The Chinese civilisation is one of the oldest and most fascinating in the world. Even though very different from India, the West often lumps the two together as part of the ‘exotic’ East. Ironically, China clubs India and the West together as Indo-European cultures that are highly speculative, obsessed with philosophy, and hardly pragmatic.The one thing that separates India from both the West and China is faith in rebirth that forms the cornerstone of Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. Also, Indian religions value thoughts over things, unlike both the West and China.

Yes, the idea of rebirth did spread to the rest of the East via Buddhism, but it remained in the background, never as central as it was in the Indian subcontinent. The Chinese therefore clung on to their older practices of ancestor worship, building tombs and storing urns of ashes, not seen in cultures rooted in rebirth.