It’s a very common observation to remark that politicians are full of fecal matter[NSFW], but usually this is a metaphorical remark about their character and moral worth. Very little attention has been paid by people to literal politician droppings … until now. It turns out there is no topic beneath the attention of the Indian bureaucrat: 
Village council candidates in India should be allowed to stand for election only if they have a toilet at home, the rural development minister says. He said too many elected members “do not have toilet facilities in their own houses and defecate in the open”. Mr Singh said this activity was the main cause of the high incidence of diarrhoea in rural areas. [BBC]Nor (surprisingly) is this a new issue:
Some states have already made amendments in the Panchayati Raj Act, which deals with the election of village councils, to ensure that elected members have toilet facilities in their households. The rural development minister suggested all chief ministers make similar provisions. [BBC]Actually, concern with morning stool has long been a staple of desi culture. Mahatma Gandhi’s daily greeting to women was:
“Have you had a good bowel movement this morning, sisters?” [cite]Indeed, one critic pointed out that
… Gandhi seems to have written less about home rule for India than he did about enemas, and excrement, and latrine cleaning [cite]It seems the minister is merely following a path made by giants …
Arrghh, that pic just had me shrieking in terror, at work. Memories, memories I had locked up in a forgotten corner all these years. They’re back dammit!
Ack! Those squat toilets give me nightmares! When I was a kid, I had a deathly fear that I would fall into that hole and get stuck …
Now I have a permanent issue with all toilets, thanks to our Indian variety.
No shit (pun intended). It took me sometime to get over my fear induced by the movie “Aliens” and approach one of these again. I swear I thought an Alien was going to jump out and eat me alive. That and those giant flying roaches creeping out of the hole, slowly probing the air with their whiskers and scampering around the bathroom gave me nightmares.
Ok now that first link to WIkipedia was entirely unjustified….. [shudder]
To be politically correct, the proper term is an IWC, or Indian Water Closet.
..Go figure.
I’m not sure I accept that cite on Gandhiji, Ennis, since that writer clearly has plenty of axes to grind and his very first paragraph engages in the kind of hair splitting that exemplifies “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.” (I mean, seriously, folks. “He Ram,” is full equivalent to “Oh God” from Gandhi’s pov, and he was the one doing the exclaiming. . .and dying.)
That wiki link was pretty atrocious, and I wish I hadn’t clicked on it (or rather that it didn’t have pictures–is there anyone reading wiki who doesn’t know what that looks like?) but it makes a good point. Some of the oldest known toilets are in India. There’s a damn good reason we’re culturally obsessed with waste and waste disposal. It’s really freakin’ important. Our own flush and forget about it infrastructure and resulting culture may very well come to haunt us. In Rwanda they’ve had to turn it into electricity. I don’t quite get the exact legal logic of the Panchayat rule, but it’s certainly an issue that needs to be dealt with.
Try going backpacking for a month in the wilderness, at, say, 14000 feet, and you’ll stop complaining about those practical squat toilets. The sad thing about them is they’re no good for people with bad knees, and and as people get older, they increasingly tend to have bad knees. Now that’s a real problem.
yea, but i never understood why we eat and wash the rectum with our hands
granted youre not supposed to use the same hand for both!
With all this talk of toilets I thought I’d mention that there is a little piece in Harpers this month excerpting Sa’dia Rehman’s exhibit at the Queens museum of art that ran until june 6th entitled “Lotah stories” article about it here
Speak for yourself. I am a clean freak.
I blame Vestern influences.
That piece on Gandhi “The Gandhi Nobody Knows” by Richard Grenier clearly has a lot of misconceptions in it regarding Hinduism and Indian culture. Sample;
” In addition to its literally thousands of castes and sub-castes, Hinduism has countless sects, with discordant rites and beliefs. It has no clear ecclesiastical organization and no universal body of doctrine. What I have described above is your standard, no-frills Hindu, of which in many ways Gandhi was an excellent example. With the reader’s permission I will skip over the Upanishads, Vedanta, Yoga, the Puranas, Tantra, Bhakti, the ‘Bhagavad-Gita’ (which contains theistic elements), Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, and the terrible Kali or Durga, to concentrate on those central beliefs that most motivated Gandhi’s behavior as a public figure.”
Notice above how he states that the Bhagavad-Gita “contains theistic elements”, as if it’s a suprise to find any Hindu literature containing such. And Kali and Durga are “terrible”.
Anyway, the whole piece was written for a magazine published monthly by the American Jewish Committee.
Enough said.
The entire thing is one big piece of Indophobia. I’m surprised Ennis qouted from it. It’s nauseating reading, even if some of the things he says about Gandhi are true.
The funny thing is he keeps referring to the fact that Hindu culture has many components that the western psyche would find disgusting and repulsive. Like Judaism is a “wester religion” and there’s not anything from the middle east (Israel) that the western psyche would not find repulsive? Get real Richard.
I’m also surprised to see that you all are so phobic regarding traditional Indian squat toilets. I’m not even Indian and I prefer them over sit down toilets for various reasons (which I won’t elaborate on here).
Grenier aside, I had read that quote about Gandhi’s morning greeting in other contexts as well. I just found Grenier b/c I was googling to find some reference for it, rather than Grenier being the source of my knowledge.
Here are other references (some glancing) to Gandhi’s high level of attention and concern with the subject of bowel movements: 1, 2, 3, 4.
Saheli: sorry about the link, I did label it NSFW though 🙁
Rehman article: href=http://www.arc.org/C_Lines/CLArchive/story8_2_03.html
From Ennis’ link no:1 :
Uh, huh.
Gandhi changed the way mass struggle is done (other examples being – civil right movement in US, South Africa, Myanmar today). He stood up for things which nobody (or few people) who had ever stood up for. The man spent half of his life in jail, fasting to death, being canned, and almost lynched to death by a mob in South Africa, Sure, he was a human being, a politician and his evolution was complex. He was breaking away from the norm, being a trail blazer – the journey was complex and at times controversial. His obsession with cleanliness, and toilet (an Indian one if maintained is far cleaner than “modern” western ones – just think it through, please) was a product of Hindu self-cleansing and achieving salvation. What do you expect? Aren’t we all product of our times? He was known for his obstinacy and eccentricities – any who is far ahead of time will become one.
Richard Grenier piece is sophomoric at best and with hidden agenda at worst. It is almost like a “smart-ass” sophomore term paper being passed as definitive commentary on India and Gandhi with little or no knowledge of history and culture on Indian subcontinent. Is this the piece Raph Reed plagiarized from in early 1980s for a student newspaper? I rest my case. Even if you want to criticize Gandhi, at least use somebody like Arthur Koestler.
His lasting legacy is India is (very) slowly maturing as democracy with multi-ethnicity and inspired people like Mandela. It did not become Algeria.
Correction: I meant multi-religion instead of multi-ethnicity. My mistake.
Kush
Ennis, I was just giving you a hard time about the Wiki link, I assumed you posted it precisely to be atrocious and unnecessary. 🙂 It’s pretty funny that someone felt the need to illustrate it though.
yea, but i never understood why we eat and wash the rectum with our hands
Who eats their rectum?! I don’t, what is this nonsense?! If Gandhi heard you he’d make you wash your mouth (and rectum) out with soap!
Try going backpacking for a month in the wilderness, at, say, 14000 feet, and you’ll stop complaining about those practical squat toilets.
You don’t have to go that far, most semi-wilderness parks in U.S have pit toilets, and they are atroceous too – always gives me creeps..
Gandhi had many strange issues, he was an odd man… He was fascinated with the “bowels,” not just shitting, it was something about the process, a literally internalized sense of spirituality that was defined by the symbolism, balance, etc. of “cleansing” (or, having a bowel movement).
The biography by Louis Fischer is probably the best factual recounting of his life that can be found (every account of Gandhi is either derisive or hagiography, this is the only one that comes close to objective).
Anyhow… White Trash, squat toilets are great except when you look down into that friendly abyss and see things moving around (and, hey, Ennis posted this tongue-and-cheek, or so it seems, and thus, to call him out on his sources… )
Saheli – I did 😉
The man spent half of his life in jail, fasting to death, being canned
This getting canned… is it particularly painful?
(Oh, and Fark.com discussion on this.)
Does anyone have enough context to know if there’s a hidden agenda here? Intentional or no, it sounds pretty fishy to discount about 490 million people from running for office for public health reasons.
Indeed. My prof in college pointed out how odd his reaction was to his father’s death as Gandhi describes it in the autobiography–specifically, the way he linked it morally with the fact that he was hooking up with his wife and was therefore not there. I wonder if he was clinically OCD or something.
Hi,
“canned” was a typo. I meant beaten up (caned). He was cruelly beaten up many many times. Again, his guilt over his father’s death and sneaking out while he was tending to him (just before he died) is being taken out of context. You have to also remember that his father crying rather than punishing him when he confessed of theft and eating beef as a young kid would have a profound effect on him and his philosophy.
Again, do not expect him to be someone well-packaged, cool, and pc guy like Bob Geldof or Bono.
Kush
thanks for the pic of the toilet, I had to use the john here at work but now after seeing that, I’ve lost the urge….those things were scary man, you never knew what else was in there. Plus, though many debates over effective toilets usually swing in favor of the pit style, there’s something freaky about literally having your tatti out in the open air, beneath you, and knowing that one second of loss of balance might have you wearing it. Not to mention the aroma that arises on a hot, muggy, 125 degree day in New Delhi either, that will change your mind real fast.
Another thing that always worried me in India was that the bathroom is all on one level, there’s no tub or dry area…so what exactly does all that water on teh floor contain if it’s swishing around the drain, the toilet and other things? I say this bcuz unfortunately, my friend once was walked in on my nana ji in india and saw him peeing at a 45′ angle AWAY from the toilet….since then I’ve been freaked out by water on the bathroom floor ::shudder::
In Gandhi’s autobiography he does have a fascination/huge interest in hygiene and conquering the primal urges. Many times his thoughts were not directly about those things, but about how they related to his stated life goal of Ahimsa and achieving moksha via control of all his senses. Thus, he may or may not have been OCD, but been diligently practicing to separate himself from the ‘bondage’ of his senses (as the Gita says, the senses are what lead to ppl’s downfall and continuation in the reincarnation cycles, thus never achieving union w/ God)
it’s no picnic, trying to use a squat-toilet in a sari and heels…
DD – that was either a horrifying image or a deepy kinky one, depending on your predilections.
OK, India 101.
I can explain the obsession with bowel movements.
Ayurveda holds that most diseases arise from poor digestion. One symptom of poor digestion is irregular bowel movements – either constipation or diarrhea. Amongst village people and elders in India even today, you will find a stated concern over bowel movements, diet and the like. It’s all linked together to Ayurveda and good health which is linked to a regulated or regimented lifestyle. Many people seek control over their health (and thus life) through control of their bowel movements. It’s really not that big of a deal, and I wouldn’t say that most Indians are “obsessed” with it, and maybe neither was Gandhi.
Accompanying any good squat toilet in India should be a big bucket which enables you to flush down whatever was dropped therein. There is no reason why a squat toilet has to be dirty, unless there is not enough water available to flush it.
The reason why most bathrooms in India are not as clean as the ones in the west is because most Indians do not clean their own bathrooms. Most Indians have domestic helpers and even they will not clean the bathrooms (there is a specific caste that does that). So the family hiring them has to wait until that person comes around to do the cleaning. Why won’t most Indians (in villages and small towns) clean their own bathrooms? It’s considered “dirty” work. I’m not saying this is right. I’m just stating the facts here. Also, in the west, our bathrooms are kind of like our own personal spas, where we retreat to for warm bubble baths surrounded by candles and aromatherapy, after a long hard day at work. This is not the case in India. Toilets and bathrooms are for evacuating and cleaning oneself and getting out of as quickly as possible. The “home-spa mentality” has yet to hit it big on the sub-continent.
Why would Gandhi feel guilty for having sex with his wife while his father un-knowingly died? Even today you find a big guilt complex over sex in India amongst many people, what to speak of way back in Gandhi’s time. The concept of brahmacharya (even within marriage) is still held high and in awe there, so what to speak of with Gandhi, who made that concept one of his ideals? The sexually liberated attitudes you see in Bollywood films are not exactly representative of the “real India”. Even now I hear young women there are taught to be be “shy” with their husbands and not show that you “want it”. Why? Lajja bhushanam stri. Shyness is the beauty of a woman.
If you really want to get to know the real India, I suggest you go and stay in a small town or village for a minimum of one year. The Indians in such locales are drastically different in their mentality than the Indians who grew up in America, and even drastically different from the Indians who grew up in Bombay.
Why would Gandhi feel guilty for having sex with his wife while his father un-knowingly died?
bcuz his father was very ill and unable to care for himself in any manner, and Gandhi stated in his autobiography that he was infatuated w/ sex and would frequently wait for it nightly, even if his wife was sleeping, he’d wake her up to get it on. So while his father was ill, he was awaiting his chance to get laid, and when he did, and his father died, he felt guilty bcuz his mind was elsewhere instead of his father. It’s understandable, I would be torn up w/ guilt myself if that’s what I did. Plus, Gandhi loved his father very much, almost idolized him, so he felt that he let him down in his greatest time of need.
Accompanying any good squat toilet in India should be a big bucket which enables you to flush down whatever was dropped therein
true, but you have to be careful w/ your technique to not splash yourself. Trust me. It’s scarring.
Toilets and bathrooms are for evacuating and cleaning oneself and getting out of as quickly as possible
this is very true.
it’s no picnic, trying to use a squat-toilet in a sari and heels…
this is something i’ve ALWAYS wondered about…I have a hell of a time getting out of my kurta/pajama properly to take care of business (the knot, or “nada”, is always too tight for me and I can’t undo it easily!), and i’ve always wondered how a woman handles business w/ 3-4 yards of cloth wrapped around her, and not get dirty, wet or anything else!!!
I am grateful for good balance 😉
If you require a general visual, Lovin, it’s kind of like an umbrella, blown inside out, the way you invert the whole get-up… and dear god make sure you have the pallu between your teeth or secured at the waist, lest it fall loose…
Well, they’re smarter than us. Or so I’m told.
OCDs can be immensely crippling things, sufferers are often unable to function normally as their rituals can take so long. It’s a two-pronged condition. It can be purely obsessional (I can’t stop thinking about dirt) or purely compulsive (I must step on every manhole I see) or both. Commenting with a minimal of data, as I often do, I would say that Gandhi more likely had something like one of the personality disorders, as he clearly functioned perfectly normally.
Very high-achieving people often have traits of certain personality disorders, I guess you could say it’s what makes them different. He may have fit into Cluster C – anxious and fearful disorders. Perhaps he had avoidant or obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (not the same as OCD).
Saurav’s point about this ruling having a hidden agenda is one I thought about too. But it would be nice if it was just an attempt to clean up politics.
I wondered about the agenda as well. There was a part of the draft post that discussed this, but I deleted it in favor of short and pithy. After all, I didn’t know how much sh*t you would put up with 🙂
DD – how do you hold it all up? Especially the backside? Doesn’t that take 2 hands and a lot of luck?
White Trash, you made a good point — about the health benefits of the squat toilet. It actually is healthier to use, because doing the Valsalva (holding all your breath and contracting your abdominal muscles to take a big poo) in the squat position focuses the energy toward the rectum. It reduces the risk of hernias, which are when the pressure in the abdominal cavity can cause outpouching of bowel through weaknesses in the abdominal wall. (My parents just had a squat toilet installed at their house in very rural southern Illinois! I’m sure the contractors were confused.) But yes, I agree that with a sari and high heels in a filthy smelly little closet it is VERY hard to balance.
Ennis, it’s all in the balance. and the petticoat helps keep it all together. Wide-Load Aunties with bad knees? I have no idea how that takes place 😐
and dear god make sure you have the pallu between your teeth or secured at the waist, lest it fall loose…
what if you’re a dadi ma and you don’t have teeth!? or like my nani ji, you’re so overweight that there’s no room at the stomack to tuck anything in? The risks of this give me nightmares
now while we’re on the topic of squat toilet nightmares, I for one refuse to use my hands to cleanse myself and insist on TP…so therefore I have clogged many of these things. I woudn’t even know how to use my own hand anyways. How do your families react to the blocked plumbing? My family has come to terms w/ my ABCD behavior and accepts it ,but i have friends who say they have no choice. Now I never shake hands w/ them
I wonder why I was unable to post a while ago. Did any administrator/moderator take offense at my last post? I can’t imagine why.
Wow. I didn’t realize how much you guys (and girls) are removed from Indian culture.
Traditionally the toilet is used only for evacuating feces. Traditionally one is to remove all of their clothing to do so and traditionally, one is to take a complete bath after having done so.
The “bathroom” or place where one baths, is used for urinating (hence the urine smells in alot of Indian bathrooms).
The reason why a distinction is made between the place where one urinates and devacates is because devacation is very dirty, “contaminating”, whereas urinating is not nearly considered as much so.
If one were to defecate fully clothed, and not take a bath and put on fresh clothing afterwards, they would be considered “apavitra”, or impure. No one would want them to sit on their furniture.
Again, one year in a village or town.
Anyway, I hope y’all don’t think I’ve got a superiority complex or something, I don’t. But I do feel I know more about Indian culture than you guys simply because I spend extended periods in the sub-continent, living with and like the locals, adopting virtually all of their customs especially in regards to basics like evacuating, bathing, cooking, eating, etc.
I can whip up dahl baat on a moments notice, samosas, kachoris, even rasagullas. And I make a mean kesar lassi.
Yet I still feel this weird “otherness” around ABCD’s. And I think it’s because I’m “too Indian” for them – even though I’m white!
So often I find ABCDs saying things like, “we are a mix of all that is best in East and West”, yet the only thing “eastern” about them is the fact that their parents’ marriages may have been arranged. Quite frankly I find myself understanding and relating better to your grandparents.
But alas! I still find myself attracted to tall, dark and handsome hotties like Manish.
What is a girl to do?
And one more thing. NO. I’m not a quasi-spiritual-new-age-hippie who hangs out in Hrisikesh smoking pot. But I do wonder what ABCDs have against such people.
Anyway, it’s all good yaar.
Thanks, White Trash. Your check is in the mail 😉
White Trash, I’m immensely impressed by your knowledge of many things Indian. But I detected a bit of a condescending tone with
I was born and grew up in India. We didn’t have a squat toilet – although I have no problem using one. My point is that just because A LOT of the population has a hole in the ground, that doesn’t make it INDIAN CULTURE. Millions of Western-style toilets are in India, like phones or televisions or anything else that was better than its predecessor. They’re not un-Indian. Indian culture is village life. Indian culture is city life. The hotshot IT whizzkid who lives in a penthouse in Bangalore is as Indian as be-lungeed uncle who walks to the outhouse with his lota.
We’re a multi-faceted country.
The main thing I would like A/B/CBCDs to know about is South Asian history. Toileting is really not that important.
(For the record, I have nothing against pot-smoking hippies. In fact I positively like them.)
Maybe it would have been more accurate if White Trash had said “Wow. I didn’t realize how much you guys (and girls) are removed from RURAL Indian culture.” or even “Wow. I didn’t realize how much you guys (and girls) are removed from RURAL middle and lower income Indian culture.”
BongBreaker – WhiteTrash does have one point, the people she(?) describes are still the majority of Indians.
Of course, I don’t deny it. The majority of India is Hindu as well, are Buddhists removed from Indian culture? Nah, India moves with the times like everyone else. Some traditions should be clung to, others should be flushed. Sorry, I won’t buy any argument that a squat toilet is superior to a sit-down one, this isn’t homespun vs. Liverpool textiles! Imagine you are the aforementioned wide-load aunty with bad knees. I know which I’d choose.
Bong,
Regarding, “My point is that just because A LOT of the population has a hole in the ground, that doesn’t make it INDIAN CULTURE. Millions of Western-style toilets are in India, like phones or televisions or anything else that was better than its predecessor. They’re not un-Indian.”
I know. That’s why I posted, “Well, I think that’s probably because alot of Indians in the cities and suburbs there do live alot like westerners. They have AC, foriegn cars, go to nightclubs, etc. It’s not like Indians are not doing those things”…. in reply to…
“and the projection of ‘western lifestyle’ has been a part of Indian movie mythology for at least 40 years. And it’s always been somewhat troubling to me — a sign of a lingering colonial mentality.”…. on another thread.
I wonder exactly what is this ‘western lifestyle’ portrayed in Bollywood films that Amardeep comments on in the language, race and Bollywood films thread.
Anyway, back to the issue of toilets and all – even in the metros of India you will still see alot of these toilets. I prefer them because, have you ever sat on a “western” flush toilet in India that actually flushes? I haven’t. Therefore I much prefer the throw-the-bucket-down-squat kind.
And even in households where there are those sit-down flush toilets, you will observe that most people still follow the rule of taking off their clothes to defacate and bathing afterwards. This is considered standard hygeine in India.
Here in the west I’ve kind of combined the two practices of 1. western use of toilet paper, with 2. eastern use of water. Won’t go into details, but it is very hygenic. If anyone is interested they can write me.
South Asian history is important, but culture is no less so, and I think alot can be gleaned about a culture by the way it evacuates (I’m serious).
Also, if you really want to get into the mind and heart of a culture, language, literature and the arts are important. You can understand alot about the Indian ethos by reading Indian epics – religious and historical, as well as Indian poetry, especially village lore and wedding songs.
Manish – you don’t have to pay me for speaking the truth, Sweetheart. At the same time I don’t want to inflate your ahankar. Besides, my experience with you tall, dark and handsome desi men is that you are only interested in IT women or doctors.
White Trash, you know quite about Indian culture, however, it’s pretty clear that you have a fairly low opinion of it and that you’re out to pick a fight. My guess is that’s why you were momentarily blocked from posting.
The tone of your comments is a dime-a-dozen, there’s always someone coming in here with a bit of bitterness that clouds their argument. It’s not that interesting, so, if you want to have a real discussion, drop the attitude or find a mirror.
Hi,
White Trash has not shown any “bad attitude” and seems quite insightful. You might not agree with her. She might be off (or not) the mark on some points – but let her speak and listen without being condesending to her.
Kush
Please read this
http://www.outsidethetent.com/wp/archives/category/lying-repulicans/page/2/
or just google = ralph reed + gandhi
The moment I read the post yesterday, I knew it. I knew it. I was quite busy today so did not follow up on it. The post you use here to build your argument was the “lightening rod” for evangelicals to warn about “strange hindoos” in early 80s. How can you be so gullible?
Knowlingly or unknowingly…..you want to buy into extreme literature (the same holds for some of the dalit panther literature links have been used) to just build an argument, be my guest. I started reading “sepia mutiny” for last month and have enjoyed it for most part. I would encourage you (I say Please) to use more established pieces that have been vetted and peer-reviewed with time.
Want to bash Gandhi…quote Tariq Ali, Arthur Koestler, Churchill but no one with a darker agenda.
Kush
Churchill didn’t have a dark agenda?
because that wasn’t condescending?
And even in households where there are those sit-down flush toilets, you will observe that most people still follow the rule of taking off their clothes to defacate and bathing afterwards. This is considered standard hygeine in India.
What kind of nonsense is this ? I have visited numerous Indian homes in India with sit downs and have never seen anyone shower just because they dropped a load.
Manish – you don’t have to pay me for speaking the truth, Sweetheart. At the same time I don’t want to inflate your ahankar. Besides, my experience with you tall, dark and handsome desi men is that you are only interested in IT women or doctors.
Is this woman serious ?
But I do feel I know more about Indian culture than you guys
Wow. I didn’t realize how much you guys (and girls) are removed from Indian culture.
why? bcuz you took a long vacation in a village? So what? You might know more about rural indian life, but as usual, someone sees one part of india and paintbrushes the whole thing. For the record, half of these comments we all have been making have been in jest, yes we know why the bathroom is a certain way there, why it smells and what many of the beliefs are. We don’t need someone telling us.
Have you ever been in Kashmir, both pre/post insurgency? I have. Have you been in the deserts of Rajasthan? Have you been to the big urban centers? I have, and each is entirely different. Until you’ve seen all corners of india please don’t come on here bashing the A/B/C BCDs. That’s like saying I live in Chicago so I know the culture in Alaska as well. So many ‘travelers’ seem to think that if you rough it in the village you know what it’s like to be indian. Right. My aunts (or bhua’s just to make sure I’m not ‘removed’ from my culture’) live on farms in villages. I’ll tell you right now that half of what you claim goes on does not in that region. So please spare us your book reading and village living until you’ve seen it all. What kind of nonsense is this ? I have visited numerous Indian homes in India with sit downs and have never seen anyone shower just because they dropped a load.
Al, this is true in South India, that I know. I know many south indians here who practice this method. But it is not universal.
Yet I still feel this weird “otherness” around ABCD’s. And I think it’s because I’m “too Indian” for them – even though I’m white!
no maybe bcuz you claim to be too indian, which will always turn any desi off. Be comfortable within yourself of what you’ve seen, if your interactions are like your posts, I can see why they feel that way.
I can whip up dahl baat on a moments notice, samosas, kachoris, even rasagullas. And I make a mean kesar lassi.
wow how indian. i must be full blooded american bcuz I can cook a hot dog too.
Al, this is true in South India, that I know. I know many south indians here who practice this method. But it is not universal.
my bad, this is true in PARTS of south india and different villages throughout the country. However, i stand by my initial comments that this is not a uniform practice.
I wonder exactly what is this ‘western lifestyle’ portrayed in Bollywood films that Amardeep comments on in the language, race and Bollywood films thread
let’s see:
tons of movies filmed outside india (KKKG, Kal Ho na ho etc)
the increasing Hollywood knockoffs
these are just a few of my thoughts as to what it means that Bollywood is westernizing. I’d like to hear if other agree/disagree, however, I also don’t want to hijack/derail this thread from the focus on squat toilets.
also, on a related note, squat toilets are used in many other asian nations as well, so how do their views of cleanliness/effectiveness play into this?