I know this is more like an anecdotal evidence, but since moving to the US during my teenage years and during my undergrad almost every Pakistani student I know shared a very close bond and friendship with the Indian students, both the ones born in Pakistan and US. They have maintained that bond many years after graduation, even after moving to their respective countries or staying in the US. In an university setting with thousands of international students they had equal chances to mingle with any other ethnicity you mentioned yet they found more in common with the Indians, there is an obvious similarity in culture you can't ignore.
I discussed this in a thread with other Pakistanis recently. Pakistan culture, also similar to Pukhtoon culture of Afghanistan and Occupied Kashmir, stresses high importance of Mehman dari, meaning hospitality to guests.
We are obligated to make the guest comfortable when we sit with them. We bring out the best food, give them they best seats, etc.
Then after guest has been made comfortable, we talk with that guest to stress commonalities and to find mutual acquaintances. This was useful for our culture for centuries in potential marriage meetings, the main way Pakistanis get married,, even today..
What Indian and some BD people misunderstand is that they think this mehman dari implies some kind of commonality and that we are same, it does not.
Indian, West Indies, Americans, Japanese, Chinese and any other guests are treated the same way by Pakistanis. All come back believing that they are close to Pakistanis due to the extreme hospitality they have experienced.
Unfortunately in the West, our confused people went even a step further in losing their culture and trying to form commonality with Hindus and Sikhs. However whenever there is 27 Feb 2019 or Galwan loss, the old scars come back up very quickly.
Pakistani and Indian community in the US is no longer on friendly terms due to Kashmir and Indian Muslim issues, but mostly due to the rabid Islamophobia coming from Indians.
Many BD also have wrong and prejudiced opinions of Pakistanis, but I think it is only like half of you guys.
As a Pakistani who speaks Urdu and Punjabi fluently and decent amount of Pukhto and Hindko, I believe I am in a pretty good place to judge my countrymens' experiences better than you guys.
If you say so.
That has not been my observation at all.
Maybe its different in California or wherever it is you are from.
But certainly not the case in the NYC area or Texas.
Typically Arabs are closer, Indo-Pak-Bang are closer, Nigerians/blacks closer. etc. etc.
You feel this way due to mehman dari of Pakistanis. Pakistanis are a very Islamic oriented people and fiercely proud of our history and our identity. Naturally Muslims of BD will be seen favorably by us.
However it is not limited to only BD, but to other Muslims as well, esp Arabs, Turks, Iranians, and Afghans.
I consider myself fairly knowledgeable in the realm of languages, as in addition to the languages I speak, I am also learning Turkish and Farsi. I can understand fair amount of those languages due to the commonality with them and the Pakistani variant of Urdu (which is almost like a dialect of Dari at highest levels.)
I cannot make head or tales of the Bangla language, the origin is completely different. I read once that it is similar to Pali, which ancient Buddhist scriptures were written in.
But certainly not the case in the NYC area or Texas.
It is. You just don't see it from the Pakistani perspective. All old neighborhoods of Pakistanis in NYC are Bengali and Indian now. None of Pakistanis like it.
They will never say it to your face, because that is against spirit of mehman dari which I explained above.
Pakistanis won't even insult Indian Hindu who is abusing Pakistan due to this same spirit of mehman dari. We will move away and share our real feelings with Pakistanis or other Muslims.
