My dance teacher regularly gives the Salvation Army children food and biscuits, so everyone there, from the workers to the watchman’s son, knows her. The little ones have given her a name, too – ‘Biskitwali’. The most endearing feature of the epithet is that no offence is intended , and none is taken.
Yesterday, I parked my bike outside my teacher’s house and a cheeky child came up to me with his bright smile. “Dance class,” he proclaimed.
I nodded.
“Dance class?” inquired another child.
“Haan!” The tone said ‘naturally, don’t you know even that?’. “Tereko nahin malum kya?” Top-speed speech, barely completing each word, heedless of grammar.
I took off my helmet and scarf.
“But what is that?” the second child asked in Hindi. “What is ‘dance class’?”
“Arre!” the first one said, as if talking to a dunce. “Wo biskitwali hai, na? Wo actually dance teacher hai. Tereko nahin malum kya?” (“That ‘biscuit-wali’ is there, no? She’s actually a dance teacher! Don’t you even know that?”)
And I could not get out of my head the picture of my distinguished and dignified dance teacher disguised as a seller of biscuits.
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