China Rose

On my way to work this morning, I picked up this flower. Bangla naam- Jawba phool. Scientific name- Hibiscus rosa sinensis. The two names have very different meanings for me. I taught a class on post-structural feminism recently. It took me a long time and multiple attempts of hitting my head on the wall to understand what is post-structuralism, what is feminism, and what is post-structural feminism in this context. However, it did help me develop an appreciation for the symbolic meanings of language once I vaguely understood the concept well enough to be able to teach it.

Jawba phool reminds me of Ma Kali. Of Shibpur, Howrah. And hajar haath Kali (goddess Kali with thousand hands, you should look up her picture. It gives me goosebumps, she looks so jagrata, so alive). All these are memories from my childhood, visiting hajar haath kali mondir in Shibpur and coming home to my grandparents’ place armed with two big bags of steaming hot boma. Boma means a bomb, and Chondi'r boma is the best alu’r chop that you will ever find. The story goes that Chondi, the inventor of boma, uses a secret spice recipe that no one else in the world has been able to replicate, and this humble family business over 3 generations did so well that he built a three-storey house. I do not know how much of this is true, but I do know that my mom spent years of her childhood bonding over boma with school friends, and I haven’t had it in decades now. So if anyone could get me hot bomas from Shibpur, you are my best friend for the rest of my life!

I don’t know how I jumped from jawba phool to boma, but the other name, Hibiscus rosa sinensis, opens up a whole new world of memories for me. I am in the ninth grade and Mrs. Khurana is our biology teacher. She has just taught us how to eviscerate the flower along its longitudinal axis to expose the reproductive contents using a dissecting needle. The catch is that during the practical exam, you only get one flower and one try to get it right. Sometimes, even surgeons are not as skilled as is expected of a 14 year-old. This would be followed by my vague attempt to neatly draw and label the parts of the flower, something I hated doing. I am so bad at drawing and sketching, I could not even draw a pumpkin, forget drawing the private parts of a dissected flower. I spent a good few months of my childhood surreptitiously plucking red flowers from the landlord’s garden and practicing my surgery skills on them. I might not know how to cook biryani or write R codes, but I can surely show you the reproductive parts of this red flower.

And of course now, the flower reminds me of the three-year old grandson of our neighbor who religiously sings me “mayer paye jawba hoye” in his mellifluous voice every time we meet. It is a devotional song dedicated to Ma Kali which means something like- I will be the flower of your feet.

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A heavy conversation

I was standing in the corridor watching the grey skies, enjoying the nice breeze and minding my business, hoping that it would rain. I felt someone walk by behind me and then stop.

"You've lost weight, no?"

I cringed. I remembered attending a gathering recently when someone said that if you have to compliment someone, you don't have to say, "You look nice, have you lost/gained weight?" Just say, "You look nice," and leave it at that. Don't add your expert opinion about why that person is looking nice. I loved it!

So back to this impending conversation. Whenever someone tells me something like this, I have this inexplicable need to justify why they might be mis-observing. My usual replies are:

No, it must be an optical illusion... hahaha!

No, I just got a haircut and look different.

No, I am just wearing bright colored, fitting clothes.

These justifications are unnecessary. It doesn't matter whether I have lost weight or not, I could just give them the answer they want to hear, and they will leave me alone. In this case, I had two options- a yes or a no. If I said that no, I have not lost weight, that would prolong the conversation about why that person is right and I am wrong. Very calmly, I said, "Yes, I have lost weight."

I thought that the conversation is over, that the person would leave me alone and move on with life. They did not. I was not anticipating what came next.

"I will not be diplomatic and say that you did not need to lose weight. You did. And looks like you have indeed lost weight."

I grimaced as the seemingly well-meaning person walked away. I so hope that commenting on body weight becomes unconstitutional and banned by law someday! Like I say, there are mostly four unimaginative ways many people greet me here---

Roga hoye gechish!
Mota hoye gechish!
Kalo hoye gechish!
Forsha hoye gechish!

You've lost weight!
You've gained weight!
You've tanned!
You've become light-skinned!

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Country Rap

Have you noticed how Bengali expats who congregate with other Bengali expats at the airport and bond while bitching about how India will never improve usually share certain common attributes?

One, they usually wear GAP or Nike clothing.

Two, the farther they get from the US (or the closer they get to India), the louder their rants get. They might not be as vocal in Houston or Seattle but will be very loud in Dubai. Perhaps the humid Dubai air makes them realize that shit is about to get real in a few hours.

Three, the rants are always, always in English. Ninde korar belaye accent diye Ingriji.

Based on what people say, it is easy to predict who is who.

"Ayi saala suorer bachcha plane ta deri koralo" -- A Bengali from India.

"Can't believe nothing runs on time. It's always sooo hard to get things done in India. This country will never improve" -- naak oonchoo expat whose patriotism is confined to missing and discussing aam jaam lichu tyangra lyangra on Facebook but dreads every moment of their trip to India. 

A curious spectator (sunshine).

Speak your language, not theirs

At the Kati Roll Company, we were enjoying our kati rolls, adda (conversation), and the reunion we had after a year. A group of young girls sat at the table next to us.

Soon, an oddly dressed young man joined their table. Given my ignorance about popular American fashion, I could not say if he was a style icon, or generally poorly dressed. When the girls smiled sheepishly at him, I thought that they knew each other. But the girls started to leave their table, clearly uncomfortable. They might be planning to leave anyway, but our young man surely facilitated their departure.

By now, my colleague and I were curious spectators. The man had a drawl, maybe he was drunk and stoned and anything in between. The girls left, and the man walked further inside the restaurant with confidence, calling out to more people. I could not see any further after that. I told my colleague about my disappointment that four girls could not confront a man and ran away, validating him and fueling his courage in the process.

Sometime later, the man came back to us, of all the tables. I could not understand what he said but recognized a mishmash of words that occasionally sounded like baby and boob. Sure, all babies need boobs for nourishment, but I don't think that was what he meant. I saw red! I am allergic to people calling me baby, and I didn't ask for an assessment of my boobs. He walked towards us with an intention of joining our table.

“Dada, ki bolchen bujhte parchina, Banglaye bolun,” I said out loud enough to turn a few heads in our direction. (Please speak in Bangla, I cannot understand what you are saying, I said).

The man was momentarily stunned. Of all the things he would have anticipated, a sharp reply in Bangla was outside his syllabus of imagination.

He has some nerve, he asked me to speak in English, with more references to baby and boobs. I lost it.

“Banglaye katha na bolle hobe? Boshe boshe meyeder theke khisti khachhen, bujhteo to parchen na. Ingriji te katha bolte parbo na, amake niye jokhon katha bolchen, amar bhashaye katha bolun aage.”

The more I spoke in Bangla, the more confused he got. It had never occurred to him that he would not be able to communicate to a girl something as simple as a lecherous remark about body anatomy. With a horrified expression, he started to leave the restaurant.

“Arrey paliye jachhen keno, adda maarben na?" was the last thing I said before he scampered out.

Looks like my “confuse your enemy” ploy worked wonderfully, although it was unplanned, untested, and impulsive. Whatever the guy had expected from us (shame, discomfort), being reprimanded in a foreign language was outside his imagination. This strategy might have failed if he had a gun or knife or if it was late in the night. I do not know. What I know is that in the heart of Manhattan, my mother tongue gave me the confidence to confront, confuse and belittle a man, and drive him away. I could have given him a piece of my mind in English. However, communicating and engaging with him was not my goal. Whenever you speak in the language of the enemy, you validate and empower the enemy.

Speak to your enemies and speak to them in your own language (and not their language). Chances are that the enemy will not understand your language. If they did, then they would not be enemies. I use the word “language” metaphorically here.

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Things I learned as faculty: Unconscious bias

As faculty, I have learned to be more cognizant of unconscious bias, how people view me and what’s going on around me. Sometimes, in a room full of people who do not know me, some assume that I am a student. This has happened at conferences and board meetings. In the same room, some people will talk to other faculty as faculty but ask me what year of my PhD program I am in.

It is tempting to get flattered and think that I look young, and hence the misunderstanding. However, this has nothing got to do with age. Many people are subconsciously primed to think of women and minorities as holding lower positions. White faculty, brown student. Male faculty, female student. Male doctor, female nurse. People are not evil but they just do not know any better.

If it was about age, they would assume I am young faculty, not an older student. I always use this as a teachable moment for my minority students. I sense those few seconds of discomfort when I calmly tell them that I am not a student. However, I do not take my position for granted.

For example, I never wear jeans and informal clothes to work. I am always in semi-formals or formals. I don’t care whether people think I am a student because those are their biases to deal with. However, I am immensely aware of the responsibility my position brings, not just for me, but for others who are training to be faculty. My colleague next door will wear denims, sports jacket and running shoes and no one will flip an eyelid. However, I cannot assume that I will be treated like a faculty if I wore the same kind of clothes. We do not live in an ideal world. We don’t get what we deserve. We get what we negotiate.

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Mother tongue speaks the loudest

The sign outside my office door has my name written in English and my mother tongue, Bangla. This creates quite a stir in the busy hallway with students, teachers, faculty, and other people walking around.

At the least, people stop and take a close look before walking away.

And some stop to tell me how beautiful it looks, asking me what language it is.

Some keep the conversation going, wanting to know more about the place I come from.

And some come inside my office, wanting to know what their name looks like in Bangla. They always leave my office very excited at having seen their name written in a foreign language.

This has sparked many a long, important discussions, about the history of languages, language politics, the brain of those who speak multiple languages, colonization of the English language around the world, diversity and immigrant power, and so on.

Some people are so inspired that they want their names written in Bangla too, just like mine. Because it's not fair that they can speak and write only in English whereas I have the advantage of flaunting my knowledge in multiple languages.

Of course, I did not plan any of this. All I have wanted for the longest time is to have my own office one day, and have my name written in my mother tongue along with English. And so I did, sparking so many joyful, interesting, and important conversations in the process. I know so many more people in the building now, just because they stop by to read my name, introduce themselves, and ask me to write their names in Bangla too. And that is the power of the human connection.

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Connecting and communicating

"Ma'am, I have a doubt. How can I write this in the CV?"

There is language. And then, there is the culture of language. This line written in an email by someone seeking career advice from India opened floodgates of nostalgia. I used to speak the same English many years ago. "I have a doubt" in Indian English equates to "I have a question" in American English. Doubting something is a different thing altogether. I went back to my old documents, looking at the research statement I had written for graduate school in 2005. In my current age and wisdom, that can hardly qualify as a research statement, a page full of lofty ideas and goals of changing the world with no clear focus. If I was in the selection committee reading my essay from 11 years ago, I would have never admitted myself in the program. It's a miracle I made it. 

As I prepare to say goodbye to my host in Berlin, she tells me in a mix of broken English and German that she will miss having me around and will look forward to seeing me again. She was the one who hosted me last year as well, and although this is a pay-money-provide-service relationship (I was staying at her family-run place), she goes out of her way to touch my hand warmly and make me feel at home. I reciprocate, this time in my broken German and English, that her place is the only one I know as home in Berlin. I call her a day later to thank her and let her know I have reached home, and she is delighted. Language is not a barrier between us anymore.

And then, I receive an email from a close friend saying that she has been offered a faculty position at one of the top schools in her field. We have known each other for decades, and I am thrilled. But her words are filled with doubt and anxiety. In her email, she confesses that she is scared as hell and does not know how she will do well. Her self-doubt mirrors mine and her humility and honesty renews my soulful connection with her. That is the exact way I have been feeling as well. I have no idea how to be faculty. To see the same sentiments reflected in a person of high caliber with extensive training from several Ivy League schools only shows me how we are all human, sometimes terrified and vulnerable. I assure her that it will all be fine, that she is already a role model to many (including me) because of her achievements, and she will do great. I tell her that I have decided to frame those damn degrees on the wall facing me in office (as brilliantly suggested by a friend) so that whenever in self-doubt, those degrees will remind me of the immense amount of hard work and motivation it has taken to get to this point. In my friend's insecurities, I feel a renewed connection with her.

And just like that, in three different events with three different people on a random day, language connects my past, present, and future. A young and starry-eyed girl from India whose writing reminds me of who I used to be through our shared cultural nuances of language, a German lady who makes me feel at home in an unknown city despite her broken English and my broken German, and a childhood friend with a stellar career in whom I surprisingly see my insecurities mirrored because of the honest note she writes me.  

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Lost in (Deutsche) Translation

I don’t know how you started your new year, but I can tell you how I started mine. By logging in to my German bank account, to see if they deposited my salary on time. Not that the Germans have ever been tardy. However, even after all these years, I get a kick out of seeing my bank balance slightly go up at the beginning of every month.

I typed in my user id and password, to get the following message in German (that I Google translated):

“Dear Customer,

Your account has been due to PIN input errors provisionally blocked for security reasons. However, you have the possibility to revoke the provisional ban by entering your valid PIN and using a valid TAN. Please enter the current PIN twice, and confirm on the following page to enter a transaction number (TAN). Please note that a final PIN lock is carried out by an erroneous entry of the PIN. The final PIN lock can then be lifted by your institution.”

Honestly, I have no idea what they are talking about. What PIN? What TAN? What institution?

You see, my entire banking happens in German. Despite claiming to have an “international” customer base, they do nothing for international customers who understand “Kein Deutsch oder nur ein bisschen Deutsch” (no German or very little German). The customer service representative speaks in German, and gets upset if I do not reply in German. The bank emails go out in German. Last month, they deducted some money, and I have no idea why they did, because they stated some random reason, all in German. So now, I will have to catch hold of someone bilingual at work, log in to my bank account, have them call my bank, and figure out why I cannot access my account, and what made the bank take my money without telling me about it. It’s a constant struggle, a constant uphill battle everyday. To understand, and be understood.

“This is how we do it. Sorry.”

“You should have spent more time learning German seriously.”

“Don’t worry. You will figure it out. You have a PhD.”

“It was your choice to move. Why complain now?”

These are just some of the many things I am told that do not make any sense to me. And this message from the bank, all written in German, has been the summary of my life in Germany so far. Get stumped by something totally mindless, like checking the bank account. Get stuck. Wait patiently, trying to figure it out. Ask for help. Wait to get help. Get help. Thank people after getting help. Move on, until the next roadblock.

What it results in is huge cognitive overload. Getting stuck to do even the simple things. Putting the more important things on hold as a result. And wasting a lot of time in the process. A perfect example of how a familiar language can be the elixir of your life, your connection to the world. And how an unfamiliar language can become the bane of your existence, isolating you from the more local experiences, the people, and create a schism between you and your social world.

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Little “issues”, big “issues”

Language and its many contextual nuances are so interesting. Sure, us Indians in America all know that "pass out" means graduated, rubber is eraser, bathrooms are restrooms, baths are showers, notes are bills, bills are checks, brinjals are eggplants, and so on. 

But I was surprised and amused at the same time to see that children/babies are referred as "issues" in Indian English. Now whether it is a slang or used only by a subset of people with issues in life, I have no idea. However, this discovery was as a result of hearing some seemingly hilarious conversations.

They don't have any issues yet. (That's great, right?)

They have been trying to have an issue for a long time now. (What? Are they crazy?)

I am going to have an issue soon.

Are you trying to have an issue?

Yes, yes! We have been married for 5 years now, and have been trying to have issues for the past 6 years.

Okay, I made up the last one. But you get the point. And when I say I don't have any issues with you, I mean it. I neither have troubles with you, nor am I trying to make babies with you.

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Germane thoughts

One of the (not so) funny things that happens to me a lot is that when people hear that I live in Germany, they start talking to me in German. They are not the Germans. They are people who were talking to me in perfect English, Bangla, Hindi, or whatever language 2 minutes ago. It has happened to me so many times now, in person and in emails. Emails are better, I can at least go for the "German to English" dictionary. But given that I neither look, nor am German, I wonder why people do it, to get blank stares and stupid looks from me. For me, the conversation (that starts with English and ends in German) is like watching a group of graceful dancers enter the stage and dance beautifully for the first five minutes, only to slip on invisible banana peels, get derailed, and never be able to get up again.

Some of my non-German acquaintances recently wrote back to me about a professional achievement, congratulating me in German. I could only mutter a feeble danke shoen (thank you very much) in response. This is of course not the first time it has happened to me. When people hear that I grew up in Orissa and speak and understand Oriya fluently, they start talking in Oriya, which most of the times is non-sensical, gibberish words with no real Oriya meaning. Most of the time, I sit stone-faced, announcing, "This is not Oriya, this sounded more like the Azerbaijani language", only to get disapproving looks from people.

So I land in DC, and am confronted with the immigration officer. I am trying to hear him carefully, everyone speaks English with a slightly different accent even within the USA. He checks my documents and asks me something. Only that I am no longer able to understand him. I ask him thrice. I get nervous. It's never happened before that I have not been able to understand American English. I think he gets slightly irritated and asks if I speak German at all.

"nur ein bisschen" (only a little), I tell him honestly.

At which, he gets annoyed and says, "Just say nein (no)"

Okay, granted my German is not that good. But what he just spoke didn't even sound like German. It could be my unconscious bias too. When I see a non-German, I do not expect them to speak German. Or maybe I was really tired. Whatever it was, I understood not a word of what he said. These days, I know enough German to know how it sounds, even though I cannot understand the words. But the big question that still remains unanswered is, why would an American see an Indian and start speaking in German?

During a recent interview outside Germany, the interviewer started talking to me in German. Not ordinary German, but Swiss-German. Yeah, there are these classifications too. I had to request him (in jest) not to evaluate my potential for the job based on my German knowledge.

This happened at the Chicago airport too last year. The guy said something, and I started blankly. Later, my colleague told me that he was just saying goodbye.

Sometimes, things people do just don’t make any sense to me.

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For the love of language

A conversation heard in a crowded bus gave me goosebumps recently (a big reason I prefer taking the public transport rather than driving in isolation is the variety of people I get to see). In a tiny North German city, of all things, two people were conversing in Oriya!

You see, I am Bengali by ethnicity. Sure, we speak Bangla at home. However, I was never raised in Bengal. I was born in Bihar, and spent the first 16 and formative years of my life in Orissa. That's more years than I have lived anywhere else (9 in Kolkata, 8 in the US, 1 in Germany). I learnt to read and write the language in school, and used to speak fluently until I left Orissa. In school, most of my friends were native Oriya speakers. I was one of them. They were one of me.

We did not start growing roots in Bengal until my father decided to buy an apartment in Kolkata in the early nineties, forcing me to spend lonely summer vacations there. I had no friends. The topmost-floor, west-facing apartment that remained locked rest of the year was unbearably hot and smelled of concrete and cement, and the few highbrow, big-city coevals I met made no qualms in letting me know that I was not one of them and I was not welcome (although I spoke perfect Bangla with them). So I spent the summers reading voraciously, learning my Bangla alphabets at home, and finishing math chapters ahead of time. Oriya had such deep and comforting roots for me that the moment the train entered home (home being Orissa then), I would get dizzy with excitement seeing the Oriya letters imprinted bold black on a yellow background at the railway station.

It is not surprising that hearing the language after so long gave me goosebumps. A person who raises you is as much your mother as a person who gives you birth if they are not the same people. Although Bangla is my mother tongue, it is Oriya that raised me. I had barely started school when I said my first swear word (ghusuri, meaning a pig) in Oriya, long before I knew any Bangla swear words. Somehow, the other languages I spoke always stayed with me. Bangla, I speak everyday with my family or close friends. Hindi, I hear every day because of my addiction to Bollywood movies and music. But somehow, Oriya left me. I was never able to find people I could converse with on a regular basis. Suddenly, I was swept with nostalgia. I longed to visit the towns, the homes and the schools I grew up in. The guava tree where the monkeys lived and regularly invaded our home. The mango tree whose branches we used to hang ropes from, swinging with cousins in the summery afternoons. The huge black gate wherefrom our physician landlord used to enter in a bottle green ambassador every day. Such is the power of language that it took me on a 34 year long road down the memory lane.

My parents (both Bengali) have similar relationships with other languages. My mother with Hindi, and my father with Bhojpuri, because both of them spent significant years of their childhood in different places of Bihar. I wondered what language my children would yearn to hear, like I am doing for Oriya. Other than Bangla, they might grow up learning German. Or American English. I don't know. The deeper our roots grew, the wider our branches spread, the more we embraced different cultures. Maybe someday, I would feel similar nostalgia hearing German. The next time I am in Calcutta, I might make a trip to my childhood places. Walk the streets I haven't walked in 18 years. Touch the walls. Get excited reading off movie posters stuck on the walls, like I used to do as a kid. You see what havoc two strangers I heard speaking in the bus today wrought? They opened floodgates of nostalgic memories for me. They enlivened chapters from my childhood I had almost forgotten about.

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Not drinking problem

In my German learning sessions today, they dedicated an entire 30-minute unit to teaching how to say only three words (wine, beer, and restaurant), and the different variants of it. 

"Do you want to drink something? Yes, I will have a beer at your place. Or I will have a beer later, at so and so restaurant. But what will you drink? I will have wine. No, no. I will have a beer with you at that restaurant located in that street and that square. Would you also like to eat something? No, I only want to drink a beer. Excuse me. I want two beers please. Thank you." And so on ......

The thing is, I neither drink beer, nor wine. Maybe I should just learn how to say coconut water in German instead.

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A post from the post office

The last time I went to the post office, the gentleman almost barked at me, since I spoke no Deutsche. Of course why I was at the post office is a rant for a different day altogether. This time, I was prepared, armed with my knowledge from unit 1, chapter 1 of my lessons.

"Excuse me? I understand no German. Do you understand English?"

You have no idea how many times I chanted these lines in my head. My last time at Potsdam was bad. I had learned how to say simple sentences while ordering food, but when I went to the restaurant, I blanked out, and all that came out of my mouth were just keywords, "Hähnchenfleisch, essen, bitte, löffel" (Chicken, flesh, eat, please, spoon). My linguistic skills had made me want to die of shame. 

But this time, I did not want to embarrass myself. During the 20 minute bus ride, I chanted these sentences like a mantra. At the post office, I went to the lady at the counter and said, albeit in a rote fahion,

"Entschuldigen Sie. Ich verstehe kien Deutsch. Verstehen sie Englisch?"

I even said "Ainglisch", and not "English", because that is the German way of saying it. The lady smiled sweetly, and spoke to me for the rest of the time in perfect English. She did not bark or fumble or confuse me with her German-English (where the verbs are all messed up, and people ask me to "remember" them instead of "remind" them).

I need not have spoken in German at all. But the effort that went into making myself understood in the local language, and successfully so, made my day. Because on one hand, I design large-scale studies and analyze complex data for a living. But on the other hand, my language skills are no better than that of a two year old. On one hand, I write journal papers with little effort. On the other hand, I struggle to speak two lines in German. 

I might be slow, but I am working hard. I am trying to fit in.

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The language of love

My German lessons- I try to listen to 30 minute recordings of two people making daily life conversations every day. They keep repeating the lines, and that helps me learn German. 

However, listening to these conversations has also fueled my fertile imagination. It started with an innocuous hello, with the guy asking the girl if she is German, telling her that he is American, and understands only a little German.

Soon, the girl told him that his German is quite good. I smiled. Conversation flowed freely. Words were exchanged. The next time, he asked her how she is doing, and she said thank you, asking him how he is. I was not just learning German, I was also beginning to paint a rather hopelessly romantic picture in my mind. This was just lesson 3, and there were about a hundred of them. I wondered if they would be driving to see their grandchildren by the time I reached lesson 90. 

Then came the action verbs, naturally. Would you like to eat something? Maybe drink something? Yes, sure, at the restaurant by the Opera square. And they met again, and again. Sometimes on the Beethoven street, sometimes on the Goethe street. They ate dinner and drank wine. By lesson 6, they were asking one another if they would like to meet at the restaurant, or at their place. I was grinning broader with every passing day. Then, he asked her if she would like to do something. I winked instinctively. She replied aptly, saying that she would like to buy something. 

I went ahead of myself, and Googled how to say "I love you". I knew it was coming sometime soon.

Eat. Drink. Do. Buy. I kept hoping for more intimacy with every lesson. He was always asking, and she was more than willing. I knew that soon, they will be a couple, and travel Antofagasta together. Take a Flugzeug (airplane) from the Flughafen (airport). Until I reached today's lesson. He asked her again if she would like to eat something at his place.

"No."

"At 8 pm, or at 9 pm?"

"No, not at 8 pm, and not at 9 pm. Certainly not." 

"You don't want to drink something at the hotel?"

"Yes, that's right. I do not want to eat anything, and I do not want to drink anything."

Wow, that was harsh! Surely I learnt a lot of no-words today. No, don't want, certainly not, not at 8 pm, and so on. But I wonder what happened to her.

My fictional love story is beginning to see some friction now. 

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Schcolada and marmalada

I met the funniest 3 year old German dude recently. He didn't understand or speak any English. At first, he was very shy, but he gradually warmed up. When I said chocolate and marmalade, he burst out laughing (Google "English to German", and type "chocolate" and "marmalade" to listen to how these words sound in German).

When he was done laughing, he slowly enunciated every syllable of these words, the German way, as if he was teaching me to say it correctly. He wouldn't accept that I said it right too, just because he understood no English. And I totally humored him. His mom told him that I understood no German, but how does that matter? For the rest of the evening, he continued to chat with me non-stop in German, reading me stories from his storybooks, while I said those occasional "ja" and "nein" and "genau" (yes, no, exactly) as conversation fillers, with no idea about what he was telling me. He tried teaching me the names of animals and fruits. But the best part was a guy 1/11th my age laughing at me first, then teaching me how to say sho-co-la-da and mar-ma-la-da.

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Deutsch doesn’t go Dutch

If you grew up in India in the seventies or eighties and watched Doordarshan, you would remember the song, "Padhna likhna seekho, o mehnat karne waalo, padhna likhna seekho, o bhookh se marne waalo." (Be literate o hard workers, be literate o hungry people). I have been looking for the song, and last I remember, it was a song with a social message. Yet my efforts were unsuccessful and all I got were hits to webpages asking me to download hot and sexy wallpapers, or look for other singles in town. Safdar Hashmi, the writer of the song, would die once again if he saw that.

Anyway, this song plays in a loop in my head sometimes, especially on days when I check my mail (letterbox). I get plenty of mails, but none from friends or family. All of them are official mails, in German. Letters from the bank, from the immigration office, from the health insurance. Bills I have to pay and money I have to deposit, official invitation letters for events, and so on. I open the letters, and understand nothing. So I fold them back neatly, and take them to my departmental secretary.

When she is free, we sit down together, and she reads out and translates those mails for me (sometimes, she uses her translation websites as well). And inevitably, she expresses frustration over how Germany is rude to foreigners because people do not type mails in English. And I sit with a pen and jot down the important things I need to do, the amount I need to pay, the documents I need to take to the visa office, and the time and place and dates when I need to show up somewhere. I neatly write down the information I need to know in English in those German letters. Nothing important or fancy, just information like debit card pins and security passwords and my health insurance clauses. 

And while I do that, this song always plays in my head. I remember the movies I grew up watching, where poor people who did not know how to read and write would take their letters to the post office, where a Samaritan would read out those letters for them. Sometimes, the bad guys would get their thumb imprints on documents and steal all their money. I am not illiterate, I know that. But never in all these years had I imagined that I would get important, official letters in a language I do not understand, and sit down with a translator while I write down the information I need. Something like, "Hey, this is your social security number. Write it down. And by the way, this is your bank pin number, and this is your password, don't share it with anyone. And this is where you need to take your passport, and show up at this time. And by the way, this letter from your health insurance says that they do not cover cosmetic surgeries, so don't get a nose job."

Sometimes, learning something new requires some degree of unlearning. So I am unlearning the sense of comfort and security that comes from something as basic as being able to read, write and follow a language, and instead, learning to be okay about that momentary "eff! What will I do now?" panicky feeling I get every time I open a mail, and then trust others to tell me correctly what I need to know to navigate my way around. You might be reading this and nodding as if you know what I mean, but you will not understand it until you live this experience. I live in a country where I witness strong linguistic identities every day. From good news to bad news, scholarship letters to grant rejection letters, bank statements to invitation letters, rental contracts, etc., everything comes to me in German. It is my responsibility to translate it. My house lease is in German (that I signed), the English version being a mere translation for my benefit and not necessarily a legal document or contract (which means I signed something assuming that the translation of it that I read was correct; there is no way to know).

However, I am not complaining. Far from it. It is my choice, whether or not I want to live in Germany, whether or not I want to learn the language, whether or not I want to live as an outsider, insulating myself from the more local experiences. Some people might talk to you in English (mostly in the academia and out of kindness, but not outside it), some signs might be vaguely written in English.

So as always, I continue to experience something new every day.

sunshine

Television and my friend’s vision

Sometime soon after my move to Germany, I received a € 27.00 monthly bill from Deutschlandradio and freaked out. This is a monthly bill for using a TV and radio connection. The thing is I do not even have a TV or radio at home. I took it to the departmental secretary for translation (remember, all important mails are in German), and she had that knowing look on her face. Seems like this is a bill that everyone in the country has to pay, whether they have a TV/radio or not. These channels have no ads and hence there is no other way for them to make money. Since I did not believe it, I asked around a bit. Seems like it is true. It is like paying tax, it is compulsory.

The good news is this bill is included in my rent, so I do not need to pay anything extra.

When I went to my Korean friend for venting out, she looked at me all surprised. Then, she retrieved her crumpled bill from the trash can. When I asked why she trashed the bill, she shrugged and told me that since it was in German, she threw it away. She assumed that it is some company asking for a donation. She said, "Since I did not understand what is written, I assumed that it is not important. If they want my money, they should tell me in English."

I love her carefree attitude, and the basic difference in the way we see life. I, on one hand, get hyper every time I see a letter in German, and show it to at least three different people to make sure I got all the information right. I even meticulously translate all the useful information in English and write it down. And my friend simply assumes that if she cannot read something, it is not meant for her to know.

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Indecent proposals

Just like we say hi, hello, how are you doing? when we meet someone after a long time, the typical Bengali has four varieties of greetings when they meet me-

Roga hoye giyechish. You've become thin.

Mota hoye giyechish. You've become fat.

Kalo hoye giyechish. You've turned darker.

Ekhane firbina? Won't you move back to India?

"Dada chepey ....... Dada bedhey"- The two must-know mantras to navigate the busy public transport system in Calcutta. An apt translation is- Please squeeze in to make space for me and please stop the vehicle. A word-to-word and inappropriate translation is- O brother, ride me. O brother, tie me.

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An honorary Tamil

I will be soon extracting myself out of the German womb of cultural immersion to reach Seattle, and re-immerse myself in the Tamil cultural womb. G, one of my first friends in Seattle (back from 2006) is originally from Chennai, although she is hardly the stereotypical Kanjeevaram-clad, vibhuti smearing, Swami (God) fearing lady that I had expected to meet all those years back. 

They speak in Tamil and English at home, and make no exception for me. A rather rambunctious family, they even argue, fight, and watch movies and TV shows in Tamil. When we go on drives, I'm always forced to listen to Tamil songs. 

As a result, my rudimentary knowledge of Tamil is quite impressive. I can ask you to please come inside, go outside, come downstairs, and go upstairs. I can ask you to go take a shower, and ask if your bowel movements were fine this morning. I can ask you if you need a diaper change, and question why are you shouting or putting your hands in your mouth. Everything in Tamil. I know quite a few bad words in Tamil, and the good words that sound like bad words too (like poo, that means a flower). I know what an ass is, and what a buffalo's ass is. I even know random words like karandi (daal'er haata in Bangla) and couppai thotti (trash can). 

However, my abilities go far beyond linguistics. I am familiar with many of the popular Tamil soaps, and can sing (or at least hum) quite a few songs too, including Vaaji Vaaji Sivaji. I am kind of familiar with a subset of the thousands of Gods and Goddesses, particularly amused by a Quick Gun Murugan God, and a Hyper God (It's actually Hayagriva God) who accepts clove offerings. I can name many varieties of food, from the koota to the kolombo (not to be confused with Colombo), sundal, aviyal, poriyal, mostly made with nariyal. I still don't understand much that they speak, but I can recognize word patterns. For example, whenever I hear a series of words like, "andre pandre andre pandre dosa" or "andre pandre andre pandre appam", I know it is time to drop whatever I am doing, follow my nose, and land up in the kitchen for some lip smacking food. 

This time, I intend to add much more to my vocabulary, and teach G some interesting Bangla words too. She already knows Kosha Mangsho (trust me to teach that first to a pure vegetarian), Paanchu Gopal, and Paaka Meye. The knowledge exchange will be fun this time, and so will be my nocturnal fridge raiding sessions. Theirs is the only fridge (other than the one in Kolkata) that I shamelessly raid after midnight without any inhibition. 

Until then, my German lessons continue. Ten lessons done (eighty more to go), and they are still hung up on teaching me how to order beer and wine and food at Restaurant Sumloven in Opera Platz, and meet some male friend at 8 o'clock and go have a drink at his place later. Talk about focusing on the right things.

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Mind your language

It is a rewarding feeling to see one evolve with time, for the better. Perhaps, I just gave away the last line of my post.

I have many friends who work in the technological hub of India (cities like Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Chennai). One thing they always complained about is how rude the auto wallahs and the bus drivers are, refusing to speak to them in Hindi despite knowing the language (a speculation on their part). While my friends demonized these local people, I nodded with them in agreement. "Absolutely. How could they?" I had never experienced living in a place where I did not know the language. India, USA. I fluently spoke the language everywhere I lived. How unfair was it that one moved to Chennai, and the local people are so close-minded and wrapped up in their own heritage that they would not even help a stranger? I have actually believed in these ideas for a long time.

Then, I moved to Germany. The initial months were a nightmare, not because German is a hard language (It is quite manageable, now that I am getting a hang of it). They were a nightmare because I completely resisted learning German. I suffered from a sense of entitlement, just like my friends did, where I believed that people should know English, and talk to me in English. As a result, I suffered every day. Bus announcements were made, and I had no clue. I would look for certain things at the grocery store, and would be clueless about how to explain myself. Bank documents and credit card statements were sent in German. The visa officer sent me my appointment letter in German, refusing to write in English when I asked her to. Even my online banking website is in German. I would not read departmental emails or go to monthly meetings in silent protest. Sometimes, I used my hands in exasperation. Sometimes, I shook my head violently to indicate what I wanted. I even minimized going out, so that I would not have to deal with the helplessness. "How can you run a research institute and not talk to me in English?", is what I kept silently asking.

I think at some point, I exhausted myself from my passive-aggressive resistance after which I thought, why the eff am I acting this way? So I started learning German. Not too much, just for 30 minutes every day, a few days a week. And the gains were exponential. Soon, I learnt a critical mass of words and phrases that suddenly made my life so much easier. I realized that one does not need to master the language well enough to be able to author books. Simple words like thank you, sorry, please help me, excuse me, I speak only a little German, do you speak English, and counting from one to ten, etc. were enough to help me navigate my way around. I am not going to stop here. I am going to continue to learn until I am fluent. However, it doesn't take much to learn the basics.

I now wonder why my friends did not learn some basic Telugu, Tamil, or Kannada to be able to make basic conversation. Was it the same assumption and sense of entitlement, that I am the superior one here because I can write computer codes, and you bus drivers will learn my language? You are not really a part of the society if you are purposefully insulating yourself from the local experiences and living in your own comfort island, just hanging out with people like you, who speak the same language, eat the same food, and complain about the local people. If Jhumpa Lahiri could move to Italy (that too, temporarily) and learn Italian well enough to write a book, why was I complaining?

As I changed my attitude, the people around me changed too. These days, I even add a line in German while writing emails in English to my colleagues. I feel more accepted, and they too go an extra step to make me feel accepted. They drop by my office and bring me their kids' story books to read, suggest me movies and songs, and invite me home to share a meal with them. I even make fun about phonetically similar words like glücklich, täglich, and möglich, and they never take offense. During a recent presentation, the organizer explicitly wrote in the email that every one of the twelve teams have to present in English, because there is one (yes, only one) person who does not understand German. You have no idea how much generosity this is. A colleague even ended his presentation with the word "Shukriya" (thank you in Hindi) on the last slide, as a gesture of showing that he appreciates my effort of integrating into the German society. For me, it has been alienating and isolating. But on a good day, it has been hugely rewarding and humbling.

So the next time, instead of whining and complaining, just learn the local language.

sunshine