Well, over the past week I have received my first few hate emails from the blog. Hmmmm, does that mean I have made it?? Like actors who know they’ve “made it” when they have their first stalker?? Haha…. yeah, probably not. But one can dream 🙂 To date I have now received three angry, bitchy and just plain MEAN hate emails related to the post I wrote about my colleague Paromita’s wedding about 10 days ago (click here to view the scandalous post). I’m not an idiot, I realize that I am not writing in a diary hidden in my night stand. I know that by opening up my thoughts to the masses that it is fair game for anyone to – in turn – open up their thoughts to me about what I write but I really wasn’t prepared for the tone and some of the vicious comments. The first couple emails hurt a bit, which I received last week. They used profanity, called me names and basically said that I was an idiot for thinking and feeling the way I do. But the funny thing is that their angry tirades were not written to correct any of the mistakes that I made about the order of the wedding ceremony, or errors in how I described the processes. Not one! They were all insults to me about my own silly things like the way I described the way I couldn’t walk right and the way I felt all wrapped up in my gorgeous saree or the way I chose to compare the music from “western” weddings again the cool sounds of an Indian wedding. Oh and my favorite, the fact that I didn’t know that I would be taking my shoes off at the wedding. haha Oh for F’s sake!! I clearly state that this was my first Indian wedding. I mean at that time I had only lived in India for two weeks, cut me a bit of slack, haha.
To me, it is as if they didn’t really read my blog post as it was intended… or at least not with an open mind to absorb my perspective as a foreigner and first-timer at an Indian wedding. And I can’t really fix that now can I?
Today I received the third one and to be honest it was easier to digest. I told myself last week that the moment I read the first nasty word that I would hit the delete button but I was so curious that I read the whole thing. I felt like a mosquito flying toward the blue light of the zapper machine, haha. I couldn’t stop myself and couldn’t take my eyes off of it!! But it was easier this time. I sorted out the fact that the people writing the hate emails happened upon my blog unintentionally through a keyword search on Google. They had no intention of reading about me and the life I lead as a foreigner living in Bangalore. They were either searching for a saree shop or investigating things for their Indian wedding. So to these women I was just taking the piss out of something really important to them.
Now what the hell to do with the next ones? I don’t know if I can stop reading them because to be honest it is pretty entertaining. And it does give the whole blog experience a reality check. I guess as long as my next hate email isn’t hand delivered by a stalker I am A-Okay 🙂 haha
XOXO from Bangalore
Baltasar Gracian said “A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends”. You have made good use of your hate mails by posting a new post in your blog. Ignore and forgive them because Oscar Wilde said “Always forgive your enemy, nothing annoys them so much”.
Only three persons hate you, but there are 100s who love you.
Keep on writing and we will keep on reading.
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I would like to link you blog to my blog with your kind permission, if you permit then i will do it as soon as i get your response. I want my friends to know how well u write.
Regards
Arshad.
all the best to you…….
“A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends”.You have used the hatred of your enemy and posted a new post in your blog. This is called positive attitude. Ignore them. There is a quote which says “Always forgive your enemies, nothing annoys them more”. There are very few people who hate you / your blog, but there are 1000s who love you and love your blog.
Keep on writing and we will keep on reading.
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I want to link your blog to my blog as i want my friends to know how nice you write. If you can give me your concurrence, then i will link it to my blog.
All the best Angela.
Regards
Arshad
I would love that… yes of course! I can see from the dashboard that people click onto your blog from mine too (and Pencil Girl) which I think is very cool…. 🙂 Cheers, angela
MILESTONE MAN recently received his first bit of hate (or at least mildly aggrieved) mail – so I know how you feel. Still, hate mail is better than creepy ‘I think I know you really well after reading a couple of your blog posts’ mail – trust me.
Ohhhh okay, agreed. I definitely prefer the hate mail to stalker mail 🙂 thanks for comment! angela
Hahahahaha!!! I love reading your blog for the exact same reasons that you seem to be getting hate mail for! 😀
I can only imagine all the hilarious goof-ups which will occur if I were to visit Barcelona, for instance.. And the fact that you’re so thoroughly enjoying the experience makes me more confident that it’s all about the mindset. 🙂 🙂
I guess I needn’t bother saying stuff like don’t take hate mail too seriously etc. etc. since you seem to be taking them just right! 🙂 🙂
Have fun! (And post all about it!) 😀 😀
omg you are the BEST! haha DANG….some of the comments were insane though. I was called a bitch, told that they hoped I had my ass kicked, and one of my favorites — because I don’t understand it — was an insult that I came from southern California, the land of pornos. haha Anyway, it did make for interesting blog content so I suppose I should thank them 🙂 hehe
We should meet up for coffee sometime in Bangalore, PG!
Angela – there are all sorts of crazy people in the world. I am amazed at how people choose to invest their energies and cut other people down. You are putting yourself out there and sharing super interesting experiences that are meaningful to the people that count. My advice – not for one second, give any emotional mind share to those who criticize you but rather feel sorry for them that they live in a gloomy, negative world and choose to channel some of their rants towards people like you. And if you feel entertained – even better. Hey – there may even eventually be a lesson in there ;-)))
Thanks, Maria. I am so pleasantly overwhelmed with the generous comments, like yours, that I am definitely taking your advice to heart and will simply brush negativity off like water on a duck 🙂 Yesterday’s FB update you posted was incredible btw, did you write that yourself? Forgot to ask. Big kiss to you and Mr. JC xoxo
Pfft! Some Indians are so insecure that they interpret neutral and even complimentary comments as insulting.
Hi… I think it was just the viistor who was honestly looking for information on weddings and saree’s and they stumbled on to my blog by accident so weren’t loving my humorous take on their hot topic off the day 🙂 Thanks for reaching out, hope you’ll keep reading 🙂
As you’ve rightly said, then dint drop by with intentions of reading your blog, so they just blurted out instantly what ever came into their mind.
U go girl, there are 1000’s of people who are reading your blog and enjoying. I am certainly one of them. Pls dont ever stop blogging.
Bharath
haha, you are soooo sweet! Glad you are reading it 🙂
My grandpa used to say “one can learn more from one’s critics than from their praisers”. IMO, Indians in general are not still broad minded enough to get criticised about their culture, values and religion. Although that is due to historical reasons and that many of them are good and true, but not all of them. So we should learn to listen to some criticisms. Your opinion about wedding is true and people should respect that, whether they accept it or not is secondary.
One thing I appreciate about westerners like you is that they are open to learning new cultures. So you should ignore such hate mails and continue your good work. In fact you should not stop expressing your opinion, even if it is bad just because some people dislike it. There are conservatives in every country, society, religion… and I can assure you Indian conservatives are mostly harmless – there might not be any threats (unless you stay away from sensitive subjects like religion) 🙂
Thanks so much 🙂 I used to write for (contribute to) the-NRI.com but the comments were so ugly and personally attacked me for sharing my views (the same articles as what you read here) that I simply stopped. It was amazing to me how harsh so many people were to me and it simply wasn’t fun being published there most of the time. I don’t mean to be overly critical, I just find it fun comparing the cultures.
The concept of enjoying humor with a cup of tea isn't really imbibed in everyone , especially Indians and when it involves religion. Your post on your colleague's wedding was in no way hurtful. It's only the ones who are jobless and lead meaningless lives that can come up with such insane things. With the part when someone bumped into your blog (maybe for their marriage search or whatever), it wouldn't have taken a lot of time to figure out that they are in the wrong place. Either quit it or enjoy it. Maybe they were computer illiterate. 😛
Jason, what is up with your comment…in a bad mood when you wrote it? haha You have some pretty strong opinions about people you don’t know…. –ange
Not really? I was kidding about the last part , but yeah I wouldn’t have done that. Maybe I shouldn’t expect others to think the same way.