the Thinker

I realised one thing when I returned home in January this year. When the trend is of sleek and trim television picture tubes, mobile phones and many other things; you cannot move around with extra flab on your body.

Therefore, my mother screamed at me when she saw me this time in Mumbai.

"How did you manage to gain so much weight? I want you to join a gym as soon as we reach Kolkata," she thundered.

I had no proper answer to her query and blamed my extra pounds on my long office hours, which required me to spend nearly 8-10 hours a day, sitting in front of the computer screen. So now, since the past two weeks, I have been attending a gym. One can imagine how tedious is it for an inherently lazy person like me to follow 25-26 exercises written in my chart.

The treadmill, cycle, stepper and all those exercising machines appeared to me like monsters of different sizes. Things started to ease up after 3-4 days, when I started listening to the ravings and ranting of the other members in the gym. I do not know whether all of you feel the same; but on a difficult schedule, things become easier with some kind of a diversion. Perhaps, that is why they put on music during most strenuous schedules.

I found my diversion in the mindless jabbering of my fellow gym-mates (not all of them though). There was this group of middle-aged housewives, who would all enter the gym together. Whereas the others would quickly change into their gym-suits in 5 minutes; these females would take over 15 minutes in the changing room. As one can guess, they spent 10 minutes chatting there.

Finally, they began their exercise regime. After every five minutes of leg lifting, one of them would enquire the others about what they cooked for lunch that day. The discussion would be followed by various recipes and lunch preparations, which do not consume much time. They would go on talking until our trainer would interrupt their conversation and put them back to their exercises.

Another day, one of these homemakers (the most talkative one) started her day at the gym by asking her other mates that why they had not ever invited her for dinner at their homes (I do not want to sound arrogant but she was sounding idiotic as well as funny).

"This one (she pointed towards one in her group) never cares to invite me to her house for dinner one day," she complained in a juvenile tone. I was not at all interested in knowing why was she not invited for dinner at any place. But the only thing was that she was on the cycle during this pointless conversation. I wonder whether she noticed or not, but I was waiting for her to finish cycling, it was the last machine I was to do.

Though cooking was their favorite topic of discussion, the focus would sometimes shift to other things like who is the most beautiful girl in their locality and which one is the most eligible for marriage. Being a quieter person by nature, I am quite amused at the enthusiasm with which these homemakers chatted.

Whenever I enter the gym, I am always in a hurry to finish all the exercises in my chart and exit that place as soon as possible. I sometimes wonder how these women choose to stay back so long at this place. Not that they are obsessed about their exercise regime, but it serves as an ideal chatting outlet for them.

The other day a new girl entered the gym. She is a north Indian, a Punjabi called Kali (in Hindi, it means a budding flower and it is pronounced as 'K-li'). She is quite a cheerful person, but the only thing that irked her was the way her name was pronounced by these women. Bengalis are anyways known for their extraordinary Hindi pronunciations. The 'babumoshai' tag is still attached to Bongs and these women further accentuated that.

The trainer saw Kali's exercise chart and said, "Koli, do this one first." The girl was at first amused at the way her name was pronounced but soon got tired and said,"Please, its Kali and not 'Koli'."

Instead of rectifying her error, the trainer replied,"Oh! Kali or Koli, its all the same."

The homemakers added,"Kali is pronounced like that only in Bengali."

The poor girl did not appear too satisfied at their response, but requested again that if possible, her name should be pronounced in the right way. The trainer took some pity on her and tried to follow the right way; but the girl's agony intensified when she started calling her 'Kaali.' Kali gave up all hopes.

Two weeks after I joined, I found some of these homemakers missing and some were complaining that the exercises are not trimming their tummies at all. Therefore, they are planning to quit the gym.

One of them said to our trainer,"What is this didi (sister)? I have been working out like anything over the past few months. But it is not making any difference. My tummy continues to remain of the same size as it was before. It is not that I chat too much. Its of no use, I think I will stop coming here."

"Humphhh...gotta to find another diversion soon," I thought.

I can only sympathise with your plight...all the best for ur search for other diversions!:P  

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thanks krish.  

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hey...
nice..awesome first para...loved it...
and great to read a post about bong pronounciation. it is extremely funny, the way they speak hindi and english. bongs do not have a 'v' in their script and end up pronouncing 'v' as 'b'.....
as in 'bidda' for vidya.....

as they say, pop as a rasagulla in your mouth and speak hindi, it will sound like bengali...

sweet language though
have fun in the gym

kaushik  

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Hey Amrita...it was too much...
I am a bong but brought up in Pune...now workin' in Kolkata though...Fortunately/unfortunately my pronunciation is not that way...I really dont understand why these bongs fuck up every word...eg: Kali...what's difficult in that..."Kaali"..."Koli" <--- :)) this made me laugh like anything...all the ppl around my desk started looking into my screen trying to find out whats so funny to me...Trust me they were also bongs so I did not care to share the joke with them...I cudn't code for 20mins...laughin' all the way...at least something interestin' happened to a programmer's life on a monday morning...Thanx dude!!!
They murder pronunciation..be it Hindi or English..I dont know abt other languages...
But Koli :))
A woman would say "Hum batata hai tumko..."
So not only pronunciation..they murder gender also...
But poor bongs they do not understand the concept of gender associated with verbs...
Now...in hindi police is female gender..but a bong would say "police ata hai" :))
This is endless.....Anyways...  

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This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.  

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Ah, you're of the quieter sort I see :) ...I understand your 'plight'.

I'm quite the same - the observer at the side, who occasionally, if amused, lets a chuckle or two out. I think for people as us, it's always a love-hate relationship with louder people :) - they annoy us with their loudness, but without them, we can't but help notice that we haven't any entertainment.  

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hi kaushik,
hmm, it made me laugh when i read my post but not when i was in that gym with them. about pronounciations kaushik, well, i have heard all kinds of foul 'hindi.' have u ever heard gujarati hindi? they speak like "mein bolti he ne, tamareko samajh nahin aata." but that is still tolerable. (pardon me if ur one) or for that matter some south indians speak hindi in their accent, (once again sorry if ur one though ur name does not suggest that ur are one).

hi brownstone,

now that is a revelation, ur a bong, when i read ur first comment, u sounded like a non-indian altogether. i do not know whether i should be apologising for wasting 20 mins of ur encoding? i never thought everyone would laugh so much.

onthe diet problem, yes it is a serious one...umm, i am not sure that smoking is the solution, in my office i have seen ladies triple my size smoking like chimneys, but everyday they just seem bigger.

hi shankar,

i guess ur right, the love-hate thing is ery much there and yes, i am entertained also.  

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hey amrita!
i am a south-indian- madras-tamilian, who has lived most of his life in north...so my hindi is pretty good, good enuf to make fun of hindi accents......i make fun of my dads hindi all the time!!
chalo
cya
kaushik  

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you attended a gym ? :)  

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By "codin'" I meant programmin'...I work on Java..
I aint got any idea y 1 would wud possibly think that I aint sound like an Indian...
Anyways I dont know abt evey1 but I definitely laughed a lot coz ur post was well-written and it definitely reflected what happens when a hell lotta homemakers enter the arena...Moreover I meet a lot of bongs outside my company everyday who speak like that...
And say NO to smokin' coz it is a solution to nothin' but cancer in the long run...
Gettin' fat is totally natural or genetic and 1 could only remain fit by exercisin' or diet control..But chill on that coz I am sure that this is the age to explore new and fancy grub... :))  

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What are ya sayin'.."Koli" is definitely funny....
I can still laugh on that!!!
Y the hell would ya apologize for makin' some1 laugh??
As a matter of fact i should thank ya!!!
:)  

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Once i was in a gym and one morning an aged lady was ni front of me doing some exercise, I couldn;t control my laughter by seeng her actions. Quit that place and was laughing with my friend.  

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ok kaushik, i guess i will have to guess on a person's identity. i thought ur a gujju or something. coz generally not heard of a southindian name like kaushik. in my case too, i was born in gujarat and brought up there, but i am a bong.

anonymous, whoever ur...yes, i am attending a gym, is that something abnormal?

hi brownstone, hmm, i forgot to mention that i visited ur blog some days back, but could not manage to comment as the window was not opening. read some of ur posts, ur style of writing suggested me that u might be a non-indian. no offence, i assure u. fat in my case is due to hereditary traits. i m glad my post made u laugh.

hi reflex, so u too joined a gym? how long back? that was humourous.  

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The first 2 lines of every stanza has nothing to do with me and Swing...
Its whats happened of late with my life...
The 3rd line is abt the state of my mind....
and the 4th line is whats happenin' at work...
If ya read all of my previous posts then ya will understand a bit what I really mean...
In fact the only kool thing thats happenin' in my life is work for me...where I am javax.swing-ing
I say that coz I'm presently workin' in Swing...

What do ya mean by 1st comment on my blog???  

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Dear amrita,
I dont think that I will be out of tech. so soon!!!
I worked hard for 6 yrs to reach where I am...
And I am pretty much settled here as of now.....
Maybe I will think after 10 yrs of workin'...
I will sell pani-puris...and I will blog abt my panipuri experiences...probably that would ensure ppl that I am an Indian and I not a techy anymore...
:))  

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Now I know what happens behind those hush hush women only hours in our local gym....  

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Hola Amrita! This was one very different recollection from the sort of gym life I've seen... I loved it. Very amusing post! :)  

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you know there is something interesting about ur comments, they are always double. seems that u have taken my non-indian comment on u very seriously. well, i mentioned, no offence meant. writing about panipuri experiences, hmm...sounds innovative if u really plan to do such a thing (kidding). byways, since i am not a tech freak, thanks for explaining that poem in such a detailed manner. about that 'ist comment', forget it, its stale now. but ur poem was really nice.

hi mottai boss, i also came to know about those gyms now.

hi gonsings,

glad u loved it. what recollections do u have of gyms?  

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Double meaning probably coz I have a split personality...
I'm seriously not offended with non-Indian thingy!!! Trust me...
I'm kinda used to this "no-u-r-not-1" thing out here in Kolkata also...
Even if I speak to any1 in bong they reply to me in Hindi ("koli" types hindi :)) )..that has nothin' to do vth my pronunciation...Though 1 of my roots are from Rajasthan and I am semi-brought up in Pune...I'm a Bong brahmin...and I can speak bong very well...though I dont know how to read or write...But that's not my fault....I wasn't taught or I never needed to ...
Maybe this is coz of my looks...I cant think of anything else...

Anyways...Cheers.... :))
brownstone-panipuriwala  

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u sure think a lot ..

btw u mention animating as one of ur hobbies.. was wondering what it is ..  

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hi brownstone, thats ok, dont get senti...i am also a bong bbron and brought up somewhereelse, u wont believe what trash bong i used to speak when i was a child. anyways, now i speak it fluently but still ppl can make out that i am not a native bong. nothing to worry about as long as we are connected to our roots. hmm, split personality! that's interesting.

hi nikhil, i am an animation freak, as in animation films. love watching them and have learnt a bit about it so..  

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oh, my recollections of gyms are very boring ones... that's why I like the scene you described so much... every time I've joined up for a gym, people's behaviour seems to mechanical to me... It's true that they are usually using machines and following patterned exercises, but I don't think that justifies for the luck of soul I've perceived...  

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hmm, guess u should join an indian gym, gonsings, maybe u will have a more entertaining style.  

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