Vocabulary building, word by discombobulated word
You have probably tried to avoid being understood by others around you in many different ways. In a different state of the country or in a foreign land, you use your “mother tongue”; when children are around, you spell out words and hope that they haven’t yet got the letters of the alphabet straightened out in their heads; with classmates you indulge in rapid-fire “P” language and the hope, once again, that stray listeners around are not as proficient as you.
In our childhood home, our parents excluded us from the conversation by using difficult and unfamiliar English words and by the time we deciphered even one of them, most of the message had already been conveyed.
“Let the progeny proceed with their argie bargie ...” Father would say over our heads to Mother as the three of us tried to get in our news for the day. The delightful sound of “argie bargie” would make us burst into laughter, but Father would ignore us and continue to talk to Mother about her day: “Did those pilgarlics congregate in these environs?”
“Not all are pilgarlics ...” Mother would protest.
“No?” Father would scoff, “just Brobdingnagian blatherskites and you would do well to avoid their balderdash!” And suddenly both would notice that we had stopped talking (and laughing) and were following their words with our heads going from one side to the other as if we were watching a tennis match.
Father would grin mischievously. “Terminated the blather, huh? Bet the subtleties of our colloquy are too discombobulated for you, though!”
It was too much for us. Blather, Brobdingnagian, Discombobulated ... We went into paroxysms of laughter — although we had no idea that there was such a word as “paroxysms”.
Driven by our desire to be in the thick of things, we tried to widen our language base as fast as we could, but for a long time, it seemed we would never catch up. In fact, one particularly boisterous Diwali, when a careless match had made our entire stock of crackers go up in smoke and flames and we were castigated with words like arsonist, incendiary and pyromaniac, we actually believed we had escaped punishment — until Father sent us to bed without allowing us to dip into the box of Diwali sweets!
Eventually, of course, Father had to stop — because we met him one evening, demure, no longer the “uncouth, rambunctious trio” we had been in the morning and we asked him why he indulged in unnecessary “obfuscation”.
“Oh, learning to use the dictionary, I see,” he said, unfazed. “About time, too!”
When it was our turn to help build our own children’s vocabulary, we didn’t follow Father’s word-by-word method. Instead, we just used them all at one shot on our unsuspecting offspring when they committed any infractions, confusing the excuses out of them — but somehow enabling them to become familiar in one fell swoop with the words we had learnt bit by bit over years of mischief.
And now, with the next generation in foreign lands, we just enjoy ourselves by introducing interesting-sounding words in Hindi and other Indian languages to add spice to their lives. “You don’t know what to say when you are surrounded by a group of language bullies who think they are masters of the universe because of their extensive vocabulary of curse words? Just say ‘Bagaara baingan’ (roasted eggplant) or ‘gobi muttar’ (cauliflower and peas) and walk away with your head held high. It will probably sound enough like curse words to their ears!”
Of course, we don’t stay around long enough to find out whether our “language” lessons worked ... and it is a good thing too. We wouldn’t want to risk the wrath of our nieces and nephews, would we?
■ Cheryl Rao is a journalist based in India.