by Tarquin Hall
POORI puffy wheat bread deep fried in oil.
PRASAD offerings of fruit or sweetmeats sanctified in front of deities during prayer and then passed to devotees to consume as blessings.
PUJA prayer.
PUKKA Hindi word meaning solid, well made. Also means definitely.
PURSE Indian English for handbag.
RAAT KI RAANI night-blooming jasmine.
RAJMA CHAWAL red kidney beans cooked with onion, garlic, ginger, tomatoes and spices. A much-loved Punjabi dish eaten with chawal, rice. See recipes in The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken.
“RAM! RAM!” a form of greeting in Hinduism, Ram being an avatar of the god Vishnu and considered by many as a deity in his own right.
ROTIS an unleavened bread made from stone-ground wholemeal flour known as atta.
RUDRAKSHA BEADS a large broadleaf evergreen tree whose seed is traditionally used for prayer beads in Hinduism.
SAAB “sahib” meaning “sir.”
SAFARI SUIT a square-cut short-sleeved jacket with a broad collar unbuttoned at the top, epaulettes and four pockets, worn with long pants; usually khaki or sky blue and popular in India until the late 1990s.
SAHIB an Urdu honorific now used across South Asia as a term of respect, equivalent to the English “sir.”
SALLA derogatory term, expression of disgust.
SALWAR KAMEEZ baggy cotton trousers and long shirt.
SANYASSI a Hindu who has renounced all his material possessions and adopted the life of begging for survival.
SCOOTIE a scooter or motorbike.
SHAADI Hindi for “wedding.”
SHATABDI Shatabdi trains are known in India as being “superfast,” but that’s a relative term. They do, however, offer the fastest service between the country’s major cities.
SHIKHARA this term, which in Sanskrit means “mountain peak,” refers to the rising tower in the Hindu temple architecture of north India.
SHIVA a Hindu god.
SHLOKA a verse from the Hindu holy scriptures.
SHUDRA fourth in the pecking order of castes, traditionally ordained to serve the Vaishyas (agriculturalists), Kshatriyas (warriors) and Brahmins (priests) above.
SHU SHU peepee, go to the toilet.
SIGRI rudimentary stove often fueled with cow dung.
SINDOOR a red powder used by married Hindu women and some Sikh women. During the marriage ceremony, the groom applies some to the parting of the bride’s hair to show that she is now a married woman. Subsequently, sindoor is applied by the wife as part of her dressing routine.
SONF fennel.
SUBZI vegetables.
TAMASHA a form of theater in western India, but in colloquial Hindi it means a public spectacle.
TARKARI a spicy vegetable curry.
TEEN PATTI “three cards,” also called flash, a gambling card game popular in South Asia.
THANDA cold.
THARRA cheap country-made booze.
TIFFIN a lunch box, invariably made of stainless steel and consisting of a number of round containers that stack on top of one another.
TIMEPASS Indian English for lazing about, doing
something trivial to pass the time of day.
TRIBALS term used to describe indigenous tribal people of India.
TULLI drunk.
UTTAR PRADESH the most populous state in India, with a population of more than 200 million people, it is also the most populous country subdivision in the world.
VISHNU in almost all Hindu denominations, Vishnu is either worshipped directly or in the form of one of his ten avatars. The most famous of these are Ram and Krishna.
WALLAH generic terms in Hindi meaning “the one.” Hence “auto wallah,” “phool (flower) wallah,” “chai wallah,” etc.
YAAR equivalent to “pal,” “mate” or “dude.”
ZEBU a type of cattle that originated in South Asia; characterized by a fatty hump on the shoulders.
About the Author
Tarquin Hall, a British writer and journalist, has spent almost a decade living in South Asia. He is the author of the Vish Puri mystery series—The Case of the Missing Servant, The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing, and The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken—in addition to dozens of articles and three works of nonfiction, including the highly acclaimed Salaam Brick Lane, an account of a year spent above a Bangladeshi sweatshop in London’s notorious East End. He and his wife, Indian-born journalist Anu Anand, live in Delhi with their two young children. Tarquin can be reached through his website and blog www.tarquinhall.com. Puri sahib also maintains his own site www.vishpuri.com and is active on Twitter @vishpuridelhi.