Bewilderment at work!!

There is no better word to say what happened to me at work today - complete bewilderment.

I started working on a new project a couple of weeks back at a manufacturing facility. The project manager is a Middle-Eastern guy or so I thought, you know after looking at him, by his name, looking at the pictures of his family at his desk - ladies with purdah, etc. I guessed he was probably from Turkey or Iran or in and around there.

To give you the background story, this manufacturing facility unlike any other is full of politics and so lots of finger-pointing, blaming and cross-overs happen all the time. Some stuff happened on Monday which sucked me into the politics of the place. So, the PM wanted me to kinda give my side of the happening, my view and opinion of people involved and other such details when he invited me to lunch with him today.

I go outside to the cafeteria and he was already waiting. We bought lunch and sat outside facing the water front. The first thing he said was "Woh Tony ek number ka saala hai aur tu uske baaton ko math manna". I was taken aback - not at the language, but at the sudden outburst in Hindi and started laughing. Then, he went "Oh.. so you didn't understand what I said? I spoke in Hindi and I am from Bombay". OMG.. I couldn't have been more wrong. Then, after several basic introductions about background and stuff, we started talking in Hindi and we got pretty comfortable.

I have never had an Indian boss before and so have never actually spoken to anyone at work in any Indian language. This was the first time and although the start was a bit dramatic, things settled down thereafter!!