As beautiful as the Telugu language is, it has a word that really irks me.
The word is meeru , equivalent to aap in Hindi or vaguely equivalent to ya'll in English.
The problem for me is, in Telugu, you ought to use meeru even if you are talking to just one person. Supposedly, that's a sign of respect and I fail to understand how talking to one person as if he/she is multiple people is a sign of respect.
If anything, it's a sign of vision problems where you see multiple people in place of one. Or it’s a sign that the person you are talking to is way too fat that you ought to talk to him/her as if it’s multiple people.
Once at a wedding, one guy I just met, asked me something while referring to me as meeru and I immediately said, “How many people are you talking to?”. Needless to say it was a pretty awkward moment.
The word is meeru , equivalent to aap in Hindi or vaguely equivalent to ya'll in English.
The problem for me is, in Telugu, you ought to use meeru even if you are talking to just one person. Supposedly, that's a sign of respect and I fail to understand how talking to one person as if he/she is multiple people is a sign of respect.
If anything, it's a sign of vision problems where you see multiple people in place of one. Or it’s a sign that the person you are talking to is way too fat that you ought to talk to him/her as if it’s multiple people.
Once at a wedding, one guy I just met, asked me something while referring to me as meeru and I immediately said, “How many people are you talking to?”. Needless to say it was a pretty awkward moment.
Fortunately, you don't see that happen in English. You just say 'you’ in English even if you are talking to the American president.
Note: I'm pretty sure this post doesn't make any sense to most people. If it somehow does, I'm also sure, most people would disagree with me, but hey, that's my opinion and it's my blog.
2 comments:
nuvvu gives a sense of intimacy
meeru gives a sense of respect
its a way to make ppl comfortable...
calling ur friend nuvvu makes him feel comfortable ..
calling ur boss meeru makes him feel comfortable ..
wts the equivalant in english??
another case,
for an example...to address your professor( lets say his name is Mark) u call him Mr.Mark where 'Mr' is a mark of respect,now lez say u r wishing him..you do it by saying "how do you do?"....wers the respect now??
bt in telugu you say "meeru ela unnaru??" by using the same word you use to address more than 1 person...making him feel comfortable.
that is the kind of flexibility it provides
makes sense??
anyway : rote this to just let out my openion :) not hard feelings.
cya
Hmm...I do wanna argue with that but I can't do that with anonymous people. Thanks for ur effort in posting the comment though.
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