Curtain

In class 3 i changed my school from Village Darlaghat to Town Solan.
That meant a change of mediums.
Now i was a student of the most reputed English medium school in Solan.
At home we didn't speak English at all....
It was really difficult decoding those esoteric instructions from the teachers..

I was sort of comfortable in English but it was limited to monosyllables or bi syllables at the most
eg.Hi, Hello,Welcome,good morning,good night.

Any thing longer then that required a mental translation in English for each of the words
and then assembling each of those words
and then adding verbs
and the nouns
and the pronouns.
By the time i was ready with my sentence it was no longer needed.

English embarrassed me time and again....

One such incident was ...
Four of my cousin sisters and me were sitting and having some chit chat.It was getting dark
Didi said "Gaurav Please curtain kar doge?"
Gaurav gave a nervous smile and thought "Kar to dunga but Curtain hota kidhar hai aur ise kaise karte hain?"
I was blushing...heartbeat had increased...all four of them looking at me and waiting for me to "Do the curtains".
and i am sitting there absolutely clueless ....Not even a minute idea of what is required of me....

Those querying eyes were asking me "Come on you fool..do it"
this helpless Soul was asking  "Please someone tell me where does one find it?"

After a lot of brainstorming i stood up ,
leapt out of the quilt and sprinted in a direction that was opposite to that of the curtain.

I ran straight into my mother ...she was cooking something.
"Mumma Mumma Curtain kya hota hai"
She answered nonchalantly "Parda".
The obviousness with which she gave the answer made me feel like a Duffer even more.

It has been 17 years since that event ....
but today it was kind of deja vu
One of my office mates was leaving for lunch and wished a "bon apetit" to me.
You won't believe same emotions,same feeling,same blush ,same rush of heartbeat as to what should i reply to that???

Immediately i googled 'bon apetit', Smiled and thought ....
You never stop learning.