Thursday, December 24, 2009

Pictails

R is a one of a kind colleague. Referred to as C1 in an earlier post, R is known for his whacky humor, albeit unintentional mostly. What else can you say about a man who generates quotable quotes like “I have played tennis both before and after B-school and during B-school”.

Another salient feature of R’s is his willingness to go for tea, whether before tea or after tea or during tea. To put it in a nutshell, when other people are asked, ‘How are you?’ their reflex reply is ‘Fine’. When R is asked, ‘Tea?’ his reflex reply is ‘Chalo’. No matter what time of the day it is, whether he needs tea for the sake of tea or to give company to others, R is always game for the break. And, these tea table conversations are hilarious to say the least, you must very well have figured out owing to whom.

Though I cannot give you inside jokes and not-to-be-shared-in-public office anecdotes out here, there is something else I am dying to share. R is so serious about these tea breaks that every time there is one looming around the corner (which is extremely frequent – 11, 3, 4.30, 6.30), he invites us through e-mail with innovative pictures or text messages. Actually, one can expect a ‘pictail’ (pictorial mail) from R at the most unexpected of times, not just during tea breaks.

Here goes some unlimited fun, which is so totally not attributable to me except for having patiently collected the pictails over the past 5 months.

Starting with the tamer ones:

Lunch Invite


Tea Invite


Tea Invite to a colleague who is busy and says, “Let’s go after 10 minutes”

Sub: P stop acting busy!!!

And come for Tea….


After 10 minutes, when P says “Let’s go for tea”

Green Signal!!


And then, when we are all busy and are not able to make it to tea sharp at 4 a really angry mail


When a new employee joins office, the pictail is

Folks,

After a long drought almighty has blessed us with a new sheep. Let’s use this opportunity to fleece the sheep. In other words, treat time!

Regds,

R


Finally, when there is some secret gossip to be shared amongst the gang,



Wednesday, December 16, 2009

The Baasha fight to fame

As the readers of this blog are slightly aware from here, my Hindi is thoda khamzor. That was my tagline in Mumbai, when I spoke to anyone ranging from the doodh wallah to the taxi wallah to the apartment security guard.

“Bhaiyya mera hindi thoda khamzor hai”

That would sound weird to the normal reader. However, people who know me well know quite well the extent of my fluency in Hindi. Ok, forget them, any of you tell me how I possibly can converse with the apartment’s Marathi security guard this way:

“Bhaiyya, oopar paani nahi aa raha hai. Motor mein kya problem? Motor wallah nahin aaya repairing ke liye? 4 hours hua hai abhi tak koi nahi aaya? What the hell will I do without water?!

Or, with the Bihari taxi wallah like this:

“Bhaiyya, yahan se seedha jaayiye, phir aage second right pe white car ke paas ek shop hai na, wahaan ek minute stop kar dijiye. Uske baad Bandra mein ek friend ko fast pick up karna hai.”

Half the time, I would forget that jaldi is what should replace fast. And, of course, there is always the eternal dhed, dhaai problem. I am still not sure which one is 1.5 and which one 2.5. It is quite some magic that I remember that aadha is 0.5.

Aisi haalath mein I could never have risked walking down the roads of Mumbai without a sticker on my forehead saying “Thoda khamzor Hindi, Beware!” Well, almost! I started warning everyone I met with the Thoda Khamzor tagline. The very predictable response I always got (accompanied by something between a smile and laugh) was “Aap Taaaamil hai kya?!”

A story on that will be quite a digression, let’s save it for another day.

The point of this post was to let all of you know that I have come miles from the thoda khamzor girl I used to be, so much so that I have started composing wonderful poems which might some day become famous songs in Bollywood movies.

As faithful readers of my blog, I thought you all should get a sneak preview of these masterpieces before they go public and I start earning millions.

Here goes my favorite:

Hamare Rashtra Basha ko Zindabad

Main nahi bulaiya tereko, Sinbad

Zindabad hai Zinabad

Uske bad

Sab kuch Barbaad!!!!

Manage, on reading this poem, was all praise. He said no one could ever have started the first line with Zindabad and ended the poem with Barbaad. He is still in awe of my immense exponential progress with the Hindi language.

The next one is something I thought up today, while I was struggling to finish some damned Excel work.

Khatarnaak hoon mein

Hindi mein bolne ki pehle

Khadak hoon mein

Hindi mein bolne mein

Joker hoon mein

Hindi mein bolne ki baad!

I need to own up to something here. I actually do not know the meaning of Khadak, just added it for the ‘rhyme value’. And, when I came to Joker, I was stuck with no Hindi equivalent for hours. And, having a bunch of pure blood Tams working around me did not help the cause. So, readers, please bear with it till Kavity is back with the next set of khatarnaak‘ly’ improvised poems!

Thab Thak Pyaar se Aap sab ki dost,

Kavity

(Edit: Thanks to 'Butt'ah for advising me to change 'ka' to 'ki')

P.S. Definitely dedicated to FinalsPrep_Marketing (Nice Try) (same guys linked above) for having encouraged me to talk all the nonsense Hindi in the world :D