One thing I would cation, though, is that the person you ask may not always know the full or even correct answer, especially if the country they’re from is not homogeneous or if they haven’t lived there recently.

For example, my husband was recently irritated by a documentary on India produced by the BBC & PBS. There were a fair number of things to criticize about the documentary, but I’m thinking specifically about a part where the host asked people off the street to explain the story & history behind a particular Hindu ritual they were performing. As Aditya said, “being Hindu doesn’t mean that you know everything there is to know about Hinduism.” The guy in the documentary gave a very basic & slightly jumbled explanation that even I recognized as “off”. We both wished they had interviewed scholars who had actually studied the material in depth.

So it’s important to remember when asking questions of individuals from a particular culture that it’s not fair to either the culture or the individual to expect one person to have a complete & objective understanding of the thing you’re wondering about.