Kashmiri 'Intifada'

I came back from Kashmir earlier this week after a two months life changing vacation. I married a wonderful girl. It was great to go back to my homeland and meet my mom and dad and the rest of the family. Since it was wedding time so I also got to meet almost all of my close as well as distant relatives. Good times.
There were ten days during my vacation when we could not move out of our houses. Whole kashmir was protesting against the land transfer to Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB). This organization is responsible to manage the annual hindu pilgrimage to a cave shrine in Kashmir. For over a hundred years people (hindus) from all over India have been coming to Kashmir for this pilgrimage and the muslims of the valley have always provided the logistics. However, this year the government transferred around 40 hectares of land to this shrine board in the forest area. The transfer also included permission to make rail roads. Now wait a minute rail roads and concrete structures in forest area. This is even against the Supreme court of India ruling against the construction in forest land.
In Kashmir the problem was not just about forests it was about national pride. People saw it as an attempt by India to change the demography of the state (People outside of Jammu and Kashmir cannot purchase land in the state according to article 370 of the Indian constitution). It seemed like a back door approach to settling people from outside. People of Kashmir could not accept it and rose against the government. I saw people marching on the streets. Hundreds and thousands of them, shouting slogans against India. It seemed like early 90's when people rose against India and thousands of people would come out on the streets to protest. It was a revolution.
The leaders whether pro freedom or for India or for Pakistan had to but find ways to sail in the direction of the winds. After 10 days of street protests with 5 deaths and thousands injured, the government revoked this land transfer order. The government of Jammu and Kashmir lost support of its coalition partners (politics again) and did not have enough numbers in the state legislature to continue ruling. This resulted in the imposition of the Governors rule in the state.
The pilgrimage still continues with a record number of hindu pilgrims visiting their shrine. This is despite attempts by some hindu right wing organizations of Jammu trying to give it a racial color. They were trying to call these protests by muslims as protests against the pilgrimage itself. They were proven racists and defeated yet again. Muslims of Kashmir still continue to provide the logistic support to the hindu pilgrims.

Stereotype - Reality or Myth

Recently I had a change in my life as I received my PhD and was offered a good job. The usual congratulations were often followed by questions and comments from my friends. Initially, I thought it was just me, but later, in order to prove myself wrong (or right) I decided to compile and then average out the responses from my friends, colleagues and acquintances grouped by their ethnicity. The results were strangely consistent. I thought of compiling and presenting my findings here. Worth mentioning is the fact that when I mention an ethnicity or culture, I mean a friend who is 'fresh off the boat' and thus his frame of mind represents his upbringing in that culture. Thus an Indian friend is one who was born and brought up in India, I grouped anybody raised in the USA as American irrespective of his ethnicity. Following are the responses:

American - Awesome, congratulations. So you moving to Philadelphia, eh? Nice city, good job, getting out of Buffalo, what else would you want? I am really happy for you.

Arab - MashaAllah, congrashulashuns. This is great news brazaar. So did u get married yet or not? C'mon man, now you have a job, u should get married, get a family inshaAllah.

Desi (Indo-Pak) - Wow Man! Congrats! So now you make big bucks haan? New car, big house no?

Kashmiri - Mubarak! So, what is your salary?

This one was a classic. From a friend from bangalore, was not the usual desi response.

Friend: Great man, congrats! So can I ask you what your salary is going to be?

Me: umm.... no you cannot.

Friend: OK. So how much is it?

Me: !!!!!