I’m far from being a linguist. Not exactly my cup of tea but I find it endlessly interesting. I learned a lot about them bounding through Thailand trying to figure out how to swallow certain sounds and palatize others. Ok so I’m throwing around a lot of words I know nothing about. But as I understand it this whole bit about tonal languages is that its not just how you enunciate the word but also whether or not your voice goes up or down.
So I’m not an expert, but in Mumbai they speak Hindi as well as this other language I don’t know what its called but you hear it all over town uttered by the most unlikey culprets, cars. Just with a few honks with varied tones you can say all of the following:
Move!
Look out!
The light is only turns one shade of green.
I’m gonna pass you slowpoke.
This is a no honking section jerk.
Can you believe this tourist paid 5 USD to go two blocks.
Hey did you see that cricket match last night?
The lonely planet didn’t have its usual primer for this language in the back of the book but I really think I’m getting a hang of it. Try this on for size. “Honk, honk… honkety honk.. ho ho.. higgity honky honk.”  Which means… (I think) That’s a lovely sari you are wearing… can I buy you a banana lassi?