Sarla tells all

Previous encounters with Sarala

It was raining heavily this Friday. I ran to the bus with only my palm for protection against the downpour. The words cats and dogs would never been uttered by so many. I ran to my bus and looked around for my favourite companion. Silly Sarla was not to be found at her usual seat; but I was not disappointed. She was sitting in a corner at the back, right next to the only available seat on the bus. :-D.

If you recall, Sarla's company had started the appraisal cycle and she wished to be promoted.

Unlike previous encounters Sarla was whispering into the phone, like a normal person would do. I was lucky to be seated right next to her. Seemed like she wanted to avoid being overheard. But I had strain only a little bit to hear. She was on the phone with Ram, the agony uncle for her troubles at work.

'... kaNo. yen sigtu nange? motte. Harsha bere treat kotta yelrigu.'
('...yes. What did I get? Nothing. Harsha even gave a treat to everyone')

'innelli, CCD^[1]. treat bagge keltiya, thoo. nan kashta kelu andre... aiyoo'
('Where else, same old CCD. You are more interested in the treat than my appraisal. Aiyoo..')

'hoon. saaku saaku. munde keLu ivaga. nan manager bagge keLu. moDle heLona anta idde, paapa avnu anta, neenu avn mele nagad beDa anta sumnidde.'
('ok ok. Forgiven. Now listen to me reveal all about my manager. I thought of telling you a few days back, but decided that he was too paapa.')

'howdu, nanna promote madidre idella heL-tirlilla. vishaya keLu sumne, madya mataad beda. yen heLali, dodda joL party kaNo adu. avna desk hatra dinda yaavde hudugi sulidrunuu taLe yetti nodtane. yeshTe important kelsa irli.'
('yes, you are being bestowed this privileged information only because I was not promoted by him. Don't interrupt, chumma listen now. What can I say, he is a huge slobber. A drooler. Looses his concentration on work whenever a girl walks past his desk, whatever he might be working on.')

'yenu nagtiya. nijvaaglu kano. senior aagidrunu college hudgun-tarah maadtane. nanna yella friendsu adee heltare. keLu bekadre.'
('I'm not kidding, don't laugh. Acts like a college kid despite his seniority. Believe me. Ask my friends.')

'aiyoo, bari nodtan ashte. mattenilla. adakke nange siglilla promotionnu. hudgirge kaDe partialty maadovnagidre nange sikta ittu. nan-kade nodod nodidre haage ansta ittu. aadre Harshange promote maad-da.'
('Aiyoo, he just looks, nothing more. Why do you think I was passed over for the promotion? He does not favour girls. Going by the way he gawked I was sure I'd definitely be promoted. But he recommended Harsha.')

'ohoo. neen baari manmatha. inna keLiLLi. hehehe. publicalle kerkotano. thoo. chi. asaiya. hudgir iDare antanu nodalla. avnde lokdalli maja madta irtane. '
('Ohooo. You are not Adonis either. Shut up and listen now. Let me reveal some more. Hehehe. He is disgusting fellow. Adjusts himself in full public view. Thoo, chi, sickening. Does not even care when girls are around. Seems lost in his own little world.')

'neen nagu. nange yen maadodu antane gottagolla. hudgurella inna dodda stories yeltare. adella heLoLLa bidu. neen heLu, nin kelsa hegide?'
('Go on, laugh. I was the one trapped. Couldn't decide between crying and punching his family jewels. The guys have more sordid stories. I wont go into all those details with you. You should talk now, hows work?')

'bidu andnalle, adella heLokke agolla kano. che che. neen heLu ivaga'
('No no. I wont say anything more. Its your turn now.')

Seemed like the juicy bits were done with. I opened my book. Went into deep slumber right after the first paragraph.


[1] Cafe Coffee Day

The plan

The plan was hatched more than 61 years ago, executed exactly on 15th Aug 1947.

No one knows the who, what, where and how of it; the when and why became apparent only yesterday.

The plan was very precise, designed for one, and only one, purpose.

There was no plan B, as failure was out of the question.

Folks, due to circumstances unavoidable, masterminded by a select few 61 years ago, this Friday turned out to be a holiday. Can you imagine the devastating feeling when the realisation dawned on me? Silly Sarala could not reveal her delightful life this Friday.

I would like to be alone for a while now. Life will be gray for a week.

Sarala dreams

Fridays with the sweet Silly Sarala continue to be entertaining. I don't dread facing a dull friday evening any more :-D.

I finished my work earlier than usual, so had a full 3-seater on the bus for myself. Unfortunately, this meant that there was a risk of being deprived of Silly's conversations. All the forces of nature were in my favour when she got on to the bus. If a statistician calculated the probability of choosing a seat, the one beside me would have scored the highest. Silly is not one to go against nature's will.

Saralu had a nightmare. She calls her sister (couldn't quite catch her name, sounded like Lilly) and goes:
"neNNe ratri yenta kanas bittu gotta? Billy idanalla, adage maadta idda!"
(yesterday night what a dream i had, you know? Billy^[1] is there no, he was cooking!)

"naanu araamagi TV nodta iddini, ivnu zefrani pulav maadta idda. zefrani pulav kaNe, aiyoo, rice dish anko, saaku."
(I was araamagi sitting and seeing TV, he was making zefrani pulav . you dont know zefrani pulav? aiyoo, its a rice dish)

"tarkaari cut maadtini andru beda anda kaNe. naanu full happy kaNe. Muttina Torana nodta koodkonde"
(i told i'll cut the vegetables, he said no! i fully happy. sat watching Muttina Torana on TV.)

"hadinaidu-ippattu nimisha aad mele yenu smell bantu kaNe, adige maNe inda. yenu anta nodudre anna yella kade, goDe mele, gas keLage, floor mele, avna kivi meloonu. aiyooo yaen pajhiti yedu ankonde"
(after 15-20 mins i smelled something in the kitchen. aiyoo, the walls, floor, the gas stove, even his ears were covered in rice.)

"beralu sutt-kondidda, uff uff anta idda, yeneno tarkaari, yaav yaavdu tarah cut maadidda kaNe. nagodo, aLodo gotaglilla. clean maadodu nanna taLe mele barutte anta yochista irvaga yechra aiytu"
(he was blowing on his burnt fingers. strange vegetables, in all shapes and size were all over. i could neither cry nor laugh. i jolted out of the dream just when it was upto me to clear the mess)

The bus had not left the campus yet. Someone got on to the bus just when it reached the gates. I just hate it when that happens. Here were were, two of us enjoying all the space on a three seater and this guy barges in to make my ride uncomfortable. He was sweating because of the sprint from the security turnstiles to the campus gate and just plonked himself between me and Silly. I could feel Silly narrate the same tale to her mom and then her dad but could not make out anything because of the incredible hulk. Grrrr.


[1] Billy Balachandra, the husband

Yes, again!

Fridays with Sarala, Silly - Part III.
Part I, Part II

Turns out our boostu girl has a name, nice one too. Sarala, 'simple' in many Indian languages. Silly Sarala, bombat name no? Her friends call her Saralu. She hates the few who call her Sallu.

Silly works for the BPO arm of my company - I should have guessed it on first encounter, but the non-BPO accent^[1] threw me off. She is married, to a nice fella from what I overheard. Hopefully the smaller, low level details will be unravelled in subsequent Fridays.

Its appraisal time at the BPO. Silly only proved my suspicions from a previous encounter with her distant-colleague, who, fortunately for me, was less silly. Apparently, if what I over-heard is correct, SS has 10 peers and her manager can pull only a couple of them to the next level. SS calls up a close buddy, Ram, to express her anxiety. Completely confident that nobody even remotely associated with her is on the bus she goes:
"Lo Ram, yeno madLi, yibraNNe C3 levelGe kaLstananto avnu"
("Oye Ram, what to do, he will only send 2 people to the C3 level, it seems")

"Naanu isht dina kelasa madidella waste madtano avnu. prati dina correct timeGe bandu, poorti kelsa maadi hogtino. aa Harshantara proxy hakolvo, yella kelsa sariyaage maadi hogtino. yeno madodu nananna avnu select maad-de idre?"
("All these days I have worked without wasting time, coming and going on time. not putting proxy like that Harsha fellow. What to do if he doesnt select me?")^[2]

Unfortunately, I was robbed of the opportunity to listen to rest of the interesting exchange of ideas on manager-management. Silly must have had a suspected that she had me completely engrossed in her 'private' conversation, moved closer to the window and started whispering into the phone.

[1] Ahmerican accent for the unfortunate few who are unaware of the IT lingo.
[2] Thankfully, my company does not believe in rewarding people who work for the stipulated number of hours; I would not have met Silly.

Not again!

Met the 'Boostu' girl again! I could not believe my rotten luck when the office bus left the campus on Friday. Very high price for not taking time to see who my neighbour is on the bus. I became aware of the situation only after she dialed the number and said her first hello. This time the first conversation was with her mom about the agalkayi^[1] she had sent sometime back. She does have the sweet accent of a typical bengalooru girl, each word uttered with full sarasa sallapa. Surprisingly she got right to the point. Did mom use it or throw it away? Why didnt she use it the moment she received it? Amazing how the girl could stretch that topic to 5 mins.^[2] Thankfully, this conversation was not repeated with the dad or the sister.

The second topic started off with an announcment to everybody around that her kid sister was dumb as a donkey. Apparently, wires of the geyser at her sister's house had decided to breath some fresh air and broke out of their plastic casings. The sister, for some reason talked her landlord, the father, the mother and the helpful neighbour downstairs about it. Eventually she ended up using water heated on her gas stove. Boostu girl couldnt fathom the reason for all this - How could the sister even think of spreading the news to everybody? Was she out of her mind? All she had to do was call the electrician.

I couldnt stop LOLing in my mind. It was like the recap shown before a new episode of a TV soap starts. Sit next to her to get a recap of whats happened in the family over the past couple of days.



[1] Bitter gourd
[2] I have to learn how to do that. A necessary skill for writing long essays for applications.

Recipe for ruining your ride home

1. Work for 11 works of the day.
2. Get on the bus back home, choose a seat with just one more occupant (recall that three is a crowd).
3. Open your book of the day and, this is important, look forward to a nice ride home.
4. Notice girl next to you dial a number. Expect her to be discreet.
5. Get all hopes of discretion shattered by her loud voice.
6. Listen to the conversation(s) which follows the algorithm:
while (true) {
  1. shout 'boostu, boostu, boostu, boostu, boostu'^[1]
  2. describe why there was 'boostu, boostu' all over the uppinakayi ^[2]
  3. get back to the 'boostu' routine.

if (tired with own voice^[3])
  break for 5 mins;

repeat loop with mom, dad, obscure distant cousin...
}

7. Watch girl get down two stops before you, with the ubiquitous phone glued to the ear and curse self for not buying that iPod.


[1] fungi, moisture, mould, mold, green stuff
[2] pickle, especially South Indian
[3] noice