Yogi Boogi and Johnny Munga

So Nancy has told you about her foreign language of love. Maybe this is about mine.

The Gateway to India, added to lend some gravity to this post

Call Your Correspondent impolite, but one of my main goals in learning any language is to obtain a good, solid competence in cussing someone out. I'm pretty sure it's a genetic thing that comes down from all sides of the family tree. I don't think one can call him or herself fluent without this basic skill. If you can't call someone "Wicker Bill" in a given language then you simply aren't fluent yet.

I find great humor in what some cultures consider a curse. In Arabic it often has something to do with a person's lineage and/or nationality. In Hindi one of the best ones is "Sala," best said with a bit of a sneer. It means brother-in-law. There's just something poetic about that.

Sala Ghandu, on an empty train

In fact, the best cursing is very creative, and leaves a strong mental picture. It is indeed like poetry that way. And while belittling the person addressed, it should also make them smile at your overpowering creativity.

In my earlier post I mentioned that one of my names for Ravianna is Sala Gandhu. It means brother-in-law a__wipe. Obviously, I use the term with a great deal of love and affection.

People, of course, react differently to my pet names. Some are scandalized that I would know these terms at all, and some want to teach me new ones. I am always grateful when I find such a brother in vulgarity. So Ravi's cousin Yogesh, who is known by family as Yogi, is just such a mawali bhai (hooligan brother). He calls me Johnny Munga, which means Johnny the Monkey - somewhat in the same spirit as "slap the monkey" if you get my drift. I call him Yogi Boogi, both because he taught me that term, but also because it has a certain faint alliterative groove to it. Boogi is the term for a female dog, BTW.

Yogi Boogi and Johnny Munga, solving the world's problems

Another very good element to all of this is that in Bombay there are many languages spoken every day, not just Hindi. So you can sort of mix and match, at will. Munga, I think, is Tulu, while mawali and bhai are Hindi. Marathi has some very good ones. And when you're on the train and you'r not sure what the dude next to you just said, you can always slip into some good Tex-Mex and be pretty sure (but not totally) that you're not going to offend anyone.

Akki and Addi, or, How Mawalis Spend Their Mornings

So, tere ghand mein haathi kah lundh. And that's in Hindi.