Blind leading the deaf to a potential invention!

It was the first week of my first job, and the first week away from my home state, Kerala. I  was quite excited about getting placed, being able to stay with new people in an apartment as opposed to college hostels, being my own boss in life, earning my own money... and what not. 


Travelling - that too alone - was on top of my fun agenda, as always. But one thing that had been bugging me right from the time I landed in my 'city of job' - Hyderabad,  was nothing else but, Hindi. 


Like any other average mallu, I could handle malayalam and english quite well. I had learnt to read and write Hindi at school, and may be showing off by asking 'Aapka naam kya hai' - that's the maximum - at college. And I could understand 'thoda thoda/kuch kuch', that's it. But Hyd demanded to know hindi well, if I had the intention of travelling alone. 


Well, mallus learn quite fast though. And there we had our dear Kochiite Rufee, fresh off the boat like us all,  donning the role of our 'hindi' teacher. Not that she knew the language all that well - and see, a coach never has to be a good player, as the saying goes. She taught us - the hindi illiterate mallu gals - few words which would come in handy, and can be used in our day to day life. The first set of words included the ones which we'd require to use with taxi and auto drivers, and we welcomed them into our brains with respect and applause. 'Aage se left/right' - which means you know what, 'Waha pe rokiye', 'Gaana lagao', 'kitna hua', 'Sahi daam boliye bhaiya', and a single word, 'maheena', which she said, means time.


I began using most of the words, immediately, and felt quite proud. The only issue was understanding the replies given in heavily accented hindi, by whichever driver I speak to! But nevertheless, I did not give up. 
Once, it was me alone in the car with an office driver, and he had 3 other people to drop home, for which he had to take different inside lanes. I was happy that I got to see the insides of different lanes and learn what existed in there, but as time grew, I kept on asking myself when will I reach home. I decided to ask our driver and yes, it was another chance for me to use an item from my bag of hindi vocab. 


"Bhaiyya, meri ghar pahunchne keliye kitne maheene lagengey?" ( I understand the potential for grammar mistakes in the statement, but, all that matters is whether you understood what I intended to ask ;P )
Out came the question from my mouth, and I saw the face of the driver contorting to make expressions of self-pity and sentences which I did not understand, but had a tone of 'madam-this-is-not-my-fault' feeling. He went on, for around 5 minutes, and later took a glance at my face, which sincerely looked, clueless. What he comprehended from my facial expression in an instant had a metamorphic effect on his mood, and he asked with a dubious smile - 


"Madam, aak kahan se ho"? 


"Kerala"


"Kitni din hua Hyderabad pe?"


"2 weeks"


Hearing my reply, he had an amused, ear-to-ear smile. "Madam, maheena ka matlab hai - month". Gosh! did you get what I had asked him in the urge to know when I would get home? And who can blame him for 'understanding me right' given the situation supported the statement so right? And what got unfolded there was nothing else, but a minor episode of my megaserial of embarassments, in the new city! 


I spotted Rufee the next day in office, walking in my direction, heavily giggling and teary-eyed, within a bunch of friends who were equally struck by some comedy event that she was surely narrating. I ran towards her and mockingly caught hold of her neck saying "you idiot, tell me again what the meaning of the word maheena is."  And there she goes -


"What for?   Did you too use it on someone and get a lecture and questionnaire on why we south indians are hindi illiterate? and why we should have started using the language right after it getting declared, the national language? " My grip on her neck got tightened as I too started laughing with a questionmark on my face."
One of Rufee's admirers said "one of the drivers tried to take Rufee on a guilty 'ride' on this, and she reciprocated "Bhaiyya I'm sorry that I wasn't born at that time to promote it well. Don't worry I'm doing it now." I had to release my hand to hold my stomach from aching, coz of continous laughing. 


I could very well imagine the 'about-to-get slaughtered' look on the driver's face. Well, after all, mallus are good at 'malluficating' even Chinese food, then why not make 'Minglish' out of Malayalam and Hindi?