Adopting Culture

Today I had a little girl come up to me at a juice stand/convenient store. She asked me my name. I answered and then asked her a few questions. I asked her where she was from. She looked at me inquisitively at first, so I quickly changed the question to, "Where is your place?" She answered by telling me the name of her city.

That seems like a random story, but it actually made me very excited. I've tried really hard to observe Indian culture and adopt it as much as possible. I bob my head from side to side in conversation; I'm firm when I say no; I greet people with my hands folded; I eat and drink whatever they serve me. And I realized today that I phrased the question to find out where the little girl lived based on the way I've been asked it by Indian children. I don't think she would have understood me if I didn't know how to rephrase the question.

There have been two American pastors and one of their wives here the past few days. Its been refreshing to have someone here who not only speaks English with a non-Indian accent, but who has my cultural background! It was so interesting, though, to compare myself to them as far as interacting with Indians. They shake hands with people, they speak English to people who clearly have no clue what they're saying, they use a fork when they eat. That's the way we do it in American culture, so unless you have a period of time to soak in Indian culture, you wouldn't know that that is not the way they do things.

I really do want to connect to the people around me as much as possible while I'm here. And it looks like having been here for a couple of months is actually paying off as far as understanding the people around me. I'm so grateful to look back and see that God has graced me to be able to make progress!