Quote: (12-06-2013 02:53 PM)WalterBlack Wrote:
It really depends where you are - there's a lot of "untouchable" Indian Punjabis in northern California and in UK. Many have been in the US or UK since the 1960s. Because they come from the bottom rung of Indian society, they're pretty down to earth people and the women don't have this "princess" attitude. The women get put in the kitchen at a young age and as a result of this most of these women can cook...they're most not career women and many have never been to college. This has been changing in the last 10-15 years and many are starting to go to college.
A lot of the "untouchable" Punjabis drink, smoke, screw around & like to party. I know many that have been to jail. They're a world away from the FOB IT/Engineering nerds who come and work in the US & UK. I remembering asking some south Indian IT guys what they did for fun in India - they said that they played chess! A lot of the nightclubs in some UK towns are owned or run by Punjabi people.
I've come across many Indians in the US who are non-drinkers or vegetarians..most of the "untouchable" UK or US born Indians eat and drink anything.
There's Indians all over the world and a lot of the labourers in the Middle East are from a poor background. However, there are rich Indians in the middle east too - a lot of doctors and jewellery guys are Indian.
Indians Unseat Antwerp's Jews As the Biggest Diamond Traders
The Punjabis are rarely untouchables. The absolute lowest castes in the Punjab don't have anything approaching the resources and money required to move to the states. Most Punjabi, Pakistani, and Afghan immigrants to the states are, however, poorer and more prone to crime than peninsular Indian-Americans. These three groups, however, tend to look better, party harder, and pull better than most other South Asians.
Punjabis are pretty common around San Jose in the SF Bay Area and throughout the East Bay(Oakland, Richmond, Vallejo etc.) The lower-income one basically match the description you just provided(minus the caste thing). There are also plenty of richer Punjabis, however.
Chances are, if you meet an Indian guy with game, he's Punjabi. I myself hail from Tamil Nadu, and, apart from a few friends of Carnatic and Telugu origin, I have never met another South Indian with any semblance of game.
I personally believe Punjabi culture is the most alpha in India. There's little of the monasticism and vegetarianism that typifies South Indian culture, nor is there any real belief in pacifism. While religion in the Punjab(both Hindu and Muslim) has a long tradition of advocating nonviolence and universal love, you only have to look at the history of the area to understand that these people will fight when necessary, and are very good at doing so. This is the warrior race of India. These are the descendants of the people who served as the subcontinent's first line of the defense, the race who broke the morale of Alexander's army, routed the Huns and Muslims numerous times, and refused to ever fully submit to the Mughal emperors. The Punjabi Sikh empire of Ranjit Singh gave the British one of the best fights they would ever receive at the hands of a native polity. Even after colonization, most of Britain's Indian recruits were Sikhs of Punjabi descent.