Watch it!

I never thought I would be blogging about a watch I bought (!) but sometimes you have to put your money where your mouth is :P So here goes..

All that guilt about not contributing to society (top 1% of the youth in the country who has had the privileged access to premium education and all that) can actually be assuaged by buying a watch - do you believe it? Atleast that's what I felt when I first saw the watches on the Titan website. And one particular watch caught my eye - the Red Panda.

The Red Panda, also called the Firefox, is native to the Himalayas, ranging from Nepal to west of China (thanks to wikipedia for the info). It is also found in Northern India, Bhutana and Myanmar. The Red Panda's diet consists mainly of Bamboo. It is hunted for its fur, and its lush bush tail which is used to make hats. It is an endangered species today, protected by laws in all the countries where it lives. Hunting it is illegal.

In my case it was the cart pulling the horse, if you know what I mean. I saw the watch before I knew about the animal:
What a beautiful creature, I thought. And the watch, with its rich brown leather strap and golden casing seemed to enhance its beauty. I bought the watch.

And every time someone remarks on my watch (it's usually: "Oh wow! What a beautiful watch!") :)) I tell them: "This is the Red Panda. It's native to the Himalayas.. "
My 2 cents.

Is it true?

Last Sunday (5 July 2009) the Times of India supplement Times Life! (can be accessed through: http://epaper.timesofindia.com) carried an article that in a sense answered the questions I raised in one of previous posts Being Indian to the Rest of the World. This article is titled “Why are Indians targeted?” and using the recent attacks on Indian students in Australia as a backdrop, it tries to answer why Indians living abroad seem to be targets for hate/racial crimes than other immigrant minorities.

From a personal viewpoint, being an Indian in a foreign country has its advantages and drawbacks. The advantage is the familiarity that locals and others in the country have with ours thanks to the predecessors. It makes it easier to mix and get along, for us and for the locals. The drawback is that the Indian visitors before us have left some impression on them, and in most cases we have no idea what it is. We are simply the recipient of their behaviour that has resulted from this impression. Sometimes, this impression is not a good one.

The article mentions that although Indians are admired for their brains, looks and in some cases money, we are despised for showing off shiny gadgets, playing loud music and talking in our native tongue in public. In short, we Indians wear our culture on our sleeve. Indians do not make any effort to assimilate into their culture, preferring to “herd” with other Indians.

Of course, there is nothing wrong in being connected to our culture. In fact, there is every reason to be proud that young Indians despite being exposed to the various other cultures and globalization are balancing their culture with living in the modern world admirably. I would say that our mature sensibilities and conflict management skills are a natural result of growing up in the mela that is India :-) So the thought here is, maybe we are just being too loud about it.