Our German office in Endingen was a small one. My table was shared by a middle aged diminutive African lady of slight build with a prominent lump on her nose, let's call her Ms K, who sat opposite my seat. She was the personal secretary cum stenographer of our German boss.
She sat facing me on the other side of the table pecking at a German language computer keyboard with two of her fingers.
Since office hours turned boring after some time we got around to chatting with each other when the boss was not around. I cracked some sardarji jokes for her benefit and she seemed to enjoy it.
Ms K was not yet adept at the German language. Half the time the German boss was at her side correcting her grammar mistakes.
"German grammar is hell", Ms K commented to me once. "Especially when inanimate objects are referred by gender. I find it a hard time to pronounce the 'ich' sound too."
Well genderization of inanimate objects is a trait common to a lot of Indian vernacular languages too, so I could understand her distress. She was obviously a new immigrant to Germany and she was still getting the hang of German. For her to work on stenographer tasks with this handicap she must have been getting paid real cheap.
Once on my request she handed me a German to English primer. I went through it in bits and pieces and before I left for lunch, I declared "Ich haben hunger" which loosely translated means "I am hungry" and pronounced as "ist haben hoonger". She laughed at this.
It was also she who introduced me to the word "Samstag", German for Saturday, that I needed to know to make an appointment with my German barber that day.
Ms K it seems previously worked in the US at some airport, I learnt from the talks we had. She was single and I guess open to dates too. One of the other German programmers, a tall hippie style blond, once asked her in English whether they could make it out that evening. She was all for it.
I had to work some Sundays too, and I was a bit embarrassed when I found her alone in the office premises talking on the phone for long periods of time in what seemed like German. She never explained to me who she was talking to or why she had to come to office on a holiday to speak privately. Maybe she didn't have a cellphone.
One day Ms. K called me to her side and pointing at her computer, she said she wanted to Google but was not able to. I tried the URL on the browser but that didn't work, neither did it when I tried changing her network settings. It was then I realized that she was not connected to the world wide web. She was only on the office intranet.
When I told her this, she was distraught and asked whether she could use my computer for a while, to which I agreed.
Ms K was very moody and whenever it rained she took leave.
"I like the weather when it rains", she told me. "In such good weather I rather be outside rather than sitting here in the office."
One day she was very cheerful and she told me that the coming Sunday there was a potato exhibition in a nearby village and she asked me whether I was interested in going. I said yes, but come Sunday, I decided sleeping it out in my studio apartment was more agreeable than looking at some damn potatoes which I decided might look a little like that lump on her nose.
Come Monday, and I asked her about the exhibition, but she said it had not taken place after all, her face falling a bit.
Ms K was remarkable as much as every individual on this earth is unique. I think I saw one more facet of human nature in her and she did add some color to the office that German summer.
She sat facing me on the other side of the table pecking at a German language computer keyboard with two of her fingers.
Since office hours turned boring after some time we got around to chatting with each other when the boss was not around. I cracked some sardarji jokes for her benefit and she seemed to enjoy it.
Ms K was not yet adept at the German language. Half the time the German boss was at her side correcting her grammar mistakes.
"German grammar is hell", Ms K commented to me once. "Especially when inanimate objects are referred by gender. I find it a hard time to pronounce the 'ich' sound too."
Well genderization of inanimate objects is a trait common to a lot of Indian vernacular languages too, so I could understand her distress. She was obviously a new immigrant to Germany and she was still getting the hang of German. For her to work on stenographer tasks with this handicap she must have been getting paid real cheap.
Once on my request she handed me a German to English primer. I went through it in bits and pieces and before I left for lunch, I declared "Ich haben hunger" which loosely translated means "I am hungry" and pronounced as "ist haben hoonger". She laughed at this.
It was also she who introduced me to the word "Samstag", German for Saturday, that I needed to know to make an appointment with my German barber that day.
Ms K it seems previously worked in the US at some airport, I learnt from the talks we had. She was single and I guess open to dates too. One of the other German programmers, a tall hippie style blond, once asked her in English whether they could make it out that evening. She was all for it.
I had to work some Sundays too, and I was a bit embarrassed when I found her alone in the office premises talking on the phone for long periods of time in what seemed like German. She never explained to me who she was talking to or why she had to come to office on a holiday to speak privately. Maybe she didn't have a cellphone.
One day Ms. K called me to her side and pointing at her computer, she said she wanted to Google but was not able to. I tried the URL on the browser but that didn't work, neither did it when I tried changing her network settings. It was then I realized that she was not connected to the world wide web. She was only on the office intranet.
When I told her this, she was distraught and asked whether she could use my computer for a while, to which I agreed.
Ms K was very moody and whenever it rained she took leave.
"I like the weather when it rains", she told me. "In such good weather I rather be outside rather than sitting here in the office."
One day she was very cheerful and she told me that the coming Sunday there was a potato exhibition in a nearby village and she asked me whether I was interested in going. I said yes, but come Sunday, I decided sleeping it out in my studio apartment was more agreeable than looking at some damn potatoes which I decided might look a little like that lump on her nose.
Come Monday, and I asked her about the exhibition, but she said it had not taken place after all, her face falling a bit.
Ms K was remarkable as much as every individual on this earth is unique. I think I saw one more facet of human nature in her and she did add some color to the office that German summer.
0 HITCHHIKERS:
Post a Comment