Expatliv: An Indian in Kuala Lumpur?

Sunday 30 December 2012

An Indian in Kuala Lumpur?

"So, where are you from?" The teksi driver looks at my husband.. "Well.." My husband smiles and give us a here-we-go-again-look. "Well, my wife is from Norway, I am from Greece, but we live in Mumbai." We have said this tale before, and usually the person comes up with a "Why?", "Greece-is-beautiful" "I-have-a-cousin-who-went-to-Oslo". This taxi driver however, just started to laughed and concluded: "Sooo, you are Indian!"

I am not sure how wise it is to tell a proud Greek that he is anything else but A Greek, but on the other hand they have a saying in Greece: Opou gjis, patris, meaning wherever you live, is your homeland. I have always liked the sound of that - but on the other hand, as expat, your roots are important. I believe you can have both. You can have a wonderful live where you are and at the same time cherish the roots to your homeland (s). Being here in Kuala Lumpur, I started to think back to when I was a little girl, and my dad and I were laughing at that funny name: Kuala Lumpur. We thought it sounded so funny - like a name you find in Donald Duck. AND HERE I AM!

And a funny thing: we keep meeting a lot of fellow Indians here in Kuala Lumpur, we passed Little India with the car, we walked by the restaurant A Taste of India, and our guide turned out to be from Kalkata. And last but not least: where do you think we went on the first-day sightseeing tour? Well, only to one of the most sacred Hindu pilgrimage sights: The Batu Caves. Aaaand we keep saying that after KL we are going home to Mumbai. Before that, we will celebrate New Years Eve here, close to the Petronas Twin Towers - remember the stunning scene from the film Entrapment - with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Sean Connery? Well, that is where we'll be! And we feel lucky to be able to see this exciting parts of the world -we greek-norwegian-indians expats!