#365DaysOfWriting – Day Sixty-Nine
Don’t snigger. It’s not the 69 you’re looking for.
No matter how old we get, there’s always a little snigger, shake of the head or a bitten tongue at the mention of an innuendo or a double entendre.
One of the earliest ones I heard was a Maharashtrian one, by comedian Dada Kondke – अँधेरी रात में दिया तेरे हाथ में। (Andheri raat mein diya tere haath mein).
Translating it into English just takes all the fizz out of it – roughly it translates to ‘in the dark night, I gave something in your hand’. See, it doesn’t work in English right? But it’s one of the early ones I’ve heard.
Our childhood has suffered a major ‘blow’ thanks to these entendres.
Sigh. You smiled at ‘blow’ didn’t you? Just think back to when you were in school – words like blow, cock and pussy had such innocent meanings. They were just poor animals. A piece of meat gave you protein, not a hard on. Even HARD just meant that something was difficult, or a material was solid, firm and rigid (I see wry smiles even as I type out the synonyms).
Not all PJs are of the ‘innuendo’ variety though.
You do have your vanilla PJs, ones that usually elicit a different ‘eye-rolling’ response. Sanika Tillway will know what I’m talking about.
An example of this type is the harmless pun. I’ve almost made a career out of punning, so much so that my comic book group has bestowed the title of PUNisher upon me (get it, get it). It fits too, some people say – my puns kill people’s brain cells with as much violence as Frank Castle inflicts on a drug lord. One of my favourite ones in this regard is from a game I played many years ago – the 2001 Activision Spider-Man game. In that, when Spidey and Venom team up to do a bit of computer database hunting, Venom asks Spidey if they’re going to ‘surf the web’. Play the game if you haven’t (if you can). It’s bloody brilliant.
