By Upendra Mishra
BOSTON — As life slowly began to settle in Mexico City and my daily commute to El Colegio de México became routine, I found myself stunned—almost disoriented—by the contrast between the world I had left behind in India and the one now unfolding before me. Mexico, with its chaotic yet charming rhythm, welcomed me in a way I hadn’t anticipated. It didn’t just offer a new language to learn—it offered a new way to live.
Growing up in rural India, life had always felt structured, hierarchical, and relentlessly competitive. Even as a child, I remember feeling the invisible pressure to excel at everything—school, social decorum, family expectations. In my village, status was measured in land, livestock, and lineage. How many oxen you had. How majestic your buffaloes looked. Even cows were judged by their appearance and productivity. Social status wasn’t fluid—it was carved in stone.
Family life was dominated by anxiety. Aunts and uncles were constantly strategizing—how to marry off daughters with an acceptable dowry, how to maintain family honor in the eyes of the village, and how to navigate the ever-watchful eyes of relatives. Marriages were less about love and more about logistics and family honor: who brought the biggest crowd, who gave or received the most impressive gifts and dowry. Looking back, I wonder: when did anyone actually live?
Mexico was different. Life in Mexico was lived, not endured.
One of the first things I noticed was the absence of caste. People were still rich or poor, but no one was untouchable. There was no unspoken system barring someone from certain spaces or social circles because of their birth. It was freeing to see people—rich and poor—gathering in public squares, laughing, embracing, even kissing without judgment.
On weekends, the city transformed into a celebration. Parks buzzed with families. Even the domestic helpers I saw during the week would head out with picnic baskets and companions to enjoy the simple pleasures of sun, food, and conversation. There was no social script that said they couldn’t. It amazed me.
What was even more astonishing was that all of this joy existed in the midst of a severe economic crisis. The mid-1980s were not kind to Mexico. The country was staggering under the weight of foreign debt. Inflation was soaring, the peso was constantly at risk of devaluation, and economic uncertainty hovered like a permanent cloud. And yet—there was life, music, laughter. Mexicans weren’t ignoring their struggles; they were transcending them.
As I settled into this rhythm, I found myself increasingly accepted—almost celebrated. As one of the very few Indians most people had ever met, I was considered something of an exotic curiosity. Strangers asked me endless questions about India. Many confused us with other Asian cultures, but they always did so with warmth and interest, not malice.
One afternoon, I put on my kurta-pajama for an Indian Embassy event and flagged down a cab. I sat in the front seat, as I often did, wanting to engage with people. The driver glanced at me and asked, “¿De dónde es usted?”
“Soy de la India,” I replied.
He looked at me, eyes widening. Then, unexpectedly, he reached out and gently touched my arm.
“India… Gandhi,” he said, his voice trembling. “Gandhi es mi héroe.”
I was stunned. By the time we arrived at my destination and I asked how much I owed, he waved his hand firmly.
“Nada,” he said. “Usted viene del país de Gandhi. No puedo cobrarle.”
I had no words. In that brief moment, Gandhi had built a bridge between two completely different worlds.
Everyday encounters in Mexico were laced with such moments of wonder, confusion, and unexpected learning.
Take, for example, my first or second haircut.
I walked into a small salon near my apartment, and to my surprise, the hairdresser was a woman. In India at that time, the idea of a woman cutting a man’s hair was unthinkable. But this wasn’t India. I sat down nervously.
She greeted me cheerfully and asked, in broken English, “Are you from India?”
“Yes,” I said.
Her eyes lit up. “Then you know about… Kamasutra?”
I froze. The Kamasutra? Of course, I had heard of it. Everyone in India had. But hearing about it and reading—or even talking about—it were entirely different things. The Kamasutra was a whispered legend, not a dinner table topic. I had never read it. I had never even seen a copy. But this woman? She had read it. Multiple times.
She leaned in, her scissors snipping while her questions sliced through my embarrassment.
“Do you think the position with the elephant is possible?” she asked with complete sincerity. She knew so many potiions. I had no clue. But she did help my imagination soar on this subject matter.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or run. So I did what most people do in such moments—I nodded and pretended to understand, mumbling, “Yes, very traditional in our culture…”
That haircut took over an hour.
The next day at El Colegio de México, curiosity got the better of me. I sheepishly asked a librarian if they had the Kamasutra. She gave me a curious look, but shook her head. The only reference I could find was a small section in the Encyclopedia Britannica, where the book was discussed more as an anthropological artifact than a manual.
It’s ironic, I thought. The world thinks Indians are experts on the Kamasutra, and yet many of us back home had never seen it, let alone understood it.
My fascination with the cultural perceptions of India in Mexico only deepened when I stumbled upon a historical gem: the Mexican Communist Party, one of the oldest of its kind outside Russia, had been founded in 1917 by none other than an Indian—Manabendra Nath Roy, known as MN Roy.
Roy wasn’t just any revolutionary. Born in 1887, he had traveled the world as a Marxist theorist, anti-colonial activist, and political philosopher. He had helped shape the global communist movement and later distanced himself from Soviet authoritarianism to advocate for what he called Radical Humanism—a philosophy that emphasized reason, individual freedom, and ethics.
To think that an Indian had shaped Mexico’s political landscape decades before my arrival—it gave me goosebumps. I often wondered what Mexico had looked like through Roy’s eyes. Did he experience the same warmth I did? Did he also feel the country’s contradictions—its joy amid struggle?
Being in Mexico was a journey not just across borders but across assumptions—about life, identity, sex, politics, and spirituality. And I was just beginning to scratch the surface.
Stay tuned for Chapter 13: Trip to Costa Rica Where I Sang a Bollywood Song in Public.
(Mr. Mishra is the managing partner of The Mishra Group, a diversified media firm based in Waltham, MA. He writes about his three passions: marketing, scriptures, and gardening.)
