"Don't Angry Me" and Other Awesome Indian Phrases

I love language. As many of you know my favorite jokes are puns, the worse the better. That’s because at their heart puns are about taking language and twisting it in some unexpected way. It’s no coincidence then that one of things I delight in most about India is the phrases and words people use. Some are funny, some are interesting, and some are just plain brilliant. Here are my favorites (a few of which I intend to help achieve mass adoption in the US):

Do the needful. This means, “Do what you have to do to get the job done.” For example, you and your boss come up with a plan to solve a problem at the end of which she says, “Okay, do the needful.”

Please revert. This means, “Let me know how it went” and usually follows “Do the needful.” English translation: Do what you have to do get that solved and let me know how it went when you’re done.

Don’t angry me. Technically this isn’t a common saying, but it is the catch phrase of an awesome Chuck Norris-like character of the popular movie “Rowdy Rathore.” So the next time someone is about to cut in front of you in line or flips you off say, “Don’t angry me.”

Prepone. Have you ever been asked to move a meeting up (or move a meeting back) and wonder if that means you need to make the meeting earlier in the day or later? India has come up with a way to solve this confusion: Prepone. Prepone is the opposite of postpone. If you postpone a meeting by rescheduling to a later time on your calendar, then you prepone it by making it earlier. Brilliant!

Parcel. There are no doggy bags (how about that for a culturally-specific idiom?) and no one has their unfinished meal “boxed up” at a restaurant. Rather, you must ask to “parcel” your food if you want leftovers the next day.

Carry bag. The first time I heard this phrase at a grocery store I had to ask “What?” three times before I understood. A carry bag is a bag to take your groceries home in. Like some markets in the US, grocery stores in India charge extra for a carry bag.

Boss. In the states we use boss as a description for either 1) a direct supervisor and 2) Bruce Springsteen. In India, we use “boss” as a term for any old person. For example, “Hey, boss, how much for this beer?” or “Hey, boss, how much will it cost for you to drive me to the Koramangala Club”

WRT & PFA. The digital age has brought about a number of interesting – and some would argue useful, but I’m not one of them – shorthand ways to communicate. My two favorites are WRT and PFA. WRT is short for “With regards to…” and PFA is short for “Please find attached.”

So, if I were to write the following email I’d expect you all to know what it means:

Boss,

WRT your inquiry about the Marx Brothers, PFA their filmography. Per our discussion your next steps are to catalogue every pun made by Groucho Marx. If you are able to finish the project by the 4th, then we can prepone our meeting a day.

Do the needful and please revert.

Adam
ps – This project is very important. Don’t angry me!