The wonders of language

Scene 1:

Atul and I had been to Salzburg, Austria the last time I had come here. It is a beautiful city, clean and picturesque. We had taken a tour for the week end from a tourist agency. Everything was planned and executed very well. The cab came to pick us up from our location and there were 3 other pairs of people in our little van. 2 from Australia, 2 from UK, 2 from the USA and we were from India. The language which connected us was obviously English. I wondered, if there was no English, today we wouldn't have been able to interact with each other in the tour and it would have been so boring to sit like that seeing each others faces!

Scene 2:

There is a group of people in Karnataka, who share the same surnames as us, e.g. Velankar, Devdhar, Joshi etc., but speak the Chitpavani language. They are here since 4 generations and do not understand a word of Marathi, which is my mother-tongue. I came to know about the existence of such group when I came to Bangalore.We had been to a wedding in that group and again English came to our rescue. Their group and we were interacting in English! lol! Imagine again, if there was no English language, we, the people of same community (but separated due to location and language) wouldn't have been able to talk to each other. They do not speak Marathi and we do not speak Chitpavani.

Scene 3:

Last time, when I had come to Germany, we were staying in the guest house and there a lady called Maria served breakfast regularly. She was very strict and did not like people touching the bread etc. by bare hands. She often scolded people for being careless and dirty. I was initially scared of her, but once she got to know that I speak fluent German, she was totally a different person with me. She helped me find a good shop for buying chocolates at cheaper rates and she even gifted me when I came back to India. Once she got to know about my pregnancy, she sent nice gifts for the baby! Again, language came to our rescue here, where we both bonded over it.

Scene 4:

Here, in Germany, a Croatian woman comes for cleaning my apartment, twice a month. She speaks German, but with a very heavy accent. I understand German, which a commoner speaks. So the communication medium between her and me is her heavy accented German and then my understanding of her German and replying to her. Had I not known German, there would have been a big gap in our communication and we wouldn't have understood each other at all. She is a nice woman and she calls my little boy "Puppe" (doll). My boy is also happy to see Tante (aunt). She must be in her late 60s, but she calls herself aunt. She is very talkative and she does her work well. She calls me "Schatz" (dear), just because I offered her food when I was having lunch and she was immensely overwhelmed by it.

I was wondering, how and where this common language takes 2 people and how it binds them together for time to come. It helps them understand each other, to share their problems, joys, happiness with each other. It helps them to make better people and help each other in times of adversity. How I wish that different languages bind us all in a language of love and peace and makes this place a little better to exist instead of making it an issue and fighting over the language problem.