Tuesdays with Madam Utra

What do you do at work when classes are canceled, there’s no power and not much to do? Learn Hindi, of course. So far I have found it very difficult to pick up any Hindi at all, because I have never seen it written down and I am trying to do all my learning by ear. As a result, I’m learning very slowly, and it’s a bit embarrassing. The girls will try to teach me a phrase or two, and it all sounds the same to me. On the few occasions where I am able to pronounce it correctly, I promptly forget it because I don’t have it written down to practice. I started to think that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

Then Madam Utra, the warden at the hostel, graciously offered to teach me a little bit of Hindi every day. I immediately pulled out my notebook so I wouldn’t forget whatever she taught. Would you like to guess the subject of my very first lesson? The verb kata, which means “to eat.” Go figure.

Today I was able to pronounce and remember all of the pronouns and the present tense forms of the verb “to be,” which also happens to be an integral part of every conjugation. I actually learned quite a lot in the short time, and I don’t remember it all, but at least I wrote it down. There’s hope for me yet.