Hindi Classes

I feel like my Hindi classes are a little window into Indian culture. Apparently the word for 'yesterday' and the word for 'tomorrow' are actually the same word. Which, trust me, explains so much. Time in India is very flexible. If someone says they sent something yesterday I assume that it means that they may send it some time next week.
We are learning words/phrases such as: to make, expensive, I would like; and we are learning how to tell time. What I find amusing is how our teacher uses these phrases. She says, 'this is how you tell your maid to make you a cup of tea' and 'this is how you tell your driver when to pick you up'. Of course the reality is that I wanted to learn Hindi so I can speak to my maid and my driver...and to haggle at the market; the word expensive is a good one to know.
(although really, I can make my own tea, but here most people have someone make it for them.)
One of the guys in my class wanted to know how to tell someone a deadline. We all cracked up; deadlines don't exist here so of course that is what he wanted to know; how to get the people in his office to finish projects on time.
What I find interesting is that I don't use the formal version of the verbs when talking to someone working for me. People that work for me would likely speak to me formally though. The closest I can relate it to is like the student/teacher relationship in grammar school; the students speak formally to the teacher, but the teacher is not formal with the students.
I find the learning the language, even the little bit that I have, helps me to understand India much more and helps me to function better. People definitely really appreciate that I'm trying to learn the language.