Shutting the world out

Last Sunday, I decided to stay indoors and spend the whole day just watching movies and eating! Its one of those days, when I like to pamper myself. It was cold and cloudy outside with occasional spells of light snow, so staying indoors was the natural choice. Also I happen to be in the middle of a Hindi movie watching spree and for the past few weeks I have watched movies I'd have never watched previously (some people choose to describe it as an assault on 'taste'!). A part of this was due to the fact that while most of my friends staying abroad had gone home for the winter break, I preferred to stay back in Korea. So suddenly everything Indian seemed very special. The nearest Indian restaurant is quite far away and on the expensive side, so free Hindi movies seemed to be the obvious choice. I woke up rather late and started watching movies right away. The first one was 'Singh is Kinng' and it made me laugh, in spite of being rather stupid and cheesy. But I guess watching serious movies all the time can be exhausting. Somehow I seemed to like Javed Jafri and his antics a lot, though he was not among the principal characters. This was followed by 'Jaane Tu ... ya Jaane na' for lunch. 'Dil Chahta Hai' with coffee in the evening and 'Bade Miyan Chhote Miyan' with dinner!
The result was that the next morning when I came out of my house, I was rather shocked to see so many Koreans all around me! Somehow, all the movies the previous day and not coming out of the house had transported me back to India and it took me some time to grasp the reality. When I did, I laughed out aloud - in the middle of the road, and people looked at me suspiciously.
This was not the first time that it has happened to me. On the occasion of the Diwali dhamaka at the Yonsei auditorium, there were a large number of Indian cultural events. Sitting in the auditorium that day, speaking in Hindi and laughing out at the jokes, I never felt that I was in Korea. It felt very much like India - the music, the people all around and the atmosphere in general.
Staying away from India has not been a problem for me so far. I have made new friends here, adjusted to the local food and fashion remarkably well :). In general, I have never quite felt seriously homesick. Yeah, there has been times when I yearned for Indian food and someone to speak to in Bengali or Hindi but they have been just casual desires. But once in a while, I really enjoy shutting out the world and creating one of my own, be it within the confines of a room or an auditorium. And I guess, this has been the key to my survival. People used to ask me and they still do - how difficult it would be for you to stay in a new country. For me, at least from the experience I've had so far - it has been rather enjoyable. This transformation started about a year and a half ago, when I went to Germany for summers 2007. I learnt to accept, adopt and enjoy other cultures without severing the link to my own. I view every new experience as one adding and enriching my own view rather than occluding it - a mutual coexistence of views rather than one conquering the other. People often use the word, culture shock. I haven't had a major culture shock so far. I think the closest I've come was to see that people have cakes with chopsticks!
Retreating into this self made cocoon and shutting the world out, helps me renew my links to India and Indian culture. Though strange as it may sound, staying out of India has made me more Indian than what I used to be!