Of Food and Company and a Trip Down Memory Lane

Walking down Mohammad Ali Road brought back so many memories, happy memories, of being there with friends, being there as a child, being there with your family, savouring those mouthwatering meals, whether it was Ramzan or not.

So you don’t mind that the streets are crowded, there’s traffic jams and vehicles all around who are going honk crazy, or that city is sweltering under the heat (and to think of it, summer hasn’t set in yet and it’s just pre-summer). You’re all excited and looking forward to having a wonderful evening in the company of your friends and enjoying some amazing food, and you get to to include your mum in it all (after all I am such a mumma’s boy). Moreover you get to relive so many memories, childhood memories.

What you are mindful is that you are late. Your friends have moved on to the starters and there’s no scope of getting a cab, so you have to make your mum walk for well over 1.6  kms (as indicated by Google maps) while dodging both people and  vehicles of the two-wheel kind. You sure can’t make your mum walk fast and she doesn’t want to consume water (which is important considering the weather  cause she doesn’t want to go or even use the washroom. So you are left with a slow progress, which you have to be ok with. 

Did I mention you also have to be mindful of your belonging on those crowded streets. And you have the announcer reminding you do so .

So by the time you are near the intended destination, or trying to find the intended location, your friends are almost done with the starters, so you are left with booking a table for good 17 people for the main course, and patiently waiting for them to arrive, while you get your mum a seat cause your sure she’s tired from all the walking (making up for her missed evening walks).

As you wait for a table (it’s not easy to get a table for 17) you see others too waiting for a table, and many enjoying their meals (oblivious to the heat and merciless honking outside). What you do notice that the number of non-Muslims outnumber actual Muslims. Friends and coworkers and families, out to enjoy a wonderful meal, the delicacies that the Ramzan season brings, serving a further testament that when not divided by politics and politicians and political parties and their ideologies (for their own selfish motives), people from different religions, different cultures, different walks of life, different social status, all come together in celebration, weaving a beautiful tapestry of harmony. And this is not just here, but in most festivals that the city celebrates. Just goes to show that we are willing and very able to live in harmony with each other when we are left to ourselves, without the interference with those with evil ways.

Anyway, we get our table  and place our orders, listening to the recommendations as we decide what we have to eat.  

And trust me the food  is delicious. All the Kormas, the Bottis, the Niharis, Biryani, Paya soup (got to mention this for my mumma) are so delicious and flavourful in every morsel, but  there’s that one ingredient that that ties it all together and that is the company you share this meal with. 

So whether it’s your family, your friends, your coworkers, your colleagues, your peers, your significant other, or even a total stranger, all make the meal even more meaningful and beautiful.

So over giggle and laughters and good natured ribbing, over conversations on the weirdest of topics, and taking photos ( how is that possible with me around and there being no pics), you are bonding with your fellow diners, the ones partaking these meals with you. And over these conversations, and wolfing down some delicious food, you are getting to know them better, their backgrounds, their cultures, their food, everything beyond running, even over peels of laughters and discussions of what race next, and clicking and posing for the millionth pic (how’s that even possible with so many runners and with yours truly).

In these moments, beyond the setting we usually see each other, you are cementing the bonds you’ve created, and making some beautiful and delightful memories that you’re going to cherish.

Now how is it even possible that you make a trip to Mohammad Ali Road and not treat yourself to some delightful dessert? In those moments your diet, your calorie count, what your trainer says, all goes out of the window. If you truly want to enjoy these delicious delicacies you need shut all these from your mind.

So once the plates are cleared and the bill is paid, you make your way down and into the street, one with the crowd and into the needless honking. Only this time you are not making your in the direction you would normally go to. But instead you’re going some place where you have never been to before. 

Once again it’s a slow walk, cause you can’t hurry your mum. So you walk slowly, trying not to loose your friends, wondering when would this place actually come. And the place was surely worth the walk.

The sight of a beautifully round Malpua deep frying in that kadai, can send any diet conscious person and their dietitian and trainer into a tizzy (I told you, they need to be left back at home and away from the mind), but for people like me, it’s a sight, an amazement, a delight, one that gets you all salivating. It’s not an indulgence, it’s not cheating, it’s called eating without guilt, enjoying the cuisine, giving your senses and your taste buds a feast, a treat, one they deserve, and you deserve. 

You’ve got to appreciate these beautiful delicacies cause they are what’s binding us together.

So you greedily wolf down phirnis, a biscuit with delicious mawa in the centre and the unmissable and piping hot Malpua with delicious rabri. You truly are in food in heaven. And when you had your fill of these delicacies, you wash it down with some nice cool falsa soda, the perfect coolant for a warm summer evening(not sure if it is paired with all that you have wolfed down, but that doesn’t matter, as long as it doesn’t upset your system), and considering the heat, and the awesomeness of the drink, one glass just won’t do.

And with that last glass of falsa, it’s time to head home, as it’s school night, make that a work night. You don’t quite look forward to walk back to the station. Your full but content belly doesn’t quite do you any favour. Also you don’t want to make your mum walk through the crowd again. So you book cab, bid farewell to your running buddies, and patiently wait for your ride to arrive, as it makes it way through those crowded street.

And with its arrival, it marks an end to a wonderful gastronomical evening of amazing food, awesome company, and amazingly crazy conversations, leaving all your senses completely satisfied, and your mum too had a good time, what else could you ask for.

SoBo Sojourn: A Sunday Musing

Walking down these oh so familiar streets brought back memories from the deep recesses of my mind, they memories rash weren’t forgotten, that weren’t dormant, they were safely kept and preserved to brought back whenever needed.

As I walked down the streets, I was taken back to my childhood, to the days when my papa took me to the ENT to get the wax out off my ears (not sure if I should be mention it here). Then later in my youth I walked down those streets and passed those fascinating structures as I made my from VT (as it was then called, before the entire politicisation of the name change) to my college in Churchgate. I didn’t need a heritage walk, I just did it everyday. 

Those buildings fascinated me, the structure left me in awe, you always ended marvelling the architecture of those building, especially the station and the municipal build, and they were breathtaking when lit up. So starting the full marathon, running by these structure is something else in itself, a sense of marvel, a sense of pride. And although all the digging, tunneling, of the metro work had taken away some sheen of the place, it can never ever take away the dignity and fascination of the place.

So as you made way though pavements lined with tin barricades, and there’s mud and dust everywhere, digging everywhere, you’re trying to get your bearing where exactly you are, but you can’t help continued to be awed by the place. You discover places you didn’t know existed, enjoyed a delicious breakfast in the company of friend, cause we Runners need a good brekky after a good run. You walked past places you have never been to, down roads and lanes you didn’t know were there, each of these little nooks and corners held on to your fascination, each turn a discovery, and to think about it I spend so much of early life here, never truly exploring the place. 

In the end, though you walked through lanes, through barricaded pavement, you didn’t mind the walk. You though wished it would have been another time when there was no metro work robbing the sheen of the place, eating into its beauty. But in those little places you enjoyed the beauty of the place, the beauty of the company, you brief SoBo sojourn.

The Incident

It was a day just like any other. Nothing special, nothing great. Yes it was a Friday so there was the weekend to look forward to. He got up, caffeinated himself, hit the gym, came back, showered, dressed up, had breakfast and left for work. Nothing unusual, just the same mundane routine. Reaching the station he parked his bike and quickly made his way to the platform just before the train could pull into the station.

He managed to get into it, and as it was just about peak hours, the compartment was packed like a can of sardines. He slowly tried to make his way towards the side he needed to get off. He heard a voice from behind asking him if he was getting off at a particular station, a thing that people normally did, to which he nodded and as a habit asked the one in front the same. He stood there holding on to the handles, while holding onto an umbrella in the other.

He felt a crotch next to his ass, nothing that he had not felt before when traveling by a crowded local. As the the train moved he could feel it move as if it was dry humping him from behind, making him a bit uncomfortable. He tried to wriggle way out of the position, but the crowd around him would have none of it. So he stood in the same place hoping it was just an unfortunate and awkward situation. A moment later he could feel fingers caressing his, the one that he was holding onto his umbrella with. He thought it was just his over enthusiastic imagination playing with his mind. So he sort to ignore it and get back to his chain of thoughts.

Now the hand began caressing his sides, brushing against his butt, much to his annoyance, much to his disgust. He should have turned around and have created a ruckus, slapped the person and should have made a scene. But for some reason he was stunned, just frozen in the spot. He didn’t consent and was not at all comfortable with what transpired. 

He tried to jam the hand, push it back, even glancing sidewards so as to show that the antics didn’t pleased him one bit, not necessarily trying to get a glance of the person behind him. Now emboldened, the hand made its way across his hip and close to tighs, pressing  it, trying to reach further, if he hadn’t pushed it away it would have been pressing against his privates. He could feel a breath on the back of his neck, a movement that made him uncomfortable, disgusted. 

For his luck his station came, and he hurried away to the exit, actually he didn’t have to do anything, the crowds just pushed him out. He had this disgusted sick feeling, he just wanted to get away from there. He was furious with himself for not reacting, for letting this happen. He quickly took the bridge, not looking back, to trying to glance at the pervert that had in a way defiled him and left him feeling disgusted.

Mumbai Local Trains: Bringing people closer together

The Mumbai locals, the lifeline of the city’s transportation system, have been around  for well over a century and a half, and for over a century and half it has single handedly managed to bring people closer together. You’re squeezed against each other, like a can of sardines, packed during peak hours, so much that you don’t know where one person ends and the other begins. It’s like you two becomes one.

Its bodies pressed against each other, crotch meets butt, face meets armpit, oily hair meets elbow (for that matter, any part that should come in contact with it). You become brothers bathed in each other’s sweat, sweat brother, sweaty brothers, who in the end begin to smell the same. And with all that continuous bump and grind, it’s almost an orgy of dry humping, with all that hot and heavy breathing over the neck, only adding to the atmosphere.

You don’t need any cold cream or moisturiser. Just stand next to a well oiled head and you’ll be lucky enough to have it rubbed against you. The caveat being you should not be picky of whether it’s nariyal ka tel, or sarson ka tel, or any tel for that matter. Just go with the flow and you’ll be well oiled.

Hands become intertwined as they reach to hold whatever they find to hold. Legs become intertwined, trying to find a toe space, if a foot space is not possible (which is most of the time). Heads peering over shoulders straining to see what the other is seeing, what the other is reading, making it a group activity of reading, watching. With body parts intertwined, bodies intertwined, weaving into a fabric of the brotherhood of train travellers.

Thus the locals have been successful at bringing people together, that no man or thing can put asunder. In short, what the Mumbai locals brings together let no man put asunder.

The Greeters

You see them the moment you step into the foyer, seated behind their desk “, in the lobby. They greet you with a smile and “good morning sahab, kaise ho ap?”

You see them huddled under the shade of an umbrella or the archway of the gate, at once greeting you with a smile and a good morning, as you flash your I-card to them. In way reminding you that you need to smile too.

The moment you enter your office premises, after you have swiped in, you find them seated behind their desk, behind an absurd white box from which you have pick out a ball (a random checking thing). They mostly will greet you with a smile and make small talk with you, for a short while.

At the mall, after they have scanned you, they have checked you, they will always greet you with according to the time of day.

How many of us have returned their smile, or even returned their greeting. We are so caught up in our lives, in our mobile that we ignore, we forget, to notice these little gestures, let alone responding to them. At time we feel it even below ourselves to reciprocate to these gestures. You may even argue that they are just doing their duty, they are just doing what they have been trained to do, cause the next thing they would be doing is checking your I-card, bag and you. But then it doesn’t take much to appreciate the effort even if it is out of a sense of duty.

These little gestures remind us to smile, no matter how tough life maybe, cause smiling may not take troubles away but it will sure going to make the burden lighter. Greeting morning, noon, evening or night, is a wish of the greeter to the greeted. So no matter how the day may be or has been, they are always wishing you the best.

So the next time they smile and greet you, greet them back, or the least you can do is smile back at them. Who knows this greeting, this smile, would be the thing you needed to remind yourself that you are alive and blessed, and you wish others well.