I (34M) spent a couple of months in India earlier this year for a consulting project with my engineering firm. Before I left, my sister-in-law (29F), who is from India, asked me to take plenty of pictures during my trip. She said she wanted to see the places I visited and was excited for me to experience her home country and see how things might have changed since I was in the state she grew up in but hasn’t been back in years. But she did not specify what pictures she wanted.
Since the project lasted a while, I had free time outside of work on weekends and holidays. I used that time to explore. I did visit some of the popular landmarks with my coworkers, but to be honest, I didn’t find them that impressive compared to places like Rome or Paris, so I only took a few pictures.
What I found more interesting was seeing how people actually live in different parts of the country. As an engineer, I like observing housing, infrastructure, and sanitation, even in poorer areas. I have done the same thing when I visited Egypt and Somalia. It helps me also appreciate what I have. So most of my pictures ended up being of slums, rivers full of trash, people washing clothes or bathing in polluted water, and just the daily life of people in less fortunate areas. For India it was particularly intetesting to me since my country has a lot of immigration from there recently and I was looking to understand their culture and roots more deeply.
When I got back, my sister-in-law was eager to see the photos. I handed her my phone, and after scrolling for a bit she got upset. She asked why I only took pictures of “filth” and said I made her country look terrible. I told her that was not my intention and that I just find those things fascinating. She got really angry and said I must be insane or obsessed with poverty.
My wife thinks she overreacted but also understands why she was upset. I genuinely did not mean any disrespect, and I do the same kind of photography everywhere I go.
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I (34M) spent a couple of months in India earlier this year for a consulting project with my engineering firm. Before I left, my sister-in-law (29F), who is from India, asked me to take plenty of pictures during my trip. She said she wanted to see the places I visited and was excited for me to experience her home country and see how things might have changed since I was in the state she grew up in but hasn’t been back in years. But she did not specify what pictures she wanted.
Since the project lasted a while, I had free time outside of work on weekends and holidays. I used that time to explore. I did visit some of the popular landmarks with my coworkers, but to be honest, I didn’t find them that impressive compared to places like Rome or Paris, so I only took a few pictures.
What I found more interesting was seeing how people actually live in different parts of the country. As an engineer, I like observing housing, infrastructure, and sanitation, even in poorer areas. I have done the same thing when I visited Egypt and Somalia. It helps me also appreciate what I have. So most of my pictures ended up being of slums, rivers full of trash, people washing clothes or bathing in polluted water, and just the daily life of people in less fortunate areas.
When I got back, my sister-in-law was eager to see the photos. I handed her my phone, and after scrolling for a bit she got upset. She asked why I only took pictures of “filth” and said I made her country look terrible. I told her that was not my intention and that I just find those things fascinating. She got really angry and said I must be insane or obsessed with poverty.
My wife thinks her sister overreacted but also understands why she was upset. I genuinely did not mean any disrespect, and I do the same kind of photography everywhere I go.
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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> I did not take more traditional pictures of India when my sister in law requested to take pictures but I did take pictures this might make me an asshole since I did not take the kind of pictures she wantef and did not bother asking her.
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Contest mode is 1.5 hours long on this post.
Bro. If you moved to another country, heard your in-law was visiting your home country, asked for pics to relieve some homesickness, would you be happy if they only took pictures of trash and poverty?
YTA.
Is your wife’s sister Indian but your wife is not?
Confusing post. You brought home pictures of trash, dude.
I think you knew what she expected to see, especially since you were visiting her childhood home.
Instead, you basically showed her only the worst of the area.
If this is your typical focus while traveling, you should have told her that up front.
YTA.
She may not have specified what pictures she wanted, but clearly she didn’t want pictures of poverty and filth. It wouldn’t have hurt you to take a few extra pictures for your sister-in-law. That would’ve been the kind thing for you to do. YTA.
YTA (kind of)
Couldn’t you have kept the pictures of trash and poverty that you find so interesting to yourself?
You could have shown her the good pictures and just apologized for not taking more.
NTA
Im an engineer also so I get what you mean about being interest in things different than “normal” people.
If SIL wanted pictures of specific things, then she should have asked.
If she’s upset by what the area really looks like, that’s her issue.
YTA. You spent two months in her home country and the one simple thing she asked for was pictures of the beautiful parts she misses. She didn’t ask you to ignore the reality of the poverty, but she probably wanted to see the iconic landmarks, the beautiful architecture or even just modern city life.
Oof – YTA. It’s not the engineer interested in the way people live. It’s your attitude.
You couldn’t be arsed to take some pictures of landmarks for your homesick SIL because they “didn’t live up to Rome or Paris”? You say you do the same kind of poverty-tourism photos everywhere but then quote two white European cities as superior so you didn’t bother maintaining family relations.
Yta and it sounds like you did it on purpose
NTA. If she misses India so much, she should visit there herself or look at some street view pics from Google Maps, but it isn’t hard to take a few pics. At least she didn’t ask you to buy anything.
It’s very clear that you have different interests than she does.
NAH — You took pictures of things that interested you on your trip while your SIL is disappointed you didn’t take photos of what she wanted you to see so she could talk to you about it.
So, while you could probably have taken more normal/touristy photos to fulfill her request, she has every right to be disappointed by the photos you did take, and I don’t see either action/reaction as being an AH.
You’re one of the hundreds of assholes who go I want to see authenticity and only consider poverty authenticity in Asian and African countries
YTA
It would have been nice to get more traditional tourist pictures for her sake but this was a work trip and you spent your off time exploring things that actually interested you. It’s not your responsibility to explore things that don’t interest you and it’s not your fault that she’s offended by the reality of her home town and what is legitimately happening there. You’re not a mind-reader and she didn’t specify any points of interest.
NTA. She doesn’t get to be offended about your fascinations. If she wanted a curated photograph collection she should have specified what she wanted.
Really weird to take photos of people bathing YTA
You say
>She said she wanted to see… how things might have changed since I was in the state she grew up in but hasn’t been back in years.
So she told you exactly what she wanted. If you didn’t know what areas were familiar to her why didn’t you ask at any point during your trip? Or just politely decline?
If it was just that I’d say it was a communication issue and not necessarily asshole behavior. The reason YTA is this:
>I did visit some of the popular landmarks… I didn’t find them that impressive compared to places like Rome or Paris
>most of my pictures ended up being of slums, rivers full of trash, people washing clothes or bathing in polluted water, and just the daily life of people in less fortunate areas.
>I have done the same thing when I visited Egypt and Somalia. It helps me also appreciate what I have
>For India it was particularly intetesting to me since my country has a lot of immigration from there recently and I was looking to understand their culture and roots more deeply.
I don’t know how to read this as anything other than racism. There’s no reason to compare India’s landmarks (negatively) to European landmarks, and the mention Egypt and Somalia in that context makes your attitude toward your wife’s home country pretty clear. But the fact that you think your homemade poverty porn will help you understand immigrants to your home country doesn’t really leave any room for doubt about your intentions here.
I feel so sorry for your wife. For her sake I hope you put some real effort into examining your racist beliefs and improving yourself but ime people like you aren’t very introspective or willing to change.
You are absolutely The Asshole.
You wrote“It helps me also appreciate what I have.”. This might look as if you look India inferior to your country. Though it is not your intention, it would appear for your sister in law that you ignored all the beauty of her native country and just recorded how poor and undeveloped it was…..