Gayathri did not take too kindly to that comment from someone she met at the mall:

Do I take that as a compliment? That South Indians are usually dressed well ? South Indians are more prelavent in the US thanks to their sharper brains, they get opportunities to study and work? Or is it a very sarcastic comment from a rich kid? I was thinking for answers to snub her but thanks to my father’s immediate respone – we are south Indians of course.

The Gradwolf picked this issue and wrote about the prejudices and blames this mostly on the language barrier:

The Hindi speaking community looks at South Indians as backward, narrow minded and a disconnected lot of people that at times suggests an alienating behavior in ones own country. Blame it on the language. All said and done, it is indeed a fact that Tamil Nadu at least, where I come from, has been disconnected from rest of India.

I can almost feel a “Madrasi Chick” controversy brewing here. I have to say, though, after my 4 years of engineering at an REC and my general hopping around India, this barrier doesn’t matter so much. Perhaps what matters more is how accepting one is, and how much one is prepared to learn from others than to be the frog in the well and snob at everyone else.