Black, Brown and Yellow

"In a perfect economy, wages would be same every where, everyone would earn the same for the same effort irrespective of the country he/she belongs to. But the real world we live in, is not so perfect", was the last line said by Prof. Oliver Lorz at the end of his presentation to the IIM students who are in Germany under DAAD scholarship.

Little did I know, the words in bold letters was what I was soon going to realize in the face.

(Although I am an IIT student and was supposed to attend another presentation, I had quietly sneaked into this one. I was pretty sure that I would have slept in the other presentation, so I took a quick decision to switch.)

We (me and my fellow DAAD-KITians from Karlsruhe) had our tickets booked back and forth to Aachen (thanks to DAAD). Since Amsterdam is close to Aachen, it made sense to visit it now rather than spending a lot on travelling all the way North again.

Coming back to the night of presentation, it wasn't very long after the Professor uttered those words that I realized it. World certainly isn't a perfect place and sometimes you get to have it in your face. I had heard of all kinds of odd incidences that one has to face with racism existing in this not-so-perfect-world. But ever since I landed in Karlsruhe, I hadn't had to face any such incidences.

It started out in Aachen and continued in Amsterdam. Sometimes it was the country, sometimes it was the skin color and sometimes even the language or the religion.

Different people with me reacted differently to it. Even though, I had read about it and heard about it, initially it was very hard for me to remain nonreactive when I was being verbal provoked.

Sometimes people were drunk and sometimes they were not. Things remained verbal and didn't go physical.

But it doesn't matter. Drunk or not, physical or not, there is no excuse for such behavior.

Bad experiences can happen anywhere (I can't deny that, it could have happened to me here in Karlsruhe as well). We live in a not-so-perfect-society and people with sick mentality are unfortunately a part of it.

Incidence after incidence, I learnt to come in terms with reality and let the bubble called "the perfect world" in my mind blast. The best thing one can do in such a situation is not to react at all. Sure you can react to it confront the person, and give him/her, a piece of your mind, but it doesn't work that way. It is just a waste of your time, and you may even end up in a brawl. (Remember, you are "the foreigner", you are at a higher risk and it isn't even worth a penny to react to such things)

One might wonder, education could solve it altogether. 

The fact is, it doesn't.

One does not needs to be educated to treat everyone equally, irrespective of country, language, religion or skin color. Education has nothing to do with it.

It exists in the educated lot too, in an even more sophisticated and indirect manner. (I have been subjected to it and have observed it close enough to say this)

I feel the need to breathe easy because world has much better things to offer and I should not be missing out on them. There are lot of bad things out there, but it boils down to one simple question, a choice.

A choice between love and hatred. 

I choose to love and radiate the same.

I believe in humanity and I dream of this world as a better place.

Peace.

"Happiness and love are just a choice away" ~Leo F. Buscaglia