I once heard someone say that true love is sharing your popcorn. Not offering a few pieces out of politeness. Actually handing over the bucket without thinking twice about it.

At first, I laughed at how absurdly simple that sounded. Then I thought about it a little more. People guard popcorn with surprising seriousness. Sharing it usually means comfort. Familiarity. Trust. The kind of silent understanding where nobody needs to ask permission anymore.

Oddly enough, the thought came back to me while I was reading about India and Israel.

And the more I have written about India and Israel, the more I think the relationship between these two countries resembles that kind of quiet familiarity. Not the dramatic version of friendship governments perform during state visits, but the slower kind built over decades through films, migration, food, memory, technology, tourism, and ordinary human interaction.

Most people describe India-Israel relations through missiles, intelligence cooperation, agriculture, or trade. Those things matter, obviously. But they are only part of the story.

The more interesting story is happening somewhere else entirely. It is happening in Bollywood archives, in Israeli homes where old Hindi songs still play, in cafés in Kasol filled with Hebrew conversations, in Indian students watching Fauda late at night, and in the strange cultural comfort two very different societies have slowly developed with one another over time.

That is the relationship I want to talk about.

Every serious relationship has its origin story. India and Israel have cavalry charges, covert arms shipments, agricultural partnerships, and billion-dollar trade corridors. These are important moments in the relationship. They are the photographs leaders frame and diplomats revisit during speeches. A flower named after a prime minister. A wreath laid at a soldier’s grave. A handshake at an agricultural fair that later reshaped irrigation practices across Indian states.

But relationships are rarely defined by ceremonial moments alone.

What people remember most often comes later, during ordinary evenings when nobody is performing for an audience. You learn more about someone while watching a film together than you do during a formal introduction. Shared habits matter more than grand declarations.

Writing about the India-Israel relationship from my small corner of central India, I have slowly come to believe that these two countries have been quietly sharing their popcorn for generations without fully realizing it themselves.

The Women Who........

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