Tearing down the barrier

The greatest barrier to communication, they say, is the distance between one man’s thoughts, and another’s (don’t mean to be sexist, but this is how people used to write stuff early last century). In a recent trip to a foreign land, I realized the relevance of this quote.

Besides a Lonely Planet Phrasebook guiding us on the Greek language, there was little else we could use to communicate with the locals in a small island off Greece’s East coast.

For, while the big cities and popular islands have a lot of English speakers, obscure little islands get lesser tourists and therefore lesser exposure to the language. In a neatly tucked away settlement in such an obscure island, we found a quaint little shop with some delicious locally made foodstuff (drinkstuff too!). The woman who owned the shop spoke better English than 90% of the island (meaning she could understand nearly half of what we said, without us using the very helpful phrasebook!), and explained with élan, the stories behind everything in the shop – how she actually makes everything from locally available ingredients for eight months of the year, and sells it for the rest of the four. Went on and on for almost an hour, especially as she had problems finding English words for what she was trying to say (didn’t stop her at all from talking though…women!)

What happened next was quite remarkable – a woman we’d met in a shop in another neatly tucked away settlement dropped in, and turned out to be our subject’s mum! Of course, belonging to the older generation, she didn’t speak a single word of English, but was quick to point out to her daughter that she recognized us (no mean feat, as we were the only Indians on the entire island!). Extremely excited about this serendipity, she went on to invite us to a ‘fiesta’ later that evening in a Church owned by the family (seeing as we were ‘close’ friends of her daughter). Greeks are extremely friendly people, it seems…

Following her car through a maze of hill roads (not the one in Bandra), passing about four small Churches on the way (everywhere in Greece, there’s a Church – much like the paan shops in India), we finally reached a hilltop with a quaint little Church, where a bunch of people were busy preparing for the feast. Of course, the woman from our foodstuff shop wasn’t here to translate, and we were left at the mercy of the phrasebook, as no one in this entire gathering spoke anymore English than my friend’s Labrador…

A slew of amusing exchanges followed, including one in which, on explaining that it was getting dark and we didn’t know the way back so we needed to leave, we heard lots of ‘Ohi Ohi’ (NO! NO!); and were told (mostly in sign language, accompanied by the weird sounds that were words of Greek), that the priest would be going the same way, and we would need to follow him, so there was no way we were to leave!

Then something magical happened – the food appeared on the long table, and everything suddenly became ok! Greeks go out of their way to prepare super tasty meals. A great meal later, we followed the priest and were able to get back alright, but the evening turned out to be one of the most remarkable experiences ever – a foreign land, not so much a language barrier as a language great wall, friendly strangers and brilliant food…

My take away on human nature was simple – when people connect at a human level (especially around food ;)), all other barriers disappear – it doesn’t matter if you don’t look alike or speak the same language – as long as your thoughts match, there is no barrier to communication that can’t be overcome!