Men of Letters

you overdid it. I have to leave it half way. The concept was good though.

awesome.. Lmao

So terrorism has all muslim names underneath it,.. and ISI has a smart punk remark in brackets.. way to Sardar ji,, no wonder we love you in Pakistan here,, ofcourse KASHMIR and your Foreign office does help a bi

jang, anurag mathur is like a badly cooked steak, you just start enjoying it when you bite into a badly overdone part...like so:

At Customs, brother, I am getting big shock. One fat man is grunting at
me and looking cleverly from small eyes. ``First visit?`` he is asking,
``Yes,`` I am agreeing ``Move on,`` he is saying making chalk marks on bags.
As I am picking up bags he is looking directly at me and saying ``Watch
your ass.`` Now, brother, this is wonderful. How he is knowing we are
purchasing donkey? I think they are knowing everything about everybody
who is coming to America.

With a better editor (me for example!) he would have been a lot funnier :))

burpy read the book ``these inscrutable americans`` by Anurag Mathur. It is written in perfect Indian english (all present continuous tense).

here is one of the letters from that book

http://www.rajiv.com/india/humor/inscrut.htm

si...;)

Well, this article isn`t really about Indian English, which is a fascinating topic in its own right. Jang`s post made me curious, and I got to thinking- what makes our writing style unique, in addition to the dependence on acronyms. Some help from wikipedia later, here goes:

- Using the word ``kindly``, esp as a substitute for please- ``Kindly do the needful``
- Using ``the needful``as above, similarly, ``the same`` as in ``We`ll discuss the London event and draw up a budget for the same``
- Overuse of articles- I can`t think of the examples right now
- Not being able to differentiate between v and w sounds (I confess this seems too much like nitpicking to me, the Sanskrit ``va`` seems perfectly adequate to cover either)
- ``Indian-English speakers regularly put the stress accents at the wrong syllables, or accentuate all the syllables of a long English word, since stress is not considered an essential part of pronunciation.`` (wiki). This is absolutely true. You only have to hear us pronounce geography (jog-raphy) or biology (by-logy) to know this. Most desis can pull off a reasonable ``economics``(ee-ko-naw-mics) but go haywire when confronted with economy (ee-ko-naw-mee instead of ee-KAW-nuh-mee).
- Unnecessary pluralising: ``Stop pulling my legs``, ``Our proven methodologies...``etc.
- Using ``no?`` at the end of statements when desirable of a positive response, ``You are going to the party, no?`` (personally I find this damned convenient)
- Using ``isn`t it?`` as a universal question tag (``You went to the party, isn`t it?``)
- Using ``only`` where it doesn`t belong ``We are like this only`` or ``She only told me`` (this could be attributed to replacing Hindi ``hee`` with only, which is not an equivalent replacement)
- Scattering vernacular particles liberally esp. in spoken English ``I told him ki I was going to the party`` ``I don`t want to go, yaar`` etc. In South India, ``You`re going-aa?``
- Not realising that ``so`` represents more than it says... ``I told him so that I hated going to parties``
Of course there are millions more, but this was what I thought covered the basics. About ``flummoxed` I am not sure, but ``reputed`` instead of ``reputable`` really gets my goat. I am sure it bamboozles a lot of goras as well!

Re: # 16

vaga, I always thought SPIC MACAY was one of the better ones!

very droll burpinderkar.

tell me something, is flummoxed used only by indians? i recall yan martell complaining that indians use words like bamboozle. just the other day a PGDBM types from IIMA used that word and evryone west of the pond were well, flummoxed.

Hilarious! Yaar Burpy, you just proved that Sardars are the funniest. hamidm2 is perhaps a Sardar too, with a turban missing from his head and foreskin missing from the other head.

lolz burpie... that was a fun read. :D
now do one on smileys :P

Re: # 14

No. I work for america based pharmaceutical MNC.

P.S. use of acronym in the above sentence was unintentional.

SPICMACAY

Society for Promotion of Indian Classical Music And Culture Among Youth.

I have been noticing the acronyms we use in electronic commmunications making their presence felt elsewhere. Saying ``brb`` or ``gtg`` on phones or in informal company doesnt sound out of place now. But the other day I was shocked when,after I cracked a joke, I heard some strange words in the sheepish laughter of my nerdy friend. After a while I was able to discern that he was going- ``ha ha hee hee lol rotfl ha ha hee hee lol rotfl`` .I said``wtf`` to myself. For some reason I and my joke, both felt insulted. Next time he is gonna crack a joke -I am going to make a poker face,turn towards him and say -one word - ``lol``.Lets see how he feels.

Netiz, are you a banker? A friend who worked at HSBC told me that TLA was actually in use there. The acronym I mean.
VRV, Zarha, rahuls, thanks folks...
kaami, I wish I could write the whole piece around the unfortunate acronyms but there`s only so much stupidity in the world :)))

Burp,

Talking about acronyms, my company has a 50+ page booklet full of it.

For the first year it was my survival guide, it helped me to understand what was happening around me.

Even now I come across some new ones... a new edition of the booklet would help.