Nepali.. Not Nepali??

I was flying to Delhi once, in 2008, I think. During the emigration checking, the security person said “Madam, bag kholiye zara” (Open you bag). I opened my bag. All was well, except for some medicine that I had that he was suspicious about. After convincing himself it was not some sort of addictive drug, he asked for my passport. And when he looked at it, he said, “Oho, didi ta Nepali po hunu hundo rahecha. Dekhdaina hai didi”. (Ohh, sister you are a Nepali, you don’t look like it!). I said... “Yeah, I know”.

During the Delhi immigration checking, the guy stared at my passport for a while, looked at me, looked back at the passport, again , as expected, gazed at me and said, “ohh, to aap Nepal se hi hain? Lagti nahi hai bilkul bhi, kya bas Nepali passport hai, ya udhar hi settled hain” (Ohh, so are you really from Nepal? You don’t look like it. Do you just have a Nepali passport or you have always lived there?) All I said was, “Yeah, I know, I am settled there”.

Now these incidents are not at all rare. Every time I introduce myself as a Nepali to some Indian, I get to hear, “You don’t look like it” and every time I introduce myself to someone who’s not an Indian, it is an assumption on their part that I am an Indian unless I clearly specify that I am from Nepal, yeah, that country where there is Everest. No contribution of mine as such, but an easy introduction.

But sometimes I get lazy, to take the effort and explain that I am in fact a Nepali and not an Indian. There can be two scenarios though. There are some strangers who would, for some reason, want to know where I am from. They ask me confidently “You are from India, right”. Take it as my politeness that I don’t want to negate their wisely made assumption regarding where I belong OR my laziness, I just tend to give a smile and say “Yes”. And when some go a bit further, “where exactly from India?” For some reason, I say “Delhi”. It’s convenient, I suppose.

And the other scenario is simply the fact that I don’t want to let someone know where I am actually from. Now this is because of some childhood lessons given by my Dad which hit me at times “If some stranger gives you something, don’t eat it. Do not tell him where you are from, and do not tell him your name”. Yes, I do lie about my name as well, not cause I am a liar, but because of the childhood lessons. And for some reason, the name is Neha.

Honestly, I don't mind any part of it. It's fun to be confusing. I know this will go on. I know I will be asked this question a number of times more. All I need to do is make sure I don't get influenced by it and start thinking in Hindi!