Daily Prompt: Isn’t Your Face Red ?

When was the last time you were embarrassed? How do you react to embarrassment?

Once in our college, our teacher Sr. Barbara Jeans was looking for students for Shakespeare’s play, The Twelfth night. I hoped she would not pick me, I was extremely shy and nervous. Suddenly she  looked at me and said, “Chaman , are you interested?”

I told her I wasn’t. The teacher then looked for other girls who’d be interested. There was one part no one wanted, it was that of the  priest. The teacher was frantic, she asked my friend Evie if she could suggest someone. Without batting an eyelash Evie said, “Make Chaman take the part, it’s only a short one.”

Sr. Barbara Jean announced ,”Yes Chaman you have to take the part.”

I couldn’t refuse I took the part. On the day of the play, I was extremely nervous, I felt even the few lines I  had to repeat might be difficult.

I remember waiting on the right side of the stage waiting to come to the front , I walked two or three steps and prayed all that time I wouldn’t collapse, to my surprise the lines came out of my mouth like a parrot. I was relieved when I did my part. The audience clapped , one of them said : “The teacher should have given her the longer part.”

Little did they know how hard it was for me to deliver those lines. Was I embarrassed ? Certainly.

I always used to  hide  myself when the teacher  looked  for kids to play certain parts in the plays that were staged in our school.

When I taught in school I made it a point , to pick the shy kids in my class to play the important parts to overcome the shyness. 🙂

 

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Daily Prompts: Brilliant Disguise

Tell us about a time when someone had you completely fooled, where the wool was pulled right over your eyes and you got hoodwinked, but good. Was it a humorous experience or one you’d rather forget? What was the outcome?

Once my uncle came to visit us, he was a politician who always disguised himself so no one would recognize him. This particular day he had a long bushy beard, we never saw him with a beard. My brother did not know who he was, both were arguing, my brother was about to throw him out, when I heard him I was in the bathroom, I recognized his voice,I told my brother it is our uncle.

My brother was embarrassed, I had a  good laugh, I told my uncle, it was good  he didn’t disguise his voice, if he had my brother would have thrown him out of our house.

My mother was praying at that time, when she heard the noise she came out to see what was going on, she smiled and said,  “Dear brother, when will you stop being so silly?”

……………………………………. 🙂

Five sentence Fiction: Spunk

Patricia’s question, ” Are you a pianist  too?” suddenly awakened Mark, he  realized he was not friendly with Tracy’s cousin.

He was embarrassed when the question was directed to him, he instantly replied, “Yes I am a pianist, not as brilliant as your cousin.”

Patricia was in a mood to extend their conversation, within seconds she gathered enough courage to ask him to teach her to get better in playing the piano.

Mark was unable to make an excuse, why he couldn’t tutor her, reluctantly he agreed, Patricia was delighted to have someone who would regularly teach her, she learned the basics from her cousin she wanted to make a career out of it.

Thus began the friendship of Patricia and Mark, their week-ends were occupied  playing piano, going for coffee,walks in the nearby park, both were happy to find each other,weeks turned to months and a year, piano lessons were going well, they became extremely fond of each other, suddenly, Patricia said one day , “you know Mark you have to admit I have guts, I was able to convince you to give me piano lessons, even though I didn’t know you.”

……………………………….:)

 

 

Daily Prompt: Green-Eyed Lady

We all get jealous from time to time– what wakes the green-eyed monster for you?

I do believe jealousy is a trait  unbecoming for anyone, yet we cannot help it. They say we cannot be complete without it.

I’m embarrassed to admit I was jealous on many occasions, it was nothing important, when I think of it now I say to myself it was so childish of me!

 

365 days Writing Prompt: Cringe-worthy

Do you feel uncomfortable when you see  someone else being embarrassed? What’s most likely to make you  squirm?

This is a true story: I had joined the staff of Residential Model School, only a few days ago. We were in an assembly suddenly I heard the principal screaming at one of the teachers, in the presence of the students.

The students were enjoying watching the principal harass the poor teacher. I was upset and embarrassed and made up my mind that second I will resign my job.

Early one morning I handed in  my resignation letter to the principal. He read it and had a surprised look, then he said :”Is this a resignation letter?”

I said ,”Yes.”

“But you’ve only been here ten days, how can you resign so fast?” he said.

I did not want to tell him his behavior towards the teachers made me  write the resignation letter.All I could say was,”I do not like it here.”

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365 Writing Prompts: Hear no evil

Tell us about a conversation you couldn’t help but overhear and wish you hadn’t.

I did overhear something I wish I didn’t. My husband invited some of his friends to dinner one day. All his friends knew he was a Bengali and his wife was a Bengali too.

One of my husband’s friend was from Karachi where Urdu is spoken by most people.I learned Urdu when I was very young, we had neighbors who spoke it.

My husband’s friend seemed to be in a sour mood that day, he called his friend to talk to him about his family problem. I understood what he said.He didn’t think anyone in that party knew his language, unfortunately I heard everything he said against his wife. I did not try, he spoke loud enough for us to hear, only I was the one who understood everything he said.If this is overhearing I am guilty.

This happened to me once, our British Prof. was walking past us one day, I told my classmate in Urdu, “Oh look Mr. Baird is coming!” He quietly walked by without saying anything.

Next day in the classroom, he told us, “Oh by the way, Miss Sabeth speaks very good Urdu.”

I was so embarrassed I did not know what to say, Mr. Baird was a linguist, he lived in India for two years,I had no idea!

: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/365-writing-pr…s-hear-no-evil

DP Daily Prompt: Think Again

Tell us about a time you made a false assumption about a person or a place— how did they prove you wrong?

Yes I did make a false assumption of a girl from my hometown. I met her in college, we were not friends but acquaintances, she had her own group of friends I had mine.

A few years later I met her again in the university residence, she was friendly or so I thought. One day she suggested why don’t we share to have tea together in the morning, one month I’d buy tea, sugar and milk and following month she’d do the same, I thought it was a great idea.

We started our joint tea drinking every morning, since we lived in two different buildings I offered to go to her building and make tea for both of us. It was going well we had no problems, my friends in my building warned me against this arrangement. They found out I was paying for everything and she was not paying her share.

I let it go and continued to make tea and called her when it was ready.

One day I went up to her building and noticed she was ignoring me, I called her but she walked away, I was embarrassed when the other students were watching me. I quietly left the building, went to my dormitory and got busy with my studies, I decided not to tell anyone what happened, the news of this so called friend and how she treated me was a hot topic discussed by everyone, my friend Zeb came to me and said, “You’ve made a mistake, you do not have to drink tea alone you’re welcome to join our group.”

I learned a much needed lesson, and appreciated my friends who helped me.

https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/08/07/dp-daily-prompt-think-again

365 days Writing Prompt: Fictional elevator

You’re stuck in an elevator with an intriguing stranger. Write this scene.

This scenario could have happened to me in real life. I went to see my uncle, I was told his office was on the seventh floor. I pressed the elevator button to go up, when it opened I was terrified of the man inside, he was supposedly the elevator man. There was no one else there to ride the elevator,one look at him I decided it’s best for me to take the stairs.

Huffing and puffing I reached the fifth floor, hoping my uncle was on the fifth floor, the custodian told me he was on the seventh floor. He looked at me and said : “Did you take the stairs?”

I was too embarrassed to admit I took the stairs, once again he showed me the elevator, but I knew there was only two more floors to go, I’d be fine I thought.

This is my elevator story, it is not fiction,it is very real.

k: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/05/23/365-days-writi…ional-elevator

DP Daily Prompt: The Kindness of Strangers

When was the last time a stranger did something particularly kind ,generous,or selfless for you? Tell us what happened!

It was a  cold Friday afternoon school was over, I was walking home, The snow on the ground and on the pavement made me nervous, I thought I have to walk carefully to avoid falling, which is what I was doing, suddenly a fierce cold wind gust, blew the papers I was carrying all over the place. I was stunned, these were the spelling test papers of my kids, there were thirty altogether. I watched the papers flying further down as I was trying to pick them up. Bewildered I knew it was a futile effort on my part to gather those, I thought I’d let them go.

When I turned around to hurry home,I noticed a black car stop near the papers, a man stepped out and started picking up the papers, I was too embarrassed to walk away, so I joined in and reluctantly picked up the remaining pieces. The stranger handed me the papers he was able to collect, I was so overwhelmed by such a noble act,I forgot to thank him.

Next day my husband came home and said, “Hey Ranu did you find all your Papers?”

“How did you know about them I asked?”

“Oh, he said Mr. Jenkins asked me to ask you.”

“Really I said ,he didn’t tell me who he was !”

I thanked the Lord, if I hadn’t waited to get those papers, I would be in trouble, Mr. Jenkins’ daughter was one of my students who wrote the spelling test, imagine!

k: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/05/11/dp-daily-prompt-4

 

DP Daily Prompt: Isn’t Your Face Red

It was a couple of years ago,I just started the online course. I noticed at the bottom of my comment,the image of garbage cans. I was unaware what it meant. I can be very impulsive. I didn’t give it a second thought. I got in touch with the person and complained. When my daughter came in I complained to her as well, you should have seen her facial expression it was nothing less than,”Priceless”.

My daughter explained what it meant. I was so embarrassed, I didn’t know how to apologize. I did several times. I even apologize now,whenever I think of how stupid I was. Technology is so far ahead of me,Sometimes I’m afraid to do or say anything.

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2014/02/05/daily-prompt-red/