Are we Welcoming enough?

Namaste

In schools, through textbooks, I was fed with an idea that our nation's rich hospitality culture is what makes India the most welcoming Country in the whole world. (well, to those books' credit, we did have a lot of foreign emperors who felt so welcome here that they didn't think of going back home for a long time). Then literature thought me that Indians live by "Athiti devo bhava" (A Sanskrit saying which means that 'A guest should be treated like God').

This perception totally changed as soon as I landed in China! 20 months that I lived there, I felt like a king. Be it - in office, in meetings, conferences, or in daily life places like supermarkets, malls or even in the humble Subways - respect for a foreigner, even if brown, was tremendous! For instance, grab any local citizen on the street and ask for a nearby address; I have had multiple instances where the person walked along and dropped me off at my destination if it was nearby! The height of their courtesy is this - prospective customers sending a Pick up car (AUDI, Mercedes, BMW etc) for you despite knowing that you are simply going there to pitch your own product and then even take you out for a lavish lunch/dinner even after saying no to your products/services. China redefined relationship courtesy for me.

And India, sadly, has fallen behind in this since last two years. The main reflection of for this is the reluctance of us to even offer meal to our business guests from 2nd/3rd world countries (US and EU citizens still get all the respect and honour that we can ever give, sometimes even at an expense of offending our own people! This is a common occurance at almost any leading hotel in the country!) . It's is a very simple gesture - if a foreigner has come to visit you, you ought to ask them out for a meal and if you don't, it's is extremely eccentric to the history of your country's culture itself. I am not saying that you arrange for an extravaganza like the Chinese do, but at times, even a simple office canteen meal makes up for it.

Everyone reading this please consider it as a written complaint from anyone who ever visited India and was expecting their host to offer them a simple meal but was let down. I have myself witnessed this a number of times in many parts of the nation.

But, we Indians were never like this. Things have changed only since last few years. Some blame it on westernisation but I suppose it's simply a form of rationing, a rather stupid one. We need to buckle up! This is the only land that has bestowed a Guest an honour and a status equivalent to God and we need to live up to that deed! They can take our economic growth away, they can take our rupee's value away, they can even take our land away, but we should never ever allow them to take the title of the "World's Most Welcoming Country" away!

Please be courteous and offer meals to your guests, and why only foreigners? Try that to your own people too. Let's make this country food friendly again!

P.S: A Chinese complained about this trend to my Dad (Mr Satyen Daga) when he was in China last week, and that's the tipping point for this article.