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Old 11-20-2018, 09:19 AM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 80skeys View Post
Very difficult to find random people on the streets or in local areas who spoke English. Used translator app with differing degrees of success - sometimes abysmal, sometimes decent success.
  • If you are in a non-tourist, working class area of Delhi, good luck finding someone who understands English. Very difficult to "break bread" meaningfully in these places.
  • We met educated locals, either by chance on the streets (rare) or through organized venues (more likely). Their English is generally pretty good.
  • We met latino foreigners who have been living in India; we conversed with them in Spanish
  • hotel staff and its Indian guests tended to speak decent English.
  • My company has a fairly large office in Delhi (on the outskirts, actually)
In all we had interaction with people from different stratuses of society, different backgrounds.



FYI, regarding food, I was just talking yesterday with a Spaniard who lives in my neighborhood. His wife having just returned from India has been suffering with diarrhea the past two weeks from eating the food there.
Literacy doesn't necessarily mean good eloquent spoken English. A street vendor is never going to speak English anywhere in Asia. Even Indians living and working in the USA isn't fluent as that of a native English speaker.

The diarhea is a trademark problem. You won't believe, even a player from a visiting cricket team ( England ) got diarrhea and had to sit out of the game. Food and hygiene are way too high in the West, which also may mean a decreased immune system.
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Old 11-20-2018, 10:56 AM
 
Location: World
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Quote:
Originally Posted by shanv3 View Post
Literacy doesn't necessarily mean good eloquent spoken English. A street vendor is never going to speak English anywhere in Asia. Even Indians living and working in the USA isn't fluent as that of a native English speaker.

The diarhea is a trademark problem. You won't believe, even a player from a visiting cricket team ( England ) got diarrhea and had to sit out of the game. Food and hygiene are way too high in the West, which also may mean a decreased immune system.
Yeah in olden days, Prawn Curry & Naan used to be the culprit for making ill many England, Australia, New Zealand Cricket players. I remember one touring Davis Cup Team had half of the team ill due to Curry and other half due to sunstroke. But nowadays Professional players are more careful plus facilities at premier Hotels are top-notch.

Most western visitors from Europe, America are used to eating food cooked by immigrants of these countries only in their hometowns.
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Old 11-20-2018, 11:14 AM
 
Location: World
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Originally Posted by shanv3 View Post
Looks the vegetarian/brahmin/bjp connection is imminent here. This map seriously looks like the electoral map of 2016 election
You are Right in your observation. Most Vegetarians will support BJP.

But Punjab & Haryana will defy the stereotypical image of Punjabi dishes like Butter Chicken and all. The presence of thousands of Deras (Religious congregations) amongst Rural population, farmers, so called lower castes as well as Upper castes have promoted Vegetarianism in these two states. I know many Vegetarian Punjabis.

Because of Mr Patel, typical image of any Gujarati is of a Vegetarian. But Meat consumption in Gujarat is more then Punjab. The vegetarian Gujarati was the one who went abroad and created such an image.
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Old 11-20-2018, 11:57 AM
 
Location: East Coast of the United States
27,426 posts, read 28,498,647 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 80skeys View Post
The core arguments here are:


  • You claim it's easy to find English-speaking people in India. I disagree.
  • You claim India has a high literacy rate. I disagree.
  • You imply there's minimal risk of getting sick from eating food in India. I disagree.
I'm sure other readers who have been to India have opinions about all three of these topics. Let's ask them to chime in now ....
When I go to India (which is pretty frequently), I tend to associate probably more with the upper-middle class segment of the society. This is because I have social connections there. Most of these folks are well-educated, a lot of PhDs, doctors, lawyers,... those sorts of people. They can all speak English well. If you’re only mixing with the lower-middle or lower class people, then of course you will find much lower literacy rates among them in general.

I have been to New Delhi 3 times, visited the major tourist sites and such. However, I don’t know that much about New Delhi from a social perspective. It’s a huge city. But it’s true that the majority of people speak Hindi and not English. Most Indians have pride in their local languages and speak it. The country is not just a former British colony.
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Old 11-20-2018, 05:16 PM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BigCityDreamer View Post
When I go to India (which is pretty frequently), I tend to associate probably more with the upper-middle class segment of the society. This is because I have social connections there. Most of these folks are well-educated, a lot of PhDs, doctors, lawyers,... those sorts of people. They can all speak English well.
The people in my company's offices in Delhi and Bangalore all spoke good English- not only because it was a job requirement (lots of interaction with people in the US, Great Britain and also Zurich and Munich, where the teleconference language was usually English)- but with each other because they didn't necessarily have another language in common. India has hundreds of distinct languages. One woman told me she asked her staff to speak English because their native languages were different.
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Old 11-21-2018, 11:10 AM
 
Location: World
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Originally Posted by athena53 View Post
The people in my company's offices in Delhi and Bangalore all spoke good English- not only because it was a job requirement (lots of interaction with people in the US, Great Britain and also Zurich and Munich, where the teleconference language was usually English)- but with each other because they didn't necessarily have another language in common. India has hundreds of distinct languages. One woman told me she asked her staff to speak English because their native languages were different.
Believe it or not, but Hindi is one common language. Many Indians will not admit it but most Indians, while talking to people from other states will use Hindi. I have used Hindi, not English, even in Chennai, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata.

How many Indians are there who have zero knowledge of Hindi, very few. ??

Please understand the difference between native mother tongue and ability to speak any language. Most Indians are conversant in three languages. If someone is from Hyderabad with native Telugu language which he speaks at home, he will speak Hindi in school with friends and English when he comes to USA or as per Indian job requirements.
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Old 11-21-2018, 05:59 PM
 
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Originally Posted by munna21977 View Post
Believe it or not, but Hindi is one common language. Many Indians will not admit it but most Indians, while talking to people from other states will use Hindi. I have used Hindi, not English, even in Chennai, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata.

How many Indians are there who have zero knowledge of Hindi, very few. ??

Please understand the difference between native mother tongue and ability to speak any language. Most Indians are conversant in three languages. If someone is from Hyderabad with native Telugu language which he speaks at home, he will speak Hindi in school with friends and English when he comes to USA or as per Indian job requirements.
But I have seen the Kerala and Tamil guys not doing it. Espeecially Chennai had a sizeable Hindi speaking community even before IT boom, yet not popular. They do learn it earnestly if they got a bank job or govt job in North India
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Old 11-21-2018, 08:06 PM
 
Location: Sunnyvale, CA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by athena53 View Post
One woman told me she asked her staff to speak English because their native languages were different.
Except, my understanding is that Hindi is the common language that they all speak in addition to their native languages.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lieqiang View Post
Again though everyone has their comfort zone, and it's great you found yours.
Cool.
I have eaten fried caterpillars, scorpions, snake meat, and fried cicadas in China. Most people would consider this adventurous.
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Old 11-21-2018, 08:35 PM
 
Location: Central IL
20,726 posts, read 16,283,321 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by athena53 View Post
The people in my company's offices in Delhi and Bangalore all spoke good English- not only because it was a job requirement (lots of interaction with people in the US, Great Britain and also Zurich and Munich, where the teleconference language was usually English)- but with each other because they didn't necessarily have another language in common. India has hundreds of distinct languages. One woman told me she asked her staff to speak English because their native languages were different.
I know an Indian couple whose only shared language is English.
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Old 11-22-2018, 12:04 PM
 
Location: World
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Quote:
Originally Posted by shanv3 View Post
But I have seen the Kerala and Tamil guys not doing it. Espeecially Chennai had a sizeable Hindi speaking community even before IT boom, yet not popular. They do learn it earnestly if they got a bank job or govt job in North India
They will speak Hindi when they need it. For them, it is sort of third language. I have spoken in Hindi with many Kerala people here in USA as well as in Dubai, Abu Dhabi where it is impossible to survive without knowing it.

In Tamil Nadu, I have been to Ooty, Chennai, Madurai, Kanya Kumari, Rameswaram as well as Pondicherry. No problem whatsover with Hindi-everyone I interacted knew the Hindi language-many people with amazing fluency and better accent then many North Indians.

Few people are adamant but then thats their choice.

I once met with a Sri Lankan Tamil Refugee but settled in Paris and running an Indian Restaurant. He knows English, French, Sinhalese, Tamil, Hindi. Probably in order to interact with customers, he uses his language skills. He spoke with me in Hindi along with alternate changing of languages -Tamil with staff, English /French/Hindi depending on the looks of customers.

For some people, its a matter of pride that Hindi is superseding their native language. But it is not !! As a third language, it is just doing a connector thing. I have used Hindi to speak with people from Somalia, UAE, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka. In my Grad School days, there were two students sharing an apartment- one from Nepal and one from Bangladesh. Both used to communicate with each other in Hindi.

Last edited by munna21977; 11-22-2018 at 12:13 PM..
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