My Belly Is Too Much Swelling With Jackfruit

Apropos of nothing, I remembered reading this marvelous letter which had been reprinted in the Times of India many many years ago. It made me laugh then and it makes me laugh now.

Beloved Sir,
I am arrive by passenger train at Ahmedpore Station and my belly is too much swelling with jackfruit. I am therefore sent to privy. Just as I am doing the nuisance that guard making whistle blow for train to go off and I am running with lota in one hand and dhoti in the next when I fall over and expose all my shockings to many female women on the platform. I got leaved on Ahmedpore Station.
This is too much bad if passengers go to make dung that dam guard not wait train five minutes for him. I am therefore pray otherwise I am making big report to papers.

Pray your honour to make big fine on that dam guard for public sake otherwise I am making big report to papers.

Yours faithfully,
(Sd/- Okhit Chandra Sen)

Googling select phrases from the letter yielded a number of hits. Perhaps the best of the lot was an article on railroads in India in the Baltimore Sun.

6 Mar 2010, 8:32am
by SteveR


That article also has a fun typo: “Behind me, while waiting for the Sharabdi Express to arrive…” I’d love to watch the passengers lurch onto the platform from that one.

 

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