Communication Problems, Part 3

The title of this entry really should be "Communication Problems, Part 1" because this was the origin of that phrase in our usage. When Tafara sat down to relate this event, however, I insisted she write about something else on the assurance that I would tell this story myself.

I am now, finally, getting to it.

Once upon a time, there were four young people living in an apartment. Despite wide disparities in their respective levels of desire to exercise, they resolved to secure for themselves the membership cards they understood were required for entry into the fitness center.

How did they learn of this requirement? Two of them, having gone to the gym with no such cards, were berated and interrogated during each visit in a language neither spoke by the attendant guard on several occasions before he sought the assistance of a higher-ranking-looking guard who explained about a basement office where membership cards could be obtained.

Eyes bright with the hope of licit workouts, the young couple scrambled quickly up to their apartment to gather everything they might need to get these mystical cards, these IDs of legend. Gripping passports, US drivers licenses, extra passport photos and a reasonable amount of rupees, they descended for the first time into the single subterranean floor of their building. On first inspection, the level in question ("-1" on the elevator menu) is one part laundromat and nine parts parking garage, but beyond a fence and a parked car, they spied a nondescript door with the word "OFFICE" painted on it by hand.

Knocking merited them a garbled mass of responses, all in Hindi, so they were cautious as the young, male member of the duo slowly pushed open the door. A closet-sized kitchen and three or four pairs of curious eyes came into view beyond the door, and, after a pause, a mouth spoke from below one of the wide pairs of eyes:

"Kya यू वांट?"

The young man recognized "kya" as the question word "what" and responded by saying "gym card" and holding up an invisible version of the same. Fingers and arms within the tiny kitchen, with different owners and levels of enthusiasm for the task, gestured towards one wall of the closet, which the young couple now saw housed a second nondescript door with no lettering at all.

"Please, sit"

An older, well-dressed Indian man was speaking with a heavy accent and indicating the chairs across from the seat he occupied behind one of two desks in the room the couple had been peeking into. They pushed the door the remaining eighty degrees to openness and sat while offering timid greetings to the two other men in the room.

"How I can I help you?" The older man continued, leaning forward onto the desk.
"We were told we could come here to get gym cards." The young man responded.
"Gym cards." The older man repeated, audibly fascinated.
"Yes. Are we in the right place?"
"Flat number?"
"I'm sorry?"
"What is your flat number?"
"Uh... two, zero, three."
"Good name?"
"What?"
"What is your good name?"
"Tyler." The young man replied, uncertain of the nature of the question, the quality of his name and the direction of the inquisition in which he had become an unwitting participant.
"I see. And you, miss?" The older man said, making a note and tilting his head to face the young woman.
"Is this for our gym cards?" She asked, in place of an answer, searching the faces of the men stationed there.
The older man shifted himself back from the desk and procured a ledger from atop a filing cabinet. "We have no record..." He began.
"We are guests of Mr. Talwar." The young man interjected, and met the dark eyes that darted up from the ledger to peer at him over gold-rimmed glasses.

--Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion of this visit to the basement office and my eventual arrival at a point for this story!