Jaladosham

I’m having a jaladosham (jala = water; dosham = disease, in Sanskrit-Tamil) – i.e., a cold. My nose is producing almost as much jala as the drizzling sky outside my window. The product of the nose is called, in Tamil, mukkupi (mukku = nose; pi = disagreeable substance).

Although my physical state is expressing itself in Tamil, I am listening, for about the millionth time, to a song by Kailash Kher called Saiyyan, a most romantic love song, in Hindi. It can be found here. Or go out and buy the CD -- Kher has a big voice, full of feeling. Even when he's belting out a song (not written by him) whose lyrics are almost impossible to figure out, i.e. "Allah ke Bande"... -- 'jo bhi ho, voh phir ayega' -- you mean that bird is going to get injured and not be able to fly all over again?? (It's a great song too, though, Allah ke Bande -- rousing and catchy -- just don't think too much about what the lyrics mean. If you don't know Hindi, all the better, in this case.)

When people have a cold or a fever, they usually attribute it to ‘change of climate’ – even when, in Chennai, the weather seems to me to be pretty much business as usual. I nod politely, but inside I’m scoffing. And now here I am, 30 degrees F cooler than usual, and loving it intensely, and I’ve caught a cold. I automatically think, ‘ah yes, change of climate,’ and then scoff at myself.

Thus the internal monologue of the morning.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK so I have never heard Allah ke bande but "jo bhi ho, voh phir ayega" translates to "whoever he is, he will return".

Ramesh Gandhi said...

Anonymous, acc. to me, the line means, 'whatever it is, it will return.' The lyrics of the song describe a bird which is so severely injured that it can't fly - then the chorus is, 'Allah ke bande hans de.. jo bhi ho voh phir ayega' -- i.e., O creature of god, laugh: whatever it is, it will return.' Which seems to mean that the bird will again become injured -- although I doubt that that's the author's meaning...

Anonymous said...

If he was ref to the bird then that sentence should have been "jo bhi hey". Am not sure, I learned hindi in school for 8 yrs but that was a decade ago and have forgotten the rules of grammar!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the "heads up," Nancy... I've been listening to the album all weekend, and I love it!

Peter

Anonymous said...

i believe in the song Allah ke bande its "jo bhi ho, KAL phir ayega", roughly meaning "whatever happens, tomorrow will still come" ... i have no idea why you people are hearing "voh phir ayega"

i think it basically means that bad things can happen to people but its not the end of the world. life still goes on. its actually very inspirational if you listen to the words properly :)

Ramesh Gandhi said...

Anonymous - oh, that does make a lot more sense! The main reason for the confusion is that I'm not a native speaker of Hindi. Always happy when someone helps me out :)