You can take the (wo)man out of the country but not the country out of the (wo)man. The same is true for most people, Indians more so.

We have one of the largest populations. Combined with a high literacy rate, a lot of us are now spread out into the far reaches of the world. But still then, even if it’s been a few years or a generation that the person may have been out of India, you can still find some resemblances.

This whole week, I have been in London for work and meeting a lot of interesting people from different walks of life. Colleagues who have relocated, friends staying here for more than a decade, strangers working elsewhere who I came across, et al.

It probably is also a bias that I have, that I noticed similarities in the Indian cohort rather than with others. But that’s more because of my limited understanding of those cultures. Anyways, that’s a natural tendency I believe because we are all prone to this bias.

Coming back to the point, I realised that depending on where we have been brought up, how ingrained some of the nuances are in our nature. We may not be intuitively aware of those but if we ponder over it, it’s easy to notice.

So, for adults who were raised in India, the roots are still predominantly there and their beliefs, values, behaviour aligns with the home country more. They may have stayed in a new country for a large part of their adult life but will still associate more with their culture than the new one.

However, it’s not as simple for kids. Those who have been born or brought up overseas and been there most of their lives, they associate more with the new country. And while their parents may still be thoroughly Indian in their outlook, they aren’t.

Good for them if they are going to stay in the adopted country, as it is just so much more easier to acclimatise with the native folks.

It is also a function of how independently the parents let the children evolve as they grow up. Do they still enforce things that they believe in or are they open to new ideas, methods, and cultural traits that the younger one(s) want to adopt.

And this is true not just for people relocating to another country but even to other regions within large countries like India. We often get trapped into the way things are done in our home town and don’t adjust to the new culture, standing out from the crowd.

Not to say that we move away from where we began from but more to highlight the fact that we need to assimilate and evolve. After all, change is the only constant and most times is for the good.

As we all fan out in different directions, sometimes within the country and sometimes outside, and settle down, it is for us to think through and align ourselves with the new. To make our lives less stressful and more fun…