Namaskar at the drop of a hat

Most Indians are religious people. They drop a Namaskar every now and then. If not in a temple, then there is a different form of Namaskar. Instead of joining hands, when they see a temple from a distance or something remotely like that, they touch their forehead with their hand, mostly their right hand and then kiss it. It is this form of Namaskar that I will be talking about in this post. I remember, every time a BEST bus passed Maruti temple near KabutarKhanna, almost everyone would peep outside their windows and drop a Namaskar to either the Maruti temple or the mosque that stood opposite to it. If they see a funeral procession, guess what they do? Right, drop a Namaskar. I have seen people who drop a Namaskar whenever they get in a local train in Bombay. Now things are not as bad as they are in London and what prompts people to do that is not known to me. If you just step on someone, a simple sorry is not enough. It has to be accompanied by a Namaskar. Now, not everyone is aware of this. Take this story that I heard from a reliable source. In some software company, a software engineer was explaining complexities in the system to his American client, who was wearing a short skirt. They were sitting on a table in the conference room when this guy happened to step on her toes. And how could he not drop a Namaskar. He touched her lap and then proceeded to touch his hand on the forehead and then kissed it. The American lady was stunned and it took quite a effort to explain that this was out of respect and not a lustful act. And this is my personal favourite. While traveling in a BEST bus, a guy dropped his mobile phone. The guy promptly picked it, dusted it, checked whether it was okay and then Namaskared the phone!