Why have I never chronicled what Tamil means to me?
Is it because my subconscious finally accepts that it’s as casually a part my life as eating and breathing are?
Is it because my subconscious finally accepts that it’s as casually a part my life as eating and breathing are?
When I moved back to Chennai, I had a very conscious discussion with myself towards having to adopt communicating, nay, thinking and feeling in Tamil if it mean I have to forge relationships in this city. Today, I associate it with home. About as much as I’ve associated any city with home. Sometimes I still feel like an outsider. No extent of my knowledge of the language can overcome some barriers Tamil speakers erect against me.
Sometimes I’m at a loss for how to react when someone who need not hold a conversation with me does so. Out of habit, perhaps? Or out of false obligation, so I might vacate the premises and leave him to his own predicament, as was earlier status quo?
Sometimes it’s helped me navigate a situation more fluidly than I could’ve with the most expressive and articulate English. Sometimes it’s made me realize I’m laughing at something I shouldn’t think is funny. Sometimes it’s had me in the presence of music and poetry that I want to translate into English and shout from atop the tallest building; so everyone can listen to and interpret the secret of the Universe I’ve just been privy to. But then, to my dismay I realize that a translation would be, just that. A translation. Not the secret itself. Or its possible meanings.
But I’m older now. I see things like I did not see them before. An adornment of love in Tamil is so much more than what similar words in English will ever achieve, for someone like me. My inner conflict of hypocrisy cringes at this point, because I’ve spent the entirety of my life thinking no language can quite come close conveying what I can with my English vocab. But like I said, I’m an older man now. Mani Ratnam's idea of romance with AR Rahman's soundtrack can only be transferred whisper to ear, pillow to pillow, Tamil to Tamil.
En vaazhvum en saavum, un kannin asaivilae
My life and my death, in the swaying of your eyes.
Or when I listen to a song by Kurangan, when he says
Nee kanumbodhu, nee karnghzirai endru kaanum, andha nee yaar?
Andha unakku enna peru?
Andha unakku endha ooru?
Andha nee kooradha aasaigal enn enna?I've made multiple attempts and writing the above sonnet in English. But then I realize that the English version doesn't sound like my mother screaming at me in Tamil from across the hall, it doesn't sound like the man carrying a water can up multiple flights of stairs asking for space, or like a vendor who assures you that the cauliflower on his push-cart is what you need to be cooking tonight. I realize that when I translate Tamil sentences from inside my head, there is nothing of me left in them. And that realization affects me more now than it ever has before.
There was a point in my life where any conversation in a language other than English, was a result of a micro translation in my head. Self-awareness of the ability to switch my language of thought is liberating!
In some ways, perhaps owing to being able to hold conversations in three languages, there are shades of myself that exist only in that particular language. And their complexity and meaning intensify with periods of time. Be it periods when I'm active in that language or not.
_____________________________________________________________ Now Reading : Sapiens - A Brief History of Humankind - Yuval Noah Harari
Now Listening : No - Nicolas Jaar
