Merry Christmas

Hope everyone had a good Christmas.

We didn't celebrate it, which I'm fine with since I think the real meaning has somehow been lost and now its more of a commercial holiday.

It was a good thing we didn't have any plans, since I fell ill. I spent most of yesterday dozing off and going between really cold and hot spells. Oh, yeah, and coughing so hard it felt like I was coughing up a lung, but you really didn't want to hear that. LOL

Anyways, I will be off to the dr today to see what is wrong with me, DH says I just have an upper respiratory infection, and hopefully once I get some antibiotics in me I'll feel better.

Here's to hoping I'm better for New Year's Eve, even though I just plan to stay home since I am not much for crowds.

Don't say ram chagol! and Learning Hindi

Well...I'm into my 3rd week of Hindi classes, and besides saying small sentences like, "Mein khush hoon" (I am happy) or "Mein ladki hoon" (I am a girl) and the sounds, and a few words, I'm not so far into it yet. However, I can write the letters in their horribly round shapes (I much prefer Bengali script as it's more straight) and read it pretty well.

Well, let me tell you about my teacher. Her name is Latika, her native tongue is Hindi, and her husband's is Bengali. I know, you are probably thinking, Why do we give a crap about what her husband's native language is?, there is a point I promise! This is her first time teaching at Ramakrishna Mission, and she's not entirely sure how to go about it, not that I correct her. At the beginning of each class we are supposed to say a prayer, and in my Bengali class we were made to stand while we repeated it...well, she doesn't make us stand, maybe she doesn't know better? Also, I swear she has ADD (attention deficit disorder) because she can't stay on the same subject for more than like 20 minutes. If she did, we would already be done with the sounds, and writing, and you know...the boring stuff.

In one of my last classes we were going over some small vocabulary words. The word bakri (goat) came up and she asked me what it was in Bengali. I told her it was chagol, and after a slight pause continued on to say, "But, my husband always says ram chagol." Now, ram chagol means a billy goat, but it can be used as an insult, meaning a very stupid person. My teacher upon hearing this was shocked and said, "No! Don't say that! That's not a good thing to say!"

Then the next class we were going over the hindi words for banyan tree and riverside / bank (which for the life of me I can't remember at the moment, and I'm too lazy to get out my workbook...) and she couldn't tell us the exact English translation for them, so I texted one of my friends and asked him. He responded and I then told the teacher...hehe, the power of technology.

Oh, yes, and the workbook makes me feel like I'm in Kindergarten again...seriously, but anyways...I am enjoying shocking my teacher like this, and am half contemplating continuing with the courses just to entertain myself. :-) Because, honestly, if I didn't entertain myself somehow in this class, I would just fall asleep...not good!