flower shops, anything handmade shops, any clothing item with baling attached, tea, coffee, tin, metal, roads, carpets and silks.
ENFIELD: Essential accessory for Israeli tourists. A loud bike that sucks a lot of gas and makes you look very cool. Also used for transporting milk cans.
KAL: In the land of eternal time, Kal is both yesterday and tomorrow as well as empty and over. The use of this word indicates that the majority of Hindi speakers live totally in the present moment.
MATCHES AND HOW TO LIGHT THEM: There are many different qualities of matches in India. To light an Indian match, strike the match sharply on the side of the matchbox in one swift downward movement. Never bring the match towards the body as the tips have a tendency to fall offsetting beards and bosoms alight.
MONKEYS AND HOW TO MANAGE THEM: The monkey god Hanuman is revered for his loyalty and bravery and the languar monkey is his representation on earth. Do not look a monkey directly in the eye; they take this as a sign of aggression.
WHAT TO DO IF THERE IS A MONKEY BETWEEN YOU AND WHERE YOU WANT TO BE: Close your eyes and run shouting and waving a stick towards the beast who should just clamber insolently out of your way and reach. If the monkey retaliates then simply reverse the direction of your run and get the hell out of there.
NEO HIPPIE: People who think that completing a ten day Vipassana Meditation Course sit in brings them to enlightenment.
PAAN: If you haven’t heard of pan then you may think that the streets and trains and public spaces of India are splattered with the bloodied lungs of millions of TB sufferers. This is not the case, red stains you see on the street and walls are simply the stain making kattha; an ingredient of Paan.
RAM RAM: Ram is the name of God. To greet village people with Ram Ram Sahib is to receive smiles as wide as sunshine and the greeting returned with warm enthusiasm. This is because you have just recognized the god who resides within each other. India is one of the very few nations in the world where one can shout God’s name to the sky without being forcibly removed from the streets and medicated.
RAIL: What the Indians remember the British for. Designed to hasten the spoils of India to the ports and thence to Britain, the rail liberated the masses, sparking travel that hasn’t stopped since. Indian Rail employs over 1.6 million people and moves one million people daily across 7,500 stations with its fleet of more than 8000 trains.
RAINBOW CHILDREN: People who think that experimenting with drugs turns them into an enlightened being.
RIGHT CLICK REFRESH: Internet Café cure-all for dropped connections, frozen screens, lost emails and virus protection.
SILENCE: Is golden but not in India. Indians are the world leaders in mass communications for this single reason. Silence occurs daily between the hours of 2.34 am and 2.36am.
TRUTH, TIME AND SPACE: Are licensed under creative commons in India. All are passive concepts, limitless, timeless and beyond the scope of human understanding.
WHY WHEN AND WHERE: These are considered rhetorical questions in India.
ZERO: The ancient minds of India created the concept of the zero. Since then they have worked ceaselessly to fill the void.