bus banter

okay. so my office is in a part of town about which i have no clue. so travel is an issue. yesterday i somehow managed to get back home by literally hanging off the rod for dear life. Add to that getting screamed at by a bunch of very pissing off women. In my defence... i didn' t even "give any pressure" (thats what one of them said, LOL). well, today i had to come to office on my own. I got up on the bus which was followed by a very embarrassing direction to the conductor from my maid asking him to drop me off at the correct bus stop. i ignored the ebarrassment and smartly chose a seat (i was the first person to get on, so i was spoilt for choice) and then something strange happened...i was asked to get up (that too very unceremoniusly) because that was apparantly a "gent's seat". well, well...the world is changing i guess. that was not all, something else happened, but this was nicer...this girl asked for my permission to sit on the empty seat next to me (yes, it was a public bus). At another time i would have just laughed within, but after yesterday's harrowing experience...what can i say, i was almost touched.

Hindi Connection

Coming back to internships again, my present joke of a work experience is rather odd. Everybody talks to me in Hindi...even the "very bengali" bangalis who just cannot. it was only yesterday, i kept answering all of the receptionist's queries in bengali when infact every question was asked to me in Hindi. I know she is a bong, i have made it amply clear that i am a bong...then why the need for hindi?? this is a very interesting phenomenon that plagues a lot of us bengalis actually...the want to talk in another language to make the discourse sound official. it happened this other time when my father was talking to a traffic policemen. Neither spoke in remotely correct hindi, but nonetheless they did speak in hindi. Since i didn't have anything to do today (read had but chose not to) i kept thinking about the whole hindi connection. very very baffling indeed.