Dŵr

The following riddle started out as my English assignment, but I found it worth sharing. Give it a shot!

I am a God’s wonder, wandering in the wild.

You can hear my whimsical whispers, but I never talk,

I run, but I never walk.

Free when hot, funny when cold,

Living in the lobster’s realm, sea stallions slide over.

I am the sky’s nectar, the cloud’s juice,

Eclipsing heaven’s delight, and imitating the moon-molder’s men.

I am the blood of Earth, the sun-shaper’s sweat.

Winter’s blanket, whale’s acre,

A creator’s creation so fine.

Breathe me out, eat me in,

You can swallow me, and I can swallow you.

Use me to rinse murky pots, but you cannot wash me.

Sweet silver streams, encapsulating diamond- like dreams,

A mortal’s serendipity, what am I?                                                  

P.S.: If you’re not sure about the answer, or perhaps want to confirm your answer: Type in the post title in Google Translate, and ask it to translate from Welsh to English; thou shall have your answer.

The "L" Barrier

Don’t worry I am not going to start blabbering about the change in this post. Some of my readers complained that I got a bit too serious with my previous post; moreover they tagged me as the “philosophical” guru. This post is nothing like that I promise, it’s meant to be subtly humorous- my apparent specialty as readers claim. It’ll surely make your lip muscles curl up like the crescent moon in the sky. Too lurid? Yes, I thought so too. I just meant it’ll make you smile. C’mon Shrey! This is your blog, not your English paper. My apologies readers, I’ll keep it simple, short and shreylicious (inventing new words, on my way to become a self-obsessed Shakespeare).  

I’ll just address you as the “reader” to avoid any complications and to make it very general. So, reader, what do you think about the topic of this blog post, “The L Barrier”? Pretty interesting? What do you think L stands for? Love, lazy, lumpy, luck, luxury, leopard? - No. It stands for language! Pat yourself on the back if you thought of language; If you didn’t think of language, don’t worry you’re still a genius because you’re reading my blog. You know my topic- The Language Barrier, now let us retrospect together…  

...October 15^th, 2013, I was travelling to the USA from India and I had one halt in between at France. We were supposed to have a halt there for only an hour, BUT “Aapki Asuvidha Ke Liye Khed Hai” happened (Self-blog reference, cheers if you got it). The planes were running late and ultimately we had a halt there for eight long, boring, tedious, tiresome, never-ending hours. Consequently, the airlines gave all passengers lunch and dinner coupons to compensate for their lousy service and unacceptable delay. Suddenly, we noticed that only a few employs were able to put up a conversation in English (mostly at the counters) and the rest conversed in their native language- French or Français as they say it. Employees at an international airport don’t communicate in English? WHAT. This discovery wasn’t that big of a shock until we realized that the workers (all of them) at the café didn’t speak English. Now the biggest challenge of my life (it seemed like that then) was to communicate with them and order my food. And when I say “my food”, I mean vegetarian food and no eggs too. My parents were in a dilemma, I could see their bewildered faces wearing a mask of disappointment and helplessness. This is where I come in with my French swag. I learnt French for six years of my life, I topped my school in the 10^th grade in French, I got an A* in the CIE French board examinations. That’s my French swag. And do you think there is any better place than France to test my French? So I started cracking up cheesy lines like “why to fear when the French-cap Shrey is here”. My parents were pretty convinced that their son could conquer the lady at the café by invading her territory using her language.

All my French swag was authentic, but it was also true that it had been over two years since my board examinations. Ever since then, my fingers hadn’t touched any French textbook; my eyes hadn’t read any French; my mouth hadn’t spoken any French; nor had my ears heard any French. I was just counting on my hippocampus to recollect all French vocab and verb conjugations. I was nervous. I walked up to the lady, and we did have a conversation, a weird one though. It was as follows:

Shrey: Bonjour madame (Good morning madam)

Lady: Bonjour! Comment puis-je vous aider? (Good morning! How may I help you?)

Shrey: Aujourd'hui est un jour fantastique. (Today is a fantastic day)

Lady: Ahh oui! (Ahh Yes!)

*AWKWARD SILENCE*

Lady: Avez-vous besoin de quelque chose? (Do you need something?)

Shrey: [Passes the coupons]

Lady: Ahh, Merci. Que puis-je faire de vous? (Ahh, Thank you. What can I make you?)

Shrey: Comment allez-vous? (How are you)

Lady: umm Je suis très bien, merci. Que puis-je faire de vous? (umm I am fine, thank you. What can I make you?)

*AWKWARD SILENCE*

This is where I crack up.

Shrey: Désolé madame. Mon français n'est pas très bon. Y at-il quelqu'un qui parle anglais ici? (Sorry madam. My French is not very good. Is there someone who speaks english here?)

Lady: Ahh bien sûr! Je l'aurai. (Ahh sure! I’ll get him.)

It turns out that the guy who actually knew English was on leave and the guy whom she got with her had worse English than the lady herself. I went back to where my parents were sitting only to get laughed at. My swag had to face the brutal sarcastic comments of my parents. You can hit me, beat me, whip me, burn me, scratch me, but you shouldn’t mess with me ego. My ego was hurt. To make it worse, dad challenged me to order food by any means possible, except for technology. I went back to the lady several times only to face disappointment and a muddled face.

At the end of another failed attempt, we both smiled at each other, rather at our helplessness I should say. Suddenly an idea popped up in my head. I hand-gestured her suggesting that I want to come in at the back of the counter where she was standing. She opened the door and allowed me in. I pointed at whatever I wanted, like for example pizza. She then pointed at each toppings, and I answered by just the movement of my neck. Vertical movement (up and down) was yes and horizontal (left to right) was no. Then in merely twenty minutes my order was ready. Nobody said a word. Nobody used a human translator. Nobody used Google translate. At the end, we smiled at each other and shook hands. The lady then said “Sorry, me no English.” I then laughed and said “Désolé mon français n'est pas bon.”(Sorry my French is not good.)

This is how I won dad’s challenge and learnt a very, very important lesson. Human communication is above language, technology or anything. I discovered the power of simple silly smiles and petty little hand gestures. A good experience all together; a memory to be shared and cherished.

PS: The lady’s name was Dominique. I knew enough French to ask her name, people c’mon!

For the people who didn’t get my reference of “Aapki Asuvidha Ke Liye Khed Hai,” scroll further down on my blog and read my most successful article with the same title.  

The Changeover

“There is nothing permanent except change.”- Heraclitus

I am sure almost of you readers have read this quote sometime in your life. So what do you think about it? Pretty deep huh? I would laugh at this very same quote back in time. I would think what changes? Everything is the same, my name, my body, my house, and my parents. NOTHING changes. Now when I think about this, I fail to think about things that don’t change in the course of life. EVERYTHING changes. I am sure somewhere Heraclitus is watching and laughing at me, “I ain’t a celebrated philosopher for nothing kid!” he would say.

Have you ever thought of this? Or is it only me? All changes we go through in life, from childhood to adolescence to adulthood to old age and then you die, yes you die. Sorry to be rude, just trying to add some humor there (Obviously death is a fun thing, just kidding). Getting back to the topic- change. I actually never realized this until a ray of self-actualization struck me while I was thinking about life on my toilet seat. This is surely because of the biggest transition in my life that occurred a year ago.

Shifting to a new place, a new country, a new continent actually- to the United States of America. I know what you’re thinking, shifting to the USA is not a big deal, and everybody does it nowadays. I agree, but everybody shifts according to a well laid planned, they start making preparations six months prior to their departure and most important, they know they’re going. I left for the USA on Oct 14^th 2013, and I didn’t know anything about shifting to the USA until Oct 1^st 2013. One of the wildest dreams I could have was shifting to the USA in 13 days. When my dad informed me about the final plan, I couldn’t believe him, I mean who would! I thought he’s just kidding with me and I remember I replied to him by saying “why USA, I’ve never been to moon either, let’s go there.” In fact, when I started informing my friends about it, they didn’t believe me either. One of my friends didn’t believe it until I was in the USA, she thought I was playing a prank as usual and didn’t even bother to meet me before I left. When she finally realized that I wasn’t kidding, I was already in the USA and she said “OMG Shrey! You could have told me that you were serious.” I had been telling her that I was serious since the last 13 days. (Yes Jahnvi, this is you if you’re reading this). But I can’t blame her, it took 13 days for me too to discover that my dad wasn’t actually kidding, I thought I was on a reality show or something, but no, life got real.

This was big. I can’t express what it felt like, this change. I couldn’t grasp, analyze, ingest and digest the reality. People were different, the way they spoke was different, roads were different, buildings were different, school curricula were different, sports were different, rules and regulations were different, the position of the driver’s seat was different, the festivals were different, the working hours were different, the weather was different, the lifestyle was different, the clothing was different and…just everything was different! It took so many differences for me to finally agree to what Heraclitus once quoted.

The change was overwhelming, I was deliriously happy at first but then the drastic change brutally murdered my confidence. I thought all eyes were popping out at me, I thought I couldn’t fit in this society. It was as if all these eyes were encapsulating me in a net of self-consciousness. Gradually I started spending more time looking at me in the mirror before leaving for school, just to make sure I didn’t look funny. To make it worse, I didn’t only think that people would find me funny and weird but I was also worried that they would think I am from India and so create a negative image for my country as well as for me. This was the time when I thought of all big transitions that had occurred in my life and how I coped up with them, just to seek inspiration from those instances. Moreover, my new friends and teachers made a vital contribution in getting me back from the “dead”. As a matter of fact, a very specific group of friends encouraged me to break out. I met them in Atlanta at school, and the since the day I met them, Shrey was definitely back. The first day I met them, they were crazy: dancing on tables, singing songs, fighting and teasing; totally my type of group. But they deceived me, tricked me really bad. I saw them getting all crazy and creating ruckuses at the lunch, however, they were the brightest students of the high school. As I got to know them, I realize that they’re crazy and they’re really smart. In a couple of months, a new face was dancing and fooling around with that group, and that was me. Also I managed to get in their AP classes, because face it people! I am smart (I like to flatter myself at times). They transformed me, I was back at being me. I was confident. I was happy.

I then realized that I wasn’t born to conform to the society and turn into just another face in the crowd. This change was actually an opportunity for me to explore myself and break all chains of reluctance and shame that held me back from being myself. Now that I think about it, all major changes that have taken place in my life have led me to discover a new inner self which is more productive, tough and well, awesome! All species that are subjected to any sort of change undergo evolution to adapt and survive better, the evolution theory by Charles Darwin; changes are the reason we develop into better beings, be it physiologically or psychologically. Don’t fear changes, for they are inevitable. Embrace them and evolve.