7 January 2016

As an American who has had half a brain about the nonsense our country has done in the past and the nonsense that continues today, I can confidently say that our country doesn’t always do the right thing. Americans might not always get the best reputation in other countries but today, I realized there is something that Americans are pretty good at: being subtle.

Now when an American might see a sight in public that is completely out of their idea of ordinary, they might have some clever idea to try to capture that moment on their phones to show their friends or the internet the shocking thing. It seems that this idea of trying to be nonchalant and subtle about taking pictures of people that stand out might have been an idea I should have left behind in the States.

Is this the first day that we’ve seen people taking random pictures of us? Not in the slightest. We’ve actually been constantly stopped by random locals to take pictures with them because the group is just so blaringly out of place compared to everyone else. Today had to be my “Come on, really?” moment of clarity about this nonsense.

As pictured above, you can see these two Indian gentlemen not even subtly taking a picture of our group. We were currently getting a tour of the ruins of where some Britishers were located during their residency in India. I was trying my hardest to pay attention to our tour guide because I had actually a good understanding of the Sepoy Mutiny from my AP World History class in high school. These guys didn’t quit at the picture above, they even had one of them walk right next to the tour guide and take a picture of us listening.

I have never been so concerned in my life and I’m usually the mom type of my friends when shenanigans might be occurring. I guess I took the idea of clever secret pictures for granted. It just was so irritating to me that I got fed up and took a picture of them too. The constant stopping for the locals to take pictures with my friends was fine, it didn’t surprise me all that much (except for that hot second that a flight attendant thought my classmate looked like Jake Gyllenhaal) but really?

I know the West and East are supposed to be different but apparently making people intentionally feel awkward is one of those things that the world might not agree on. The rest of the day went pretty well. Especially the one grave stone that epitomized the idea of “He tried”and seeing the holes from the cannon balls in the ruins of the buildings.

I don’t know. I’m just still a little heated about the lack of subtly here. Hopefully tomorrow bears less irritating fruit. Til next time.