Nearly every day this week, Jeff and I have walked to Green Park to explore or read in the shade. On Monday, we found a quiet, shady bench near a man-made stream with minimal foot traffic: perfect!
After a little while, we noticed a group of four young boys playing in the stream. Eventually, they wandered up to us, proudly carrying two cups with dirty water in them. "मछली? (Fish?)" they asked us. We leaned over the cups and saw they'd caught a dozen tadpoles. Then we tried to rustle up a translation for "tadpole." "मेंढक का बच्चा (Frog-baby)," we explained. Using my expert teacher moves, I held my hands close together and said, "tadpole," then gradually spread them apart while making Mario-style growth noises and said, "frog." Lightbulbs went on in the children's eyes, and they wandered off again.
Then they came back, and, pointing to my Kindle, said, "लैपटॉप? (Laptop?) मोबाइल फ़ोन? (Mobile phone?)" Jeff explained, "इलेक्ट्रॉनिक की किताब (electronic book)," while I demonstrated turning pages and gestured to Jeff's paperback, where he turned pages too. Right about then, Jeff and I decided our solitary reading spot wasn't quite solitary enough, so we got up to leave.
At which point, the most outgoing boy started pointing to the ground in a sweeping motion and speaking in rapid, indecipherable Hindi. Finally, he said in remarkably clear English, "My money fell on the ground I don't know where." This must have seemed like a great scheme to his 8-year-old brain, but Jeff and I just replied, "Well then, you better find it," turned around, and left.
So much for the curiosity and innocence of the young...
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