Perks Of Being A Bengali Girl...
...with tons of Hilsa and Rasgulla...
Hello dear readers,
Welcome to my new publication - The Bong Girl Diaries. This is where I will be talking about my life being a Bengali girl, who is living in Mumbai with her family. There might not be very adventurous things, which I can talk about. (Who am I kidding? Bengali parents are strict. They provided us with "adventures" in our childhood itself. Lol) I might teach you some Bengali along the way as well, who knows. :)
Starting with my blog. So, for those who don’t know, my name is Noyonika Avijit Banerjee. Since I am living in Mumbai, we use our father’s name as our middle name. I live in the Kandivali East area of Mumbai. I was born and brought up here. My extended family lives in various parts of India, most commonly, Kolkata.
This might be kinda weird- I have been exposed to Bombay’s style of living, but my roots lie in Kolkata. My parents have never been much of a “Bengali Culture Enthusiast.” Somehow, I became one. (Lol!) And I inherited that from my grandparents, who are typical Bongs.
I will tell you how:
I totally love Kolkata. Mainly, because you find your type of people there. Living in Mumbai, I never found a huge Bengali crowd. I think at some point, most Bombay Bongs might have experienced the sudden excitement, whenever they would hear a passer by talking on their phone in Bengali. Yeah, I am that type of a person. During every vacation, I insist on going to Kolkata, that too by that one designated train- Duronto Express. Don’t ask me what I find so special about that train. I would only say that I like train journeys better. Especially, if its sleeper class, then nothing like it!
Staying in Mumbai, I had been exposed to Bollywood songs and English songs. My dad always used to play the old English songs, and almost all Hindi songs. I grew up dancing to the peppy numbers. Whenever we used to go to Kolkata, I used to see this channel on T.V. called "Sangeet Bangla," which is like the number one Bengali music channel. Around 2016, I completely switched to Bengali songs. Every day after returning home from school, I used to complete my daily studies, and then plop down in front of my mom’s computer to listen to Bengali songs on Youtube. I discovered some more Bengali songs along the way. Now, I am a person, who knows all Bengali songs. Lol!
I know to speak better Bengali than my parents. Nobody taught me the intricate Bengali vocabulary, yet I somehow mastered at it. During some conversations or discussions, I end up using some difficult Bengali words, which leaves my parents bewildered. Sure enough, they make a joke out of it and eagerly tell my grandparents about their granddaughter turning out to be a "Khati Bangali" meaning "Typical Bengali."
Well, this was all for my introductory post. See you again in my next post. 😊
Daily Dose Of Bengali Words:
Ami means "me"
Tumi means "you”
Shobai means "everyone"
Amra means “us”
If you want to know the meaning of any word, phrase or sentence in Bengali, please do let me know in the comments and I will clear the meaning in the next post :)