Do you think we are a diverse species? Meaning ... do you think every person is so different from the rest? Think again. Its believed that human beings are very similar to each other at the DNA level; in other words, we share 99.5% genes from other human beings. This means that, two people anywhere on this earth are more similar than two chimps from the same troop. For whatever reasons this is so, yet the fact remains that its only by 0.5% that we differ and this 0.5% pretty much makes us look like what we are - diverse!

But what is so fantastic about all this is the amount of diversity and amount of differences that 0.5% has created. Except monozygotic twins, you can NEVER find two people who look alike (except in Indian movies of course!). Every person's nose is so differently shaped ... fingerprints never match ... the orientation of teeth never match ... a combination of nature and nuture has led to an explosion of phenotypes.

Americans ... for example ... sometimes I feel are an entirely different species. They look nothing like you. Their nature ... features ... ideas ... principles ... its all SO different. They have bigger personalities ... mature very early (who can believe Hannah Montana or Miley Cyrus is just 17yrs of age) ... they have this irresistable urge to party every other night ... their accent's weird (sometimes a little fake too) ... if their hair is black, they have used dye ... they do not know any other country apart from India, Africa (which Americans think is a country), Iraq, Pakistan, Palestine and Israel ... and they know these mostly because about prevalent diseases, existing poverty (they must have watched Slumdog Millionaire) or these countries are possessing potential weapons of mass destruction. They are a different species alright ... it feels like you are an alien trespassing on their planet.

I once tried explaining to a friend about the stem cell research in NCBS, Bangalore. He gasped in surprise and almost choked on the pizza he was gobbling ... "Isn't it true that poor kids get their eyes popped out and are sent on streets for begging in India?" asked he. I'm talking about stem cells and he's more interested to know the death toll on a normal day in India. Take these species of organisms to your country and there are only 2 things they wish to see ... the Taj Mahal ... and the slums of Juhu and Dharavi.

But there are times ... times when I think ... they are NO different from us. Its on really stupid occasions ... but its on these occasions when it actually strikes me hard that we are no different after all. We are all descendants from an Adam and Eve, if you will, and hence related to each other. Mitochondrial DNA gets maternally transferred from parents to offspring. The 'Y' chromosome in males gets paternally transferred. This means that, mitochondrial DNA of Eve and Y chromosome of Adam has linearly come down through generations and is within us now. Ever seen an American coughing? He/she coughs just like you. Ever seen one eating a banana? During a tennis match, at the time-out period, Martina Hingis was gobbling up a banana. My little cousin was so surprised at this and she innocently asked me, "Do they eat banana too?" Somehow, that process sounded too Indian for her. Seen someone crying? Seen old people in the bus? Don't they resemble so much like our grandparents except for the fact that here they know English ... and they have weird looking attires. Seen anyone get hurt? Do you recall that their blood was red too? I always know that I am way too different from anybody else ... yet sometimes, at the weirdest of moments, reality strikes and I see our similar phenotypes surfacing. Its those times I feel that we are all so much the same in so many respects ... and yet we fight, bicker, quarrel, kill, and harm ... because we are so different from each other ... and because we are so much the same.