You probably need to be able to follow Tamil to fully understand this post!
Yesterday, I was browsing at the library when my cell phone rang. It was my friend V. After general pleasantries, this is how the conversation went:
V: Hey, yesterday I went to Molly.
Me (thinking it is a new night club or something): Really, where is it?
V: No yaar, I went to see Molly.
Me (puzzled - we don't have any common friend named Molly): Okaaaay - but who is Molly?
V: Aaaargh, no man - I went to watch Molly. You know that Tamil movie you mentioned, with Jyothika as heroine and all?
Me: Ooooh, you mean the movie Mozhi - haahahahahahahahhahahahahah!
V (unable to see what is so funny): Yeah, that's what I said, Molly. Anyways, what I wanted to know..... (conversation continued).
You see, V is a native Telugu speaker and does not know a lot of Tamil, much less know how to differentiate between the famous Tamil 'zh' and 'la'. Hence, his brand "new" name for the movie. Still, apparently he and his friends decided to watch the movie because the Telugu movie they had originally gone to see had "flop" written all over it. And what's more, they all had enjoyed Mozhi a lot, inspite of it having no sub-titles and thus not being able to follow the entire climax scene (to clarify which he had called me up).
Ah, good movies - don't they transcend language barriers!
5 comments:
If I got a nickel everytime someone said vala palam ... i wud be rich now.
haha.. so he said 'molly' that could be rhymed with 'dolly'?
That's strange - I'd have thought a Malyali would have said it that way!
@rads - We Malayalis can pronouce our 'zha's and 'zhi's very well...
Thanu - lol :-) - I think that is the worst of the lot!
Rads - yup, rhymed with dolly - I don't know why he dragged the 'mo' part of it!!
Thanu - I think Rads meant the emphasis on the 'o' sound (no offense intended)...I think Malayalis can give anyone a run for their money when it comes to pronouncing 'zh'!!
Thanks for clarifying Archana - that's what I meant with the 'o' and also there really is no 'zhi' sound in telugu - as far as I know..
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