Day 48: Delhi & Accents

Delhi! Land of my dreams. Seriously… I have been waiting a long time to come to this place. I knew it was big but so far I have been blown away. When we flew in we saw hundreds of skyscrapers. But they were almost in the middle of nowhere! Just the outskirts, surrounded by a few residences and free land. Oh and I tried to take a picture but the smog is thicker than clouds. Nasty.

Here are a few pictures from today (now that I have some wifi): 

This is us leaving from Vizag :) 

When we got to Delhi we people watched for a little while at the airport and tried not to stare at all the white people haha (we just aren't used to that anymore) Then we started to explore the city! Eventually we met this cool Rickshaw guy named Vicky... he brought us to a good, cheapish restaurant. 

This was our first meal in Delhi.

Chana Masala, Paneer masala and Veg mixed curry stuff... plus naan and basmati. It was sooo good.

After this it was getting late so we decided to go the friend's house that we are staying at. The two guys we staying with live in a very nice apartment. They have a beautiful extra room and washroom for us. Its better than a hotel. And then they made dinner for us! Here I am with Charchit. We all get along really well. Very intelligent conversation and their English is perfect. Bikram really doesn't like to cook so Charchit was the master chef behind the terrific meal we had tonight. 

Here is the meal we had! Dal (it was REALLY good), Basmati and eggs.  So healthy and so perfect. I don't even know where to begin trying to replicate this but it is going to happen.

After dinner we stayed up and talked to the guys for a few hours. They are very interesting and very educated! Bikram works for Discovery Channel. He is on the marketing end of things. Charchit is a fashion designer.

We talked about everything under the moon but my favourite part of our conversation is when we talked about accents. I had been trying to voice my thoughts earlier today to Carly and Israel about how I think there aren't proper ways of speaking any language. Somehow I couldn't find the right words and then out of nowhere Bikram turned the conversation to the very same topic. He put my opinion into words in a way I couldn't manage by myself. Bikram said "Maybe pronunciation is a matter of perspective... Who is to say that their way of speaking English is the right way? Eventually India might have the biggest population of English speakers in the world, so then wouldn't our way of speaking be the most correct (if that is the measure of the efficiency of language)".

I love the idea that pronunciation is matter of perspective. I think that it is narrow minded to say that there is one way of using English or French or any language for that matter. If a society can communicate with each other isn't the language fulfilling its purpose? I don't like the idea of coming to India and saying "You're not pronouncing that right!" Because if they can understand each other then why would they need to change just for me? It would be like going to Britain and saying "You're not pronouncing that right!" Ok... some might argue that the most original pronunciation is the best. But is it really important what came first?

I love that there can be so much variety within a language! I love that different cultures can have the same language but that they can use it to fit their world in a unique way. I think we should accept accents (and take the time to understand them) instead of trying to push for conformity.

Stéf