This sentence clashed with my world model so hard I had to stop here and think. Not only because I didn’t have this association between rituals and candles from my own culture, but also that I didn’t know candles were so frequent in rituals elsewhere. Rituals here in India also frequently involve flame, but almost always in the form of clay or brass lamps. Candles are more of a functional, utilitarian thing, and I’d subconsciously assumed that was the case worldwide (except a few occasional events like Hanukkah).
In my mind, candles are associated with being poor—having power cuts, not being able to afford emergency backup lights, and so having to endure the slight smoke and poor light of a candle. I’d seen the Twitter conversation above previously, and imagined someone buying $3600 worth of plain white 1¢ candles—I saw it as just weird millenial humour, never did it cross my mind that someone might actually buy expensive candles and spend comparable amounts.
I don’t know if I have a point, except to say it’s weird to be part of a group that generally has similar interests, and then suddenly get reminded of jarring IRL differences in our lives that this medium can’t—usually—convey.
This sentence clashed with my world model so hard I had to stop here and think. Not only because I didn’t have this association between rituals and candles from my own culture, but also that I didn’t know candles were so frequent in rituals elsewhere. Rituals here in India also frequently involve flame, but almost always in the form of clay or brass lamps. Candles are more of a functional, utilitarian thing, and I’d subconsciously assumed that was the case worldwide (except a few occasional events like Hanukkah).
In my mind, candles are associated with being poor—having power cuts, not being able to afford emergency backup lights, and so having to endure the slight smoke and poor light of a candle. I’d seen the Twitter conversation above previously, and imagined someone buying $3600 worth of plain white 1¢ candles—I saw it as just weird millenial humour, never did it cross my mind that someone might actually buy expensive candles and spend comparable amounts.
I don’t know if I have a point, except to say it’s weird to be part of a group that generally has similar interests, and then suddenly get reminded of jarring IRL differences in our lives that this medium can’t—usually—convey.