I had some similar experiences when I was in India last year. I had the opportunity to stay with Sikh, Hindu, Jain, and Muslim friends and found them all to be quite hospitable and friendly. As expected, they were intrigued about us and asked us many questions about Pakistan. It was fascination to find ties between the two countries even though they have been separated for so long. I stayed at a sikh friend’s house whose father was born in Peshawar and was still able to read and write urdu. Other people knew the streets of bazaars in Pakistan better than I did. In Delhi there were shops named after Pakistani cities. The surprising thing to me was that people treated us so warmly even though we went only a few weeks after the Mumbai attacks. Though we still come across certain individuals who seem to be prejudiced against Pakistanis and Islamophobic most from the other side seemed to be genuinely friendly. The xenophobes generally tend to belong to the religious communities or some tend to have a jingoistic animosity toward Pakistan.

I did notice that the media and government in India seemed to be obsessed with Pakistan in a very negative way. Every time I turned on the TV each news channel was discussing Pakistan, terrorism and the possibility of war. Hopefully that will change one day.