Perhaps this link explains what my driver was teaching me to say as a morning greeting: I love the power of the Internet to get answers to mysteries.
October 5, 2008
Allison's lessons in language
I've had to add new understanding of English words to my daily vocabulary:
- Cabin = Office (for example at work: "Where is your cabin?" My answer is no longer "The North Shore" it is "225")
- Revert = Reply
- Do the needful = Do what's required, Make it so
- Tell me = "Hello, how may I help you?" when answering the phone
- What are your doubts? = What questions do you have?
I asked my driver to teach me how to say "Good Morning" in Hindi. I could tell by his fondly amused expression that I wasn't pronoucing it correctly. I asked a co-worker how to say it. She asked me what I'd been taught. To me it sounded phonetically like "asa lama lego" so that's what I said to her. She replied my driver had taught me Persian. I really don't think he did. I think it was my pronunciation was so abysmally bad that it just sounded that way. More lessons needed for me!
Update from Jessi
Yes, we do watch tv. Tom and Jerry is my favorite show. Most of the tv shows are Indian, and I don't understand the language. We haven't tried any Indian clothes on yet. we have been to some clothes shops, and they mostly look like in America. We have ridden in a car, and we have a driver to take us everywhere because mom and dad cannot drive here. They drive on the left side of the street here. While we were riding in the car yesterday (Friday), there was this man asking for food who banged on the window and stared at me - I was scared of him. He was begging for food. We have also seen lots of cows on the streets, and we even saw a man milking a cow on the sidewalk. Indians honor the cow because if gives them milk. Today (Saturday) we saw an ox pulling a cart on the street. Thursday, we saw some green parrots, and there are lots of Paraiah Kites http://www.nerdybirders.com/html/birds/Black%20Kite.html (a hawk like bird) flying outside the window. Friday, dad and I went to our new house, and I went to play at the park while dad unpacked our stuff. I found the huge caterpiller on the sidewalk. It was as big as my dads finger. We also have a bananna tree at our house, but the banannas are green at the moment. We drink mostly bottled water because the public water is unsafe for us to drink. Dad says that over time we will be able to drink the tap water at our house, but for now we have to drink filtered water. Also on Friday we say a couple of schools when we went to pick mom up from work. The schools were small buildings, and the playground is just a field of bare dirt. The kids looked about my age and size, and they wear uniforms. I'll try to have dad get a picture to send to you. Thursday was Gandhi's birthday. He was the founder of India's independence from Britian, same as George Washington for America. This week is also the end of Ramadan. Bangalore is mostly Hindu, and dad says that about 15% of the people are muslim. Because of these holidays, we have seen many firworks at night. We see many people dressed according to the traditions they follow.
October 2, 2008
Other villa residents
We met our resident house gecko and house toad last night outside our villa. The toad was as big as a baseball!
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