Simple Kindness, or a Slam?

By Victor L. Midyett

Is it the social caste system or simple human kindness that has endured?
    I remember one day in Bangalore, Southern India, I was riding my bike down a long, gradual hill while a rickshaw man was struggling to peddle his rickshaw up the hill with two adults in it. One of his thongs (flip flops) fell off. I came to a screeching halt, picked it up, and started back towards him with it in my outstretched hand.
    He came unglued and started yelling at me to put it down. I had touched his dirty thong, and even though I was a boy, I was white and way above his standing in the social caste system. Because others on the road witnessed this, I had – in his mind – drilled his social standing home and made it worse by touching his “dirty” property and social unworthiness.

Thor's Day: Missionary Kid

Caste

By Vic Midyett

When we visited with neighbors in the 1950s, in a part of Northeast India called Assam, the neighbors were usually tea growers. This was always a yummy and extravagant experience for me. Yummy, because we got to eat food we did not normally eat, although I can’t remember exactly what. Just that it was different.