You’ve got to be kidding me

Brevity is the soul of sarcasm; and you will need it in Pune

The Americans, love them or hate them, come up with the most pithy contemporary phrases, and then they improve on or make shorthand of those very phrases. So, “You’ve got to be kidding me” now has an even more eloquent and brief:  “Seriously?” - said with that particular flat kind of inflection that clearly indicates, not loud surprise, but a quiet incredulity.

I have many, many Seriously? moments in this city of ours.

The roads, the offices, the libraries, the neighbourhood…offer many such moments. And it is so much nicer to get into this mode than to shake your fist at people and/or shout out multisyllabic four-letter words. Because “Seriously?” can be accompanied with a twisted smile, and you can actually even manage to laugh.

So here are some places, people and happenings that prompt me to say it:

The man in the white car who stops bang in the middle of a lane to let out his passengers, who roll out laboriously from the doors open wide on both sides. Earlier I would honk, or froth at the mouth, or gesticulate wildly for him to take his vehicle to the side of the road and let people pass. Now I find my mind forming “You’ve got to be kkk…” and then simply: “Seriously?” (with or without the word dude added on.)

Try it. You’ll find yourself smiling, which makes the people getting out of the car look curiously at you and then actually look sheepish. You can throw back your head and laugh a little tinkling laugh too. Just to yourself. No one can hear maybe, but still fun.

Or then that person who rushes past you in a queue, straight up to the front, ignoring the long line. Earlier, one would have wordily and frostily said in Marathi “Excuse me, but do you think we are waiting in this line because we have nothing better to do?” and all that jazz. Naah, that’s old hat. Now I will tap this gent or lady on the shoulder lightly on the shoulder and deliver my “Seriously?” The Marathi equivalent, “Kharach?” may be tried.

Then there is that other fascinating life-form in Pune, the courier company. Local, multinational, inter-galactically big, anyone…at the Pune end, they are a blithe lot, this particular Marathi Manus, who will not deliver something to you right within the city, for 12 days from the time the person sent it. And on day 12 will send you several missed calls, so that his money is not spent. When you call back, and he begins to whine about Diwali/rains/father died/mouring for Balasaheb and then asks you to tell him your address (clearly marked on the parcel), you completely side-step your old ways of talking about the unenterprisingness and sheer laziness of his ilk, and just ask… “Seriously?” For good measure you can add a bit of expression: “I mean, see-rii-ouss-ly??”

When the much-touted restaurant that you go to places a slurry of tomato puree, a cutlet and what looks suspiciously like coagulated Gift of the Magi noodles on a hissing plate, and tries to pass it off as a sizzler, you can look up at the waiter or at the smug man at the cash counter and ask: “Seriously?” or “Sizzler you say? Seriously sir?”

When the guy in MSEB explains that by some computer glitch that he unglitched but which reglitched itself when he wasn’t looking, your bill wrongly has the following words emblazoned on them: Defaulter. Payment by Cash Only so you can never pay by cheque or online and you will always have to go pay it in cash …forget about writing hot and bothered letters hither and yon and trying again to find someone high up in the Board to fix this for you. Just smile, lower your voice and purr: “Seriously?” Or you can try “Kharach ki kay?” and smile thinly like the bad guy in Casino Royale.

When the person next to you in the theatre receives phone calls on her not-silent phone every 10 minutes and instructs her maid on how exactly to make the chicken, tells her son to do his homework, checks with her driver if he has got parking, and then also gives some other caller a quick review of the film that you’re trying to watch, resist the temptation to accidentally spill your coffee on her. Lean forward and ask her, modulating your voice perfectly, because she can’t see your expression in the dark: “Seriously?”

Gouri Dange
Pune Mirror 28 Nov 2012