52 weeks, 52 songs

‘Premi, pagal, deewana; ashiq, majnoo, awara…’

The first words, I have been told, that ever came out of my mouth were the lyrics to this song from the Bollywood movie ‘Phool aur Kaante‘ (Flowers and thorns) which was released in 1991 starring Ajay Devgan and Madhoo. Ajay Devgan’s debut was released the same year that I was born.

Even before I could talk in normal sentences, I started singing. It might sound weird but it is nonetheless the truth. I am sure many of us out there might have a similar experience. At home family talked to me in Kumauni, I started conversing for the first time in Hindi, at school they taught me in English.

They say that no matter how many languages you are fluent at, when you hit your toes, the first words that come out of our mouth will be in your own mother tongue. The idea being, you always will give the most impulsive responses in your mother tongue because it is your first language in which you don’t have to put even a single thought, before reacting. Words from your first language come to you instantly and without conscious efforts because that is how deeply it is entwined with your consciousness. Reacting in your mother tongue is a reflex action just like jerking your hand away as soon as you touch something too hot.

In that light, I realized quite recently that my first language is music or rather songs. Mostly Bollywood songs because that is what I have grown on. It so happens, then, with me that on most occasions, I break out into a song in reaction to any conversation. When I have to be civil and professional, I keep the track playing just inside my head. But on other instances, I let it find its way out in good company. The truth is that, in response to almost every conversation, the first thing that comes to my mind is a song.

I wake up every morning with a song in my head. I work hard and put a lot of efforts to not to break into songs every now and then. And yet every little isolation, every little chance that I get, I let the song out of my head. I sing it out loud. I relish the movement of the lyrics on my tongue, I admire the poetry in my head. In my half sleepy state, I cook up tunes sometimes.

In fact many times, people around me wondered out loud, ‘How do you break out into the most relevant song, so instantly?’ After all these years finally, I realized what it is. Songs are my mother tongue and I hardly think before I react with songs. Music comes from deep within and my love for music knows no bounds.

Songs for me are not only about music. Unlike many others, I feel that lyrics are as important. A song with good music and even better lyrics is a treasure. Like most of the poetry in this world, love is a central theme for Urdu and Hindi poetry as well. I am not a poet and until one time, I heard every kind of love song with a pinch of salt. I loved the music, I appreciated the beautiful poetic expression of such emotions with such strong words. Sometimes, the ideas are enchanting. It was hard to believe for me that there might be an emotion such as ‘love‘ which makes people express emotions with such magnificent and soulful imagination. Creativity reigns supreme.

Now that I have fallen in love, I break out into love songs more often than before. Since I always struggled to express feelings in plain words, my first language has been quite helpful. Although, having to sing for a person whose only common language with me is English, is quite challenging. I am not well-versed with English songs, for that matter.

Thanks to this exercise, I realized many a beautiful pieces of song lyrics have not been translated properly into English for everybody to appreciate. Therefore, i have decided, as a personal project, to translate some of my favourite songs into English for readers. I will only try to find songs which do not already have a good translation somewhere on the internet. The target is to post one song per week, for at least a year.

Now I am not a poet, my translations might not be poetic enough because my focus is going to be on being as close to the real meaning as possible. Hopefully, I will be able to inspire you to dive deeper into poetic songwriting from this part of the world.

In case music is your first language as well and if you want to suggest any particular songs for translation, please comment.