Panni Under the Bridge

This just in: I just made a complete ass of myself.

First of all, I walked into work late this morning, almost two hours late. Which, in and of itself, is not all that big a deal. It’s the slow period during the summer, schools are out, so a lot of our work with the teachers is on hold, all my coworkers are on leave (the reason for my transport problem), and I still get all my work done anyway, so it’s not an issue. Nevertheless, my coworkers like to rib me a little, "Oh, Canadian gets to come and go when he wants… must be nice!" That kind of thing. So I gave them my innocent, token white guy expression and walked out into the hallway to get my customary glass of cold water from the cooler.

As I pressed in the little blue button to get the water flowing, it seemed to go in a bit further than normal and then stuck there. With my glass rapidly filling I started jabbing at the button, frantically trying to get it to pop back out again. "Oh crap." I stated matter of factly. My glass filled beyond the meniscus, superceded all pretense of surface tension and started overflowing down my arm. My brain shifted into problem solving mode, and I quickly tipped the cooler back to stem the flow. Unfortunately, the cooler was fairly full, but I slowed the pouring water down to a trickle. Now I was in a precarious position. I had the cooler balanced on its rounded edge, water still trickling down into my shoe. I stood in the increasing puddle of water on the floor and wondered just what I should do. Suddenly it occurred to me: Servants. I called out to them, down one floor in the kitchen… no response. Ok, I thought, if I can just tip this back and balance it against the windowsill, I can buy enough time to run down and grab one of the dudes. I attempted my maneuver, balancing the cooler precariously, and watched with satisfaction as the water stopped trickling from the spout. Then the huge cover of the cooler flew off, the whole thing fell on its side and a Tidal wave of water surged over the counter, doused me, and hit the floor. I desperately righted the cooler, causing more water to come pouring out of the spout. The villagers ran for higher ground. I raced down the stairs yelling for one of the servants, "Rafaqat! Rafaqat!" The wave started cascading down the stairs, as I grabbed Rafaqat and showed him what I’d managed to accomplish. He took in the scene with a strange complacency and said, "How are you today sir?" which is exactly what he says to me every morning in our little exercise of shared lingual capabilities. "Panni," I said in Urdu, exasperated, gesturing to the water surrounding us. "Panni," he agreed. "Panni, everywhere!" I said, shaking my head, "and nary a drink to be found," I thought to myself. "No problem sir," said Rafaqat with a smile, as if this happens everyday. He stuck his thumb over the hole little Dutch-boy style and immediately stopped the water. "Weeelll, Shit." I thought to myself, "Why didn’t I think of that?" I hate it when I’m not as smart as I think I am. I picked up my glass, still filled to overflowing, and in a gesture to the gods, poured the overflow onto the floor with a shrug. I gathered my dignity, and walked back into the office, my "water resistant" khakis soaked from mid-thigh and dripping, my shoes sloshing at every step. I stopped in the doorway holding my glass of water and looking like I just went for a swim. My coworkers just stared. "I had a little trouble," I said.

Today’s going to be great, I can tell.