“My first brush with Punjabi:

“My first brush with Punjabi: Dr Nagi ma’am, the finest GI radiologist in PGI, induced quite a bit of terror among resident docs: if u didn’t know the exact SGOT value from last week u were dead. Freshers, therefore, were naturally sent accompanying patients to her USG suite Once I escorted a patient for liver ultrasound & as was customary, held my breath as Nagi Ma’am elegantly performed a scan on another patient. "Ramlal saas lo" she commanded majestically & the patient breathed. "Rokko" and the breath of life ceased & I watched, mesmerised! After 'Ramlal' my patient, Sardar Karnail Singh went up on the scan couch. Ma’am’s voice boomed authoritatively, "RAMLAL, saas lo", and then "Rokko" Despite the wrong name, Karnail singh obeyed. I was initially confused but at last garnered courage. "Excuse me Ma’am…” Astonished at being interrupted by a puny resident, Ma’am froze She stopped scan, turned towards me. Her eyes stared at the non-entity still standing in front after such travesty "What?" she asked coldly. "Ma’am, RAMLAL was the previous patient. This one is Karnail Singh". Dr Nagi Ma’am stared for a while at me with disbelief. Dr Sriram, my SR who had just come in, frantically elbowed my ribs. signalling me to prostrate quickly to escape demise. THEN, she burst out laughing. "Even THE 1st one wasn’t RAMLAL. I was saying -- *ARAAM NAAL saans lo*". 😃