644. A Lesson Learned From the Professor

A contractor had to be finalized for running the mess attached to our college hostel. 

After scrutinizing all the proposals received, the college administration shortlisted five applicants.

Our college principal entrusted the responsibility of talking to the five shortlisted candidates and selecting one among them to me, the mess secretary and to our hostel warden, an English professor in our college.

Our English professor would speak only in English, while lecturing in our class. I have not heard him utter a single word in Tamil, the local language and the mother tongue of most of us including him, even inadvertently.

He was speaking to me in English while walking from his cabin in the college to the hostel office, where we had planned to have the interviews with the shortlisted applicants, I was responding to him in halting English, given my limited fluency in English. 

A slight apprehension about how the professor would converse with the applicants began to arise in me. I thought that I would have to do most of  the talking with the applicants.

When the first applicant entered the interview room, I hastened to speak to him, before the professor could start speaking. I explained to him about what we expected from the mess contractor. From the way he nodded his head, I was unable to conclude to what extent he understood what I had told him. 

The professor turned to me and told me in English, "It seems he has not clearly understood what you said."

He then began to speak the applicant - in Tamil!

I was surprised to hear for the first time the professor speak in Tamil. I was even more surprised by his explaining our requirements to the applicant in a way even a child could understand. 

I was quietly listening to his talk. After the professor explained our requirements to the applicant, the applicant responded by telling us in detail how he would perform the service. We made a note of the points mentioned by him and sent him away

"I hope my Tamil was not bad!" the professor asked me, with a smile, when we were alone. 

"Sir! You explained the terms to him in a simple and clear manner" I said, with genuine admiration.

"I am aware that many students like you have been thinking that I don't know Tamil at all, since I speak only in English in the classroom" he said, with a smirk.

He continued, "While speaking to the applicant, you used several English words. Some of us might have got accustomed to using some words and expressions in English. But, for the people not well educated, such words may not be intelligible. For example, I observed that the applicant didn't understand what you meant by 'per head.' That is why, when I spoke to him, I explained it in Tamil. I am not finding fault with you. I only wanted you to be aware of such nuances, while speaking to people."

I was both amused and ashamed by my rushing in to talk to the applicant, attempting to beat the professor to it, because of my misplaced anticipation that the professor would speak to the candidate in English, but ending up in getting a lesson from the professor on how to tailor our speech to the capabilities of the people we have to talk to.

Thirukkural
Section 2

Materialism

Chapter 65
The Power of Speech

Verse 644 (in Tamil):
thiRan aRindhu solluga sollai aRanum
poruLum adhanin Ungu il.

Meaning:
Speak words that befit the capabilitiesof the listener;

there is no greater virtue and wealth than that.

(This is the English version of the Tamil story 'pErAsiriyar kaRpiththa pAdam' by the same author.) 

Verse 644 (Soon)
Verse 642