Thursday, January 17, 2008

Filmy, Very Filmy

My office was a casual place, with people bantering and commenting on goings-on, complaining about funny grammar in books being edited, and so on. People came and went. Prem Singh with the coffee. Negi to collect stuff for our typesetters. The occasional desk editor to ask about something. Santosh to clarify little matters before things went to press.

Sunaina and I worked at adjacent desks. And would sometimes (okay, often) disturb the other with a "Psstt...guess what!" or just make fun of each other. One dull day we'd been talking on and off. With my back to the office, and the cubicle wall rising to my left, I was lost in my own world - in deep contemplation about how to soothe an angry author. So when I heard Sunaina say "Mere paas kuchh nahin hai. Anamika, tumhare paas?" I only half-registered what was going on. I announced in a baritone: "Mere paas Ma hai."

Silence followed. It sank in after about 10 seconds that there was no context for Sunaina to have said that, and slowly turned. First I saw Sunaina, big grin on her face. Then I turned my head further. There stood Negi. Asking, "Mere liye kuchh hai?"

He always avoided me after that. What can I say? Yeh tum mujhe kis jurm ki sazaa de rahe ho?



8 comments:

Diligent Candy said...

honey i am telling you - GO for the book....

there is a new word in the dictionary its called annaesque: the way anamika would face it...

done the tag ...blogger did not let me present it the way i wanted to ...but, it is done...

kisses

Suku said...

thats funny!
This post reminds me of one of my numerous embarrasing moments.
Being from Assam, I struggled with Hindi when I first came to Delhi. To get by, i used to translate english into hindi, literally.
so one evening as i was leaving office, i turned to our dear old security guard Balram and said, "Aacha Balramji, aapko kal dekh lenge" ( see you tomorrow)
needless to say, he looked at me completed perplexed and nervously asked me,
Kyun madam, maine kya kiya?
:-))

Thanks for leaving the comment on my blog. I cried when I read the book too!

S

Puranjoy said...

Urm. Please don't feel offended.

There is no way people can 'crib' about funny grammar in books. 'Crib' as verb has two meanings:-
1. to confine, as if to put in a crib.
2. to plagiarize, as if copying from a crib(n, small piece of paper).

With that unpleasant thing out of the way, wonderful post!

Anonymous said...

chuckle-chuckle!

Thinking Cramps said...

Candy: Yes, yes, will write the book, but the adopton of a certain Chhota Cady will then take longer. You decide what I should prioritise!

Sbora: Heh heh. Bet that guy remained wary of you for ever after!

Puranjoy: Wow! Thanks for pointing that out. You have shaken the foundations of things I thought I knew for sure!!! Honestly. Thanks for pointing that out. And I am going to correct it straightaway!

Aunty G: :)

Dipali: Thanks. Your tag is still pending, by the way!

Diligent Candy said...

I did not know that about cribbing either ...errr....EGAD!!!!!

About CC...yeh tum mujhe kis duvidha mein daal rahe ho...

Shall keep him for another year (only for you) and then shall fedex him! DEAL!

the mad momma said...

errr...why am i not tagged for whatever it is that everyone else is. you will find me sulking in a corner whenever you are ready to apologise.

and in keeping with your filmy post ... Isi din ki dosti thi????

dipali said...

Done the tag at last!