It was a cold evening in the American southwest. I pulled my favorite shawl around me a little tighter. A woman smiled at the shawl – a burnt-orange, paisley piece my mom picked up in India – and said, “I know why you wear that. It’s because of your religion.”
“Actually, I wear it because it’s pretty and protects me from the cold,” I replied.
She insisted, “No, you don’t have to say that. It’s because of your religion.”
NPR | Yoga: A Positively Un-Indian Experience
True confession: I am an Indian who doesn’t do yoga. I wouldn’t know a downward dog if it bit me. But because I’m Indian, people don’t even ask if I know yoga. They ask, “What kind of yoga did you grow up with? Iyengar? Ashtanga? Bikram?”
… “The instructor pointed to me and said Indians are better oriented towards squats. And I realized he was holding me up as an example of how we primitive people are better squatters and have looser hips,” she laughed.
Yes, you outed me, oh wise one. I wear the shawl because of my religion. It’s a new faith, one we’ve termed The Wet Shawl Snap.
Some day, children, I will tell you the story of “Hindu squats.”
Oh, for crying out loud. You should just tell ’em you’re Jewish and get the “Funny, you don’t look Jewish,” comments. 8-P
I have never once thought you could pass on yoga tips. And this white-ass Jew probably has wider hips than you.
Thing is I can pass on yoga tips, but it’s through recent discovery and learning on my own, not some genetic Hindu-Indian precognition and urge to bust a yoga move while waiting in line somewhere.
Back when we had a land line, Derick would beg me to swear at the telemarketers in Tamil and hang up. Now I’m afraid they’ll start talking back to me.