Language story: "Going to Jahangirpura?"

Language story: "Going to Jahangirpura?"

In 2008, while working at Larsen & Toubro, I was stationed at the Hazira fabrication plant in Surat. I lived in an area called Jahangirpura. The L&T bus would drop me a few kilometers from my destination, and from there, I would take a shared auto rickshaw which had pre-filled 2-3 other passengers. Sometimes, I would sit in the front with the driver. Since it was a highway, many rickshaws were headed to different destinations, so I had to ask the driver if he was going to Jahangirpura. My question in Hindi, "जहांगीरपुरा जाओगे?" (Going to Jahangirpura?), revealed that I was not a local.

As an unwritten rule, if you weren't a local, the rickshaw driver would charge Rs 15 instead of Rs 10. Once, while traveling with a Gujarati colleague, he stopped the rickshaw for me and asked the driver, "ઝાંગીરપુરા જવાનુચુ?" (Going to Jahangirpura?). When I got off, I was charged only Rs 10 because I was considered a local. From the next day, I started asking in Gujarati, "ઝાંગીરપુરા જવાનુચુ?" and was charged only Rs 10! 

However, one day, I stopped a rickshaw with three college girls in the back. I asked my question in Gujarati. The driver responded with several sentences in Gujarati. Besides the phrase I had learned, I only knew "હા" (Yes) and "ના" (No). Assuming he wasn't going to Jahangirpura, I said "ના." Suddenly, the driver as well as the girls, looked at me as if I had committed a crime, and the driver drove away shaking his head!

A nearby Gujarati man, guessing I wasn't a local, laughed and explained that the driver had said there were three girls in the back and suggested I sit in the front so that girls can sit behind comfortably. By saying "no," I had inadvertently implied I wanted to sit adjacent to the girls. 😄

Moral of the story: It's better to learn the complete language or stick to the one you know!