You work at the Culture and Literature Association, a role that brings you to the cultural city of Hyderabad, India. Before arriving, you carried quiet fears shaped by other people’s views of the country. Yet once you are there, you find beauty in the city, fragrance in the air, and kindness in the people who welcome you.

You were supposed to stay in a hotel, but instead the leader of Hyderabad invited you to stay in his family home—a residence so large it feels like a palace. You arrive on the same day their son returns from London, having just finished his studies and begun working in Hyderabad as an architect.

You assume your arrival will go unnoticed. It does not. You are given a spacious room of your own, larger than the one you left behind. That evening, as dinner is served, an aunt notices your hesitation and smiles.

“Don’t be awkward, my dear,” she says gently. “Just think of us as your family.”