One of the many unique things about India is that the English language is spoken just about everywhere, and to some extent by everyone. There are so many ethnic groups in India, each with their own distinct languages, that if India didn’t come up with an official tongue (or two!) to enable everyone to talk to each other, your average Indian person wouldn’t even be able to go to the next state over and expect to be able to communicate. Now, India’s main official language is Hindi, but that is a north Indian (Delhi) dialect natively spoken by the ethnic group commonly perceived as the ruling class of India. This means that there is a lot of animosity towards learning Hindi, especially in states where the ethnic groups consider themselves decidedly not Indian. In fact, in some states, (I’m thinking of Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh), people have even come up to me and proudly stated in fluent English that they do not speak a word of Hindi, and that they wish their state was its own country. English is really the lingua franca of much of cosmopolitan India, especially for educated middle and upper class people who have been able to attend English medium school, where all their classes are taught in English. Many families also speak English, or at least Inglish, at home.
But I digress. One of the benefits (sometimes a drawback too!) of all this common language business, for me is that I can talk to most everyone around me. And they can talk to me. And ask me all kinds of detailed questions about my life that were not possible in countries like Myanmar or Vietnam. Consequently, and maybe also a little because I was riding through an area of India with absolutely no tourists, our group was approached several times in our first few months in India, by local and national news outlets looking for interviews.
Often the reporters just asked us if we liked their state, India, the food, etc. (and often wrote whatever they wanted in their articles, regardless of our responses), but sometimes they asked real questions, like what were some issues with cycling in India, or about our travel philosophy. I was even able to talk about Liberty in North Korea quite a bit, and my words about North Korea were featured prominently in several of the articles.
There are all kinds of misquotes in the articles, and sometimes they attributed words said by me to Mike or Mirek, or vice versa, and sometimes they cut me out of the photos but included my remarks, or vice versa, but generally the reporters were very friendly and happy to talk with us, and they tried hard. Just imagine me, sweaty as hell, stopping for a drink of water when suddenly a reporter and guy with a video camera jump out of a car, run up to me, and start rattling off questions. I tried not to get a big head, but ever since entering the less ‘remote’ part of India, I’ve been a little sad that the interview requests have ceased
Often the reporters just asked us if we liked their state, India, the food, etc. (and often wrote whatever they wanted in their articles, regardless of our responses), but sometimes they asked real questions, like what were some issues with cycling in India, or about our travel philosophy. I was even able to talk about Liberty in North Korea quite a bit, and my words about North Korea were featured prominently in several of the articles.
There are all kinds of misquotes in the articles, and sometimes they attributed words said by me to Mike or Mirek, or vice versa, and sometimes they cut me out of the photos but included my remarks, or vice versa, but generally the reporters were very friendly and happy to talk with us, and they tried hard. Just imagine me, sweaty as hell, stopping for a drink of water when suddenly a reporter and guy with a video camera jump out of a car, run up to me, and start rattling off questions. I tried not to get a big head, but ever since entering the less ‘remote’ part of India, I’ve been a little sad that the interview requests have ceased
