Duck vs. Pancho

Disclaimer: if any word in the below mentioned blog seems incomprehensible, kindly replace a few letters with letters that make sense in an expletive way. Considering the sanctity of public forums, I am bound to not use such words explicitly. For starters, try decoding the Title. If you are unable to do so now, you are probably incompetent to read the content below and hence are urged not to waste any further time reading it.

The inspiration for this blog came from a colleague who, very comfortably and casually, uses the word “Duck”. The word flows in her language as naturally as she breathes air. During general chit-chat with her one fine day, I happened to use the word “Khufiya”. She was utterly disgusted with the use of such an “obscene and gross and vulgar” term. I initially apologized for my crime, but she went on profusely about the usage of the word and its inappropriateness. This got me heated up and we ended up with a lengthy argument; that and an inspiration for a new blog.

The above mentioned incident is not the first one I have had. Over the past few years, I have observed tremendous amount of discrimination against our national language, within our generation, with respect to the use of profanities. It makes me wonder why there is such a tremendous bias towards the duck. Mother duck and Sister duck in all senses, tenses and usages have the same meaning as Macho and Pancho. When a guy uses a Duck, he’s considered to be cool, but if the same guy uses a Pancho, he’s considered ugly. Why the difference? Are we so gung-ho about the English language?

Personally, I am a staunch supporter of Hindi (even though I am not very good at it J) especially when it comes to profanities. The amount of diversity and flexibility provided by Hindi swearwords is in no dimension even comparable to what the fragile Duck provides. Let me tell you my journey from introduction to casual acquaintance to deep friendship with Hindi and its expletives.

When I joined engineering and was surrounded by Hindi speaking folks I first heard the words Pancho and Macho (seriously, at the age of 17). I was initially taken aback by its perverted meaning, but was later explained how it is casually used as a manner of speaking and not meant literally. Through the first 6 months, I observed as people used these words in different contexts, to mean different things; I was shocked; amazed by the wide applicability of these words. It was probably during the fag end of my first year that I introduced these words into my vocabulary. And since then, there has been no looking back.

My personal favorite has always been Pancho. I have been widely criticized and appreciated for my frequent usage of the word, of course by different sets of people. Let us see how Pancho is a useful word to express various emotions.

EMOTION	PANCHO
Anger	Pancho!!
Shock	Pehen…cho!! (wish there was a way to record sound on this)
Dismissal	Bhak Pancho!
Trouble	Pen chu gayi
Aggression	Pancho!

 As you can see from the simple analysis above, Pancho can be used in different contexts to express various deep emotions which are extremely difficult to express otherwise.

Hence, I urge everyone to freely use Hindi profanities in their daily conversations. They complete some of the most messed up as well as some happy moments of your life. If you are uncomfortable using such words, please try to accept them as a way to express one’s feelings and not interpret it literally; the same way all of you have casually made room for Ducks in your life, please don’t forget the home grown Pancho.