In the West, holidays are a break from life. In India, life is the holiday. There is a festival every week.

No article on Indian lifestyle is complete without addressing the pink elephant in the room: Yoga. But the story of Yoga in India is vastly different from the $80 Lululemon yoga pants version in New York.

The Culture Story: In India, Yoga is not about flexibility; it is about discipline. The Sadhu (holy man) in Rishikesh is not trying to get a "summer body." He is trying to sit still for four hours without thinking of food. The lifestyle story here is about minimalism. It is the story of the corporate executive who drives an Audi but wakes up at 4 AM to practice Pranayama (breath control) because his grandfather did it. It is the story of a nation that believes that the mind is a garden that must be weeded daily.

Every Indian lane, regardless of religion, has a sacred spot. It could be a Peepal tree wrapped in red thread, a small Hanuman temple, or a Sufi dargah.

The Culture Story: The story of Ramesh, a Muslim mechanic, who turns off his radio every Tuesday because his Hindu neighbor is singing bhajans (devotional songs) next door. It is the story of the Sikh Gurudwara that serves hot lentil soup to anyone, regardless of caste or creed, 24/7. The Indian lifestyle is a continuous act of walking a tightrope between faiths. We have "secularism" in our constitution, but in our blood, we have "Sarva Dharma Sambhava" (equal respect for all religions). The culture story is not about conversion; it is about coexistence.