C is for Capturing and Clicking with Cameras

Cameras are tricky things to use in spoken Hinglish, mostly because in most contexts literal translation is sure to let you down.

"I'll click your picture!" is an overused sentence! What exactly does it mean to click a picture? Is it like clicking a mouse? Is it like pressing a button? Oh wait, it is exactly like pressing a button..on a camera, which then makes a click sound and voila, your picture has been clicked.

Click is a versatile word. It can be used in a declarative sentence, "I'll click your picture!" It can also  be used in an interrogative sentence, "Shall I click your picture?" or as an imperative sentence, "Get your picture clicked!" The last mentioned is usually (but not always) in the context of getting a studio portait of oneself for matrimonial purposes (this will be the subject of a whole other post!).


However, I guess being clicked is better than being captured so it is fortunate that the former is used more frequently than the latter.

When the word capture is used, it is generally not accompanied by any mention of a picture. The sentence may be, "She was captured in a sari." This can lead to some understandable confusion on the part of the uninformed listener because it does sound remarkably like an Indian damsel in distress was captured by some dastardly dude! Alternatively, you may be told that, "She was happy to capture him while he was sleeping." This makes it sound like some sadistic kidnapper took advantage of some poor man's exhaustion.

 A word of caution, when someone says that they want to click a picture or capture you, don't worry. All that will happen is that they will point a camera at you and shoot! The quickest way to ensure the end of the clicking and capturing is to grin and bear it. Sooner or later the activity of taking a picture, if not the use of the words, will end.

C is for cover

"Can you give me a cover?" is a perplexing question. The person asking it could seem well-protected from the elements, clothed and not in immediate need of an alibi. They will not even be holding anything that may seem in need of covering - i.e. a book, a dish or a sleeping child.

If you've ever been asked this question, here's a hint: the person is not asking for a lid, shelter, an alibi, a baby blanket, a shawl etc. A cover is the word used to replace a plastic bag/grocery bag/plastic packet.

Covers may be large or small, plain or bear logos, transparent or opaque - their only unifying factor is that fact that they (may) be plastic and have handles. So, when someone asks you for a cover, you will generally have no real clue what type of cover you should produce.

Sometimes the word cover is preceded by a defining characteristic such as plastic, large or strong. This makes it slightly easier to understand what the person requires of the cover, but still leaves you with no clue about why he wants a cover in the first place.

Ever enamored of the redundant, Hinglish speakers have begun to replace the word cover with the word carry bag. Carry bag, over-specified in case you have ever used a bag for something other than carrying, or carried many things without a bag, is used in much the same way as cover but is not only confined to plastic/disposable bags. Although descriptive enough to leaves less room for doubt about its purpose, the word still gives you no clue about what properties the desired carry bag should possess. In these situations, it is always best to check before producing one that is too big/small/thin/transparent/opaque.

I is for Idioms

Prior to actually giving you a suggestion, has anyone ever said, "Don't mind, eh (not minding will be the subject of a whole new post)? This is just loud thinking?" And have you wondered whether this means that this person has found a way to increase the volume on their thoughts without actually voicing them? I know I frequently have! I'm then tempted to ask if when they whisper about colleagues behind their backs, they call it soft thinking.

Loud thinking, for those of you who are wondering, is just another way of saying thinking aloud. The problem is that many Hinglish speakers translate back and forth between English and their mother tongues, so the nuanced difference between thinking aloud (ie vocalizing thoughts) and increasing the volume of one's thoughts (loud thinking) is often lost in translation.

Language used idiomatically often suffer from this fate because the words do not literally mean what the expression is trying to convey. For instance, 'coming along for the ride' might become 'coming for a drive' and 'all of a sudden' could become 'all on a sudden.'

Of course, literal translations also take place in reverse. So an idiom from another language might directly be translated to English. For instance, 'He's eating my head' is a frequently used idiom which is supposed to connote frustration but may connote numerous other things depending on your perspective. I think this is a literal translation of the Hindi phrase 'mera sar kha raha hai.'

Odd though it may sound, one must admit that translated idioms can add a lot of colour to conversations especially when one person is a Hinglish speaker and the other is not!

E is for enjoying

Sometimes, in response to that regulation Monday morning question, "What did you do over the weekend?" people have said to me, "We enjoyed nicely." Pre-coffee on a Monday morning, sometimes it might not even register as an odd sentence. Post-coffee, one may begin to wonder what exactly is nicely - is it a place? Is it a thing? No, it is just an adverb. And the sentence fragment you received as an answer has left you without a response.

In response to a text message saying, "What are you doing?" Hinglish speakers think a suitable response is, "We are enjoying." When told that someone is, "enjoying," the activity involved could refer to a party, a picnic, a movie, shopping, dinner with  relations, or meals (a post on this to follow). It is best not to make assumptions as to what exactly is being enjoyed since the activity itself will never be mentioned i.e. We are enjoying a wonderful meal with friends.

If you are not asking a rhetoric question, it is important to remember to ask additional questions to get an accurate idea of what the person did/is doing/will do. In response to, "We enjoyed nicely" a good follow up question might be, "where did you enjoy?" This will hopefully prompt the person to give you a location which may then allow you to ascertain what the activity was. Other follow up questions could include, "Who did you enjoy with?" and "How did you enjoy?"

Of course, follow up questions are only necessary if you really want to know the answer to the questions. If not, then you can just appreciate talking at cross purposes and enjoy nicely.

R is for Relations

The word relations in Hinglish is used in stead of the English word, relatives. So when asked if Mr. X is your relation, the real question would be a query as to whether the two of you are related.

Relations in Hinglish can be complex (...not quite the same way that 'relationships' are complicated). A man can be your brother, but you don't have to share the same parents. This is also clarified when the same person is said to be your cousin-brother. The same example may also have a specification claiming that although he is your brother, he is not your own-brother. Of course, if someone is known just as your cousin, there is a good chance that there is no known way that the two of you are related at all. These terms have been around long enough and have been used by so many generations already that Hinglish can probably stake claim the origin of the English phrase, 'brother from another mother'.

The fact that any man (usually older, but not compulsorily so) you meet even for the first time can be your uncle (and woman be called aunty- and not auntie) shows that the relations influence in Hinglish is so deep-rooted that the sense of family permeates through nearly every relationship in life. Auntys (when spoken about in general) are a group of women (usually, but not always older than the speaker) who are not only unrelated, but also not known to the speaker. When one uses the term my aunty, it represents a lady who is still unrelated, but may be known.

You may refer to your  related aunts as cahchi, kaki, mausi, amma, maami, chitti, buaa, phooi, fufi, but remember to use only the right title for the right aunt!

H is for hArmones

I remember when I just started high school, a teacher gave us a long discourse on harmones. Having been a relatively bright student, it wasn't too often that my teachers surprised or stumped me, but harmones had me completely foxed. The teacher kept saying things like, "Adolescent boys do not have a lot of control because of their harmones." I kept wondering if she meant that since adolescent boys' voices are usually cracking, they have a tenuous (at best) ability to harmonize in a choir.

The teacher finally put me out of my misery when she wrote the word on the board and it was spelled h-o-r-m-o-n-e-s. I was so relieved. Then I was convinced that harmones was just a different way to pronounce the word when it had a different meaning [such as lead (the substance) and to lead (someone up the garden path)], and that when hormones were harmful to humans, they were referred to as harmones (pun-ny, but not my brightest moment and that I freely admit).

But no, the teacher kept talking about testosterone and oestrogen and insisted on referring to them as harmones. It finally dawned on me that she meant hormones, that the word had no other meaning when pronounced harmones, and that my dear, befuddled teacher was actually a native Hinglish speaker.

What similarity is there, you might ask, between harm and hormones, and why do people persist in pronouncing them so similarly? The answer is that there is no good answer. Many people (including some Science teachers) say it that way, despite the fact that there is no logical reason for that to be the way the word is pronounced.

Depending on their mother tongue, some Hinglish speakers like to flatten vowel sounds, so an "oh" sound might become an "ah" sound in a word. So, perhaps some science student, who later went on to teach many generations of Hinglish speakers, was taught to say harmones by the sort of person who refers to forms as farms (the vowel shift will be explained in time).

If, like me, you are ever in a situation where people keep using the word harmones and you are trying to determine whether the root form of the word has anything to do with harmony or harm, save your breath! Just replace harmone with hormone and you will be all set.