What's the experience of living with an Indian roommate?

Garnett prepared an interesting story for everyone to ease the mood of "Black Wednesday". Beautiful women studying in Britain tell about their "love and hate" with their roommates in India. Tell me what it's like to live with an Indian roommate.

I am a British "turtle", a Beijinger, and studied at Leeds University for one year. In fact, before going abroad, I was a "baby" at home for more than 20 years like many other friends, and I never left my own city to live independently, so for me at that time, everything in a foreign country in the coming year was unknown and full of challenges.

When it comes to life, "living" is definitely a big focus. I chose the single-sex dormitory provided by the school. The student dormitories here are different from those in China. Most of them have their own bedrooms and bathrooms, and only need to share the kitchen and living room with several roommates, so their personal independence and privacy are relatively high. .

Among my five roommates, there are two Indian friends.

Curry-flavored first meeting

In this way, the focus of my story began. ...

The story begins with the first time I stepped into the dormitory. That day, after running for more than ten hours, I was hungry and sleepy, and I was awake the moment I walked into the dormitory!

A strong curry smell mixed with pungent unknown spices hit my face and made me sneeze at once. Maybe she heard my movement. A short, dark girl with big eyes (Payal) came out of the kitchen. Then she said something I didn't understand and went into the kitchen, followed by a tall, thin girl with long hair (Esha). They greeted me in English with a strange accent and introduced themselves briefly. I don't know if these seemingly simple words are because their accents are too special or my hearing is too poor. I really don't understand them. Well (expressing hesitation, etc.) ... they are the Indian roommates who will spend a year with me in the future.

Look, I just arrived, and they warmly invited me to dinner, but I was too tired to get used to the pungent smell ... so I politely refused. This strange accent and pungent curry mixed smell started my year-long "cohabitation" life with my roommates in India, and it is this unique smell that makes me remember it deeply and miss it in retrospect.

Sino-Indian gourmet PK

After the dormitory partners checked in, we held a grand meeting with the theme of "eating". Everyone shows their magical powers and prepares delicious dishes in the kitchen together. We girls from China, a big oriental food country, can't show weakness. We chose a simple and delicious hot pot, which is suitable for all ages. Simple as it is, we prepared the meal with extra care. On the one hand, Indians don't eat beef, and Payal is a vegetarian, so we specially prepared two pots of vegetarian food to avoid all food related to cattle.

Two Indian roommates are also working hard to prepare food. Glancing at it, I saw that Esha was cooking a kind of yellow round beans that I had never seen before in a mini pressure cooker (it was later learned that this is a common staple food in India), and this pot would suddenly spray a lot of yellow steam on the stove from time to time. Then I was surprised to see her dig out a seasoning box from the cupboard. This box is as big as the cookie box we often eat, and there are at least seven or eight different colors of spices in it. I saw that she added several spices of different colors to the pot, and the kitchen was instantly captured by the strong and choking curry and spicy taste.

It turns out that this seasoning box is the "culprit" of the strong smell I smelled just after I entered the dormitory. Paillard worked very hard to make dough pancakes. Soon, she skillfully baked a stack of delicious cakes. She also put onions, coriander and other foods into the juicer to make "sauce". For me who don't eat coriander, my heart really hitched.

We started this dinner with a toast, enjoying the fruits of our labor and vaguely understanding each other and each other's countries.

Speaking English is a status symbol in India?

Everyone must have heard of the accent of Indian friends, and it was really embarrassing when we first started talking. Sometimes you have to "pardon" a sentence three or five times, and you have to guess the meaning to understand it. But we soon got to know each other and deepened our understanding.

Esha comes from a big family in New Delhi, the capital of India, and Payal comes from Mumbai in the south. India is also a country getting hotter and hotter in the south, so Payal is much darker and smaller than Esha. They say that in India, people in different places speak different languages and it is difficult to understand each other. At this point, it is very similar to our dialect.

They also said that in India, they are very willing to talk in English, because only well-off and well-educated children can speak English, and speaking English well seems to be a "status symbol".

Speaking of identity, class, India's huge gap between the rich and the poor and the "caste system", I have also been confirmed by them. They said that in the future, they must find a man who is not lower than their family level, otherwise once they marry a man who is lower than them, they will no longer take their father's surname, but lower their level and change their husband's surname.

Hand-grabbed rice is delicious.

Once, Esha invited me and her gourmet friend (a handsome Indian boy) to a restaurant where there was famous South Indian food. The waiter set five or six small bowls in front of each of us, which contained curry chicken, coconut juice and rice with different flavors. I was just about to eat bibimbap with a spoon. Suddenly, a handsome Indian boy stopped me and said I didn't eat right. Then he began to show me the "correct way to eat":

Seeing that he didn't wash his hands, he put his right hand directly into the curry chicken and put it into the rice, and then skillfully stirred the chicken and rice to make them fully integrated. Here comes the main event. His right hand is like a flexible spoon. He scooped up rice and delivered it to his mouth without missing a grain. I was really shocked. Is this the legendary "hand-grabbed rice"?

The handsome boy had a good time and invited me to try it. Although I refused in my heart, I really couldn't bear to refuse the expectant eyes. So, with the mentality of not eating clean and getting sick, I crustily skin of head and dialed the order of rice with my unwashed right hand, and then stirred it a few times, I could feel curry sauce entering under my nails, but I still seriously grabbed a handful of rice and sent it into my mouth. Maybe it's psychological. Seeing how delicious Indian handsome guys eat, I actually feel that the rice I grabbed has a special taste that I can't feel with a spoon.

Although I was not as skilled as him, I finished eating slowly. Of course, my hands are already dirty, but it is an interesting experience to try something I once resisted.

The sound of the Indian Divine Comedy still seems to ring in my ears.

Let's talk about Payal again. She is a sister who loves music, especially her own music, because she often plays the magical Indian Divine Comedy while cooking, eating and even studying. At first, I really couldn't appreciate these "Divine Comedy", but because I listened to it too often, I finally twisted involuntarily with this strange rhythm occasionally ... Paillard gave me a bad smile every time he saw it.

In addition, Payal is an out-and-out schoolmaster, very smart, as can be seen from her eyes. There is always light in her eyes, with a little sly rotation. In Britain, the pressure of schoolwork is relatively high, and life is just one paper after another. But I learned a skill from Payal, that is, writing papers in the kitchen at midnight, which is almost impossible to be more efficient.

I was hungry at first, so I went to the kitchen to find something to eat. I suddenly found Payal studying at the kitchen table and asked her why. She said that it is easy to be impetuous during the day, the room is too comfortable, and it is easy to get sleepy when studying in the room, so she wants to study in a different environment. As soon as I hear it, isn't that what bothers me? So I joined her, and finally, this trend spread all over our dormitory. Sometimes several people will stay up all night writing papers together in the kitchen. My last graduation thesis was born in such an environment, and there is a breath of life in the academic field.

Party fanatics are by no means "groundless"

Indians are notoriously fond of parties, especially in the middle of the night, and the more energetic they are in the middle of the night.

They have many reasons to hold a party. Today is another festival and the day after tomorrow may be another birthday.

On one occasion, Esha invited many friends to the dormitory for a party. I knew they would be noisy, so I went to my good friend's dormitory to play until 1 o'clock in the morning, thinking that I should play enough before going back. I didn't expect men and women to drink and make noise when I came back, so I hurried back to my room to get ready for bed.

However, when I was about to fall asleep, they began to sing ... it was almost two o'clock, and I went to the kitchen to gently remind them to come back to sleep.

At three o'clock in the morning, I was awakened by the footsteps of "duangduangduang" running. I just wanted to see what was going on when I heard another China roommate coming out of the room, and I couldn't help but remind them a little angrily, so they stopped. I didn't know until the next day that an Indian boy was drunk and went to the wrong room. In the middle of the night, he reached out and pulled the door of another China roommate. Fortunately, her door was locked at that time, otherwise the consequences would be unimaginable.

This kind of thing can't be managed by the boarding teacher, which may be due to living habits.

Those little "troubles" in life

I spent most of my time with two Indian roommates, but my living habits were different, such as not loving cleaning. My roommates in India use mini pressure cookers to cook. It will spit out a lot of sticky yellow liquid and finally paste it on the stove. They don't clean in time, so the kitchen hygiene in our dormitory has always been a pain I don't want to say. Another small trouble is that the food they cook tastes really unusual. It is no exaggeration to say that when they put on new clothes, they will come out immediately after entering the kitchen, and the clothes are filled with a strong curry smell in an instant.

But they get used to it after getting along for a long time, which is the simplest and unique taste in their lives.

In a word, during this year, many unforgettable things happened between me and my roommates in India, whether they were happy, interesting or unhappy, which were all valuable experiences of studying in Britain this year. It is their existence that makes my short year more colorful and makes me grow rapidly. Although we have returned to our own country to start a new life, these experiences will accompany me all my life. Thanks to fate, I met you, my Indian roommate.