Thursday, March 09, 2006

It's the time to disco!

We already have some of the vocabulary necessary to piece together the meaning of this song from director Karan Johar's 2003 hit film Kal Ho Na Ho starring Shah Rukh Khan, Preity Zinta, and Saif Ali Khan, but let's add some new words into the mix:

Kehna- to say; kehta hain= masuline present tense; kaho= imperative
Ab- now
Ghabraana- to fear
Taal- beat
Jhoomna- to sway
; jhoome= subjunctive; jhoomo= imperative
Badan- body
Hichkichaana- to hesitate
Sharmaana- to be shy
Khul ke- openly
Gaana- to sing
; gaao= imperative
Aana- to come; aao= imperative

As for the title of the movie, kal can mean either yesterday or tomorrow, depending on context, and "ho" is the subjunctive form of "hona," to be. There is an implicit "ya," or "or" before the "na," which in totality makes the meaning, "Tomorrow may or may not be."

The idea of an English refrain and additional English words tossed into the mix is now quite commonplace, due to globalization and the accompanying increasingly transnational audience.