A South Indian mutters

I have come across a lot of people, a few from my college and a few from my office, who think or believe that ‘South India’ is a State just like Bihar or Jharkhand or UP or Gujarat. Sadly, most of these people are well educated.

Somebody : “Where are you from?”
Me : “Pondicherry”
Smbdy : “Wooaaw! That is a nice place, really cooool”
Me : “hmm…yeah”
Smbdy : “By the way, where is this Pondicherry? It is an island, right?”
Me : (with a smile that says ‘here you go…not again…’ ) “No no no…it is not.”
Smbdy : “It isn’t?!”
Me : “It isn’t. It is neither an island nor a hill station. It is 150 kilometers south of Chennai on the coast”
Smbdy : “How do you go to Pondicherry?”
Me : “I go to Chennai and by bus from there”
Smbdy : “They speak Telugu there, right?”

…….and a bunch of questions like that. And I patiently answer all the questions, gradually clarifying all doubts about Pondicherry, Tamil Nadu, South India, South Indian languages, etc… No kidding, this has happened to me over a hundred times.

For all those who think South India is a single state and all South Indians speak one single language, for your information, I present you some facts about South India.

1. South India is not a single state.
2. South India is not Andhra; no, definitely not.
3. When somebody is from South, he’s not necessarily from Andhra.
4. There is no language called ‘South Indian’ and Telugu is not the only South Indian language.
5. When somebody says he’s a South Indian, he does not necessarily speak Telugu.
6. There are four States and an Union Territory collectively considered as South India.
7. Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka are the four states.
8. Similarly there are four major languages spoken by the people in South India.
9. Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada respectively.
10. And FYI, the four languages are distinct.
11. All South Indian movies are not Telugu movies.
12. Rajnikant is not the only South Indian actor.

For more interesting facts about South India, go through primary school geography and history books.

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GIVE PEACE A CHANCE

So, here I am sitting in my cubicle, pointlessly staring at the monitor screen for more than an hour now, thwarted by the ridicules of Lucknow traffic, unable to get my mind out of it (not just a reason to not work).The way to office was annoying as usual. Cars, autos, bikes, buses, cycles, rickshaws and peddlers all dying to win the race; either it be driving on a straight road or it be crossing roundabouts, everybody wants to be the first one. Nobody wants the other one to go first. The worst part is, there are no signals in most of the roundabouts and vehicles coming from all directions, going towards all directions, race their way through; not a single vehicle would let go the other vehicle even while crossing the road. They all create a lot of confusion in the middle of the road. Above all, I did not understand one thing, why does everybody sound horn all the time? Does it make any sense at all? Why not let the other one go before you? All you have to do is wait patiently for 2 seconds. Ya, I know that every second is precious. But why lose peace of mind fighting your way to office? The vehicle crossing the road sounds horn, the vehicle on the straight road sounds horn, the one behind it, then the one behind the second, then eventually the tenth behind, in fact the ones on the other side of the road, creating a death bell kind of noise. Thanks to you. You have contributed your might towards Noise Pollution. Why don’t you get some sense? Why don’t you stop sounding horn? For heaven’s sake, horn is not the bell you ring in your pooja room to remind the lord in heaven of your presence; it is rather the bell you ring to call the devil in hell. You don’t have to horn all the time while on road. Get some traffic sense my dear higher middle class and higher class public. Driving your car does not classify you as an economical elite; driving with ‘some’ traffic sense classifies you.

Why lose peace of mind? Why not drive peacefully? Why irritate others? Why not have a pleasant ride? You contribute towards annoying yourselves, your boss, your colleagues, your brothers and sisters (as the national pledge says), your city, your nation. You go to your office annoyed; you start annoying already annoyed people there; now the annoyance increasing exponentially around the place; you come home annoyed; you annoy your family; you lose peaceful sleep, you wake up the next day annoyed, now carrying your legacy of annoyance to the road and you take care that the whole process repeats itself, now the annoyance growing in magnitude, covering more space and annoying more people; the entire city is annoyed, and ultimately the entire nation. All that was required was 2 seconds of patience. Why don’t you understand this? Why not wait for 2 seconds? Please spend 2 seconds of your time; give way to the vehicle crossing the road. Live a peaceful life. “All we all say is give peace a chance”.

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