Monday, October 24, 2011

Becoming A Puneri

Being a Hyderabadi and living as a Chennalite for 6 months, it’s the journey of a guy in becoming a Puneri now. Confused, read on then….

After completing my training in Academy Chennai, to my surprise I was posted in Pune, leaving my first two preferences Hyderabad(my home) and Chennai. As I’m always interested in going to places, consoled and convinced myself that it’s a good opportunity for me to visit all the scenic beauty around Pune. At that time I didn’t knew what was to come in future. Greatest solace was that I was not alone, as four more of my friends were also posted in Pune.

So finally we started our journey from proudly standing, century old Chennai central railway station at exactly noon in Mumbai express. Three out of us five were already in Pune, left pretty early as their projects were calling them, so only two of us were going now, my friend Sathya(please note, it’s a girl) n me. Crossing Tamilnadu, Andhra, Karnataka, we entered Maharashtra n after a long journey, reached Pune station next day, around 10am. Sathya’s not so close friend(her close friend’s bro’s friend’s cousin’s …. Close enough na) Prabhakar came to receive us. Coming out of the station I was in doubt am I really Pune in train or travelled in a time machine back to 1980’s. Autowallas were ready to grab us, one autowalla said something, I could make nothing out of it. Habituated of saying “Enna”(what) or “Tamil teriyade”(Don’t know Tamil),only golden words that I learned for survival in Chennai,whenever we hear any jargon, I was about to use the same that I heard Sathya saying “Enna sollre”(what is he saying)?, it was only then I realized that we entered the great Maratha n now it’s time to take on Marathi(huh!!).

Usually Tamilians r very poor in north Indian languages(even national language) so we both were stunned to see Prabhakar, a tamilian, talking chaste Marathi(atleast I felt so) with the autowalla. He was conversing with Sathya in tamil   n in Marathi  with autowalla, both are foreign languages for me so I was sitting dumb in the auto waiting for my destiny. Dropped Sathya at Aundh where she was given accomadation, Prabhakar also left to his place n then alone I was conversing in Hindi(happy I know that at least) with autowalla, reached Pimple Saudagar in a few min after Ravi(remember this guy, he has lot more to do) helped us with address saying its near Jagtap Dairy. Names of areas are not so tough in Pune to remember, but when you change cities every 6 months it’s very difficult to remember areas names. It took me nearly a month to pronounce properly the word “Sholinganallur” an area in Chennai, now working on areas of Pune similarly.

On reaching Pimple Saudagar, I felt like I came to US or Uk, now I’m not talking about the roads or infrastructure there(boys should have guessed by now what I’m talking about). Paid the autowalla the amount he asked without bargaining, as being bluffed by autowalla is a daily routine for a Chennailite. Feeling the fatigue of journey, lied down on bed, throwing the baggage in a corner of my room in guest house-Sunshine vila. Remembering the dumbness in auto I decided, albeit missing the chance to learn Tamil in Chennai, I must not miss the chance now to learn Marathi. I remember I had a Maharashtrian friend in school, I learned a sentence too in Marathi from him, that is “Mala Marathi nai yethe…”


 to be continued..

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