Man From Matunga

December 13, 2006

Storm in a coffee cup

This has appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Expresso in my childhood days meant a frothy coffee with milk, halfway between a cappuccino and latte, that used to be served in movie halls and theatres. At home too, this was made on special occasions as a treat and like the new Bru ad, the fun was in getting the froth all over your face. Growing up, I then learnt to appreciate the dark decoction that Amma used to make, with milk and sugar, at least 10 shades better than similar stuff available in the Udipi joints in Matunga.

Traveling abroad in the mid-90s brought me in touch with Starbucks and I slowly learnt to differentiate my espresso from a ristretto. My all-time favorite drink however, remains the caramel macchiato, a signature Starbucks drink. Though, all the coffee I otherwise drink is black, without milk and sugar, the caramel macchiato, with vanilla, milk and caramel is the one exception.

Somewhere down the line, heavily influenced by Starbucks, came the Barista chain. The outlets were an immediate hit, with well-trained baristas who knew their coffee intimately. The Shivaji Park outlet has been my favorite. Sitting out, watching the world go buy, while sipping one Doppio after another, used to be a favorite past-time. This was the nearest Barista, until the one at Sion came up, a few buildings ahead of Sion Hospital. Despite this outlet being so near, it never had the ambience of the Shivaji Park outlet and the baristas were also less knowledgeable and though it hoped to be a coffee pit-stop for those on the way to the suburbs and beyond, it was never open early in the morning, when you were going to Lonavla or Pune and the take-away coffee, in any case, came in horribly thin cups, often too hot to hold properly, with lids that didn’t fit…I’ve spilt coffee on my lap at least twice.

A few years ago, on a trip to Dubai, I saw a Starbucks outlet and right next to it, a Barista outlet. It was a proud feeling, much like seeing a Jet Airways plane at Heathrow or Changi.

But, Barista never came to Matunga. CCD did. And how! When it started, it was the new kid on the block, loud (it still is), but with attitude, and obviously aimed at the college crowd. The coffee was cheaper, not as as good, especially the espressos, which were bitter and yucky. The service was slow and the food passable, and yet the college kids loved it. The juke-box was a hit, as was the outside seating, which also allowed girls to smoke.

And then Barista screwed up. It dropped its prices and started playing loud music. Instead of aiming higher, at the 40plus generation, which felt CCD to be too loud, they tried to become like CCD. And the last few times, I’ve been there, there seems to be a distinct deterioration of services…the baristas are undertrained, the espressos are bitter, granitas have not been unavailable and a couple of times, even the air-conditioning wasn’t working.

On the other hand, CCD has become more and more vibrant. Their espressos have improved, as has the food. They now sell their own brands of chips and cookies (my daughter loves their eggless chocolate chip ones). And most importantly, they sell specialty coffee powder (which, as I have earlier mentioned is far superior to the stuff locally available in Matunga), and now we even get single estate (like single malt) coffees, some of which are excellent, especially the new dark roast. It’s a pity the Monsoon Malabar is no longer available.

What does this have to do with Matunga? Most big brands don’t come to Matunga, because they don’t see potential. Barista didn’t see potential and CCD did. One is doing great and the other, at least for me, is no longer happening. Maybe there’s a lesson in there somewhere?

Posted by bhavinj at 11:19 AM | Comments (0)

December 03, 2006

Realty bites

This has been published today in the Mumbai Mirror.

I am still trying to recover from a shock I received last Sunday, which I still can’t stop talking about and really need to put in words as well. We had a meeting with a realty agent, when we overhead him talking with someone on the phone about his inability to arrange a flat for that person, at the earlier agreed upon rate of 20,000. After he finished his conversation, I asked him, whether he also handled flats in South Bombay. He looked at me quizzically and then explained, “Last month, a premium property in Five Gardens was quoted at Rs. 20,000 per sq foot and the owner has now upped it to Rs. 30,000 and my client is angry at me for this. What can I do?” he shrugged.

Thirty-frigging-thousand? 30 thousand…per sq. ft. …in Matunga? You have to be effing joking! But apparently this is not a joke! It seems that for some premium properties, these prices have become real. Its as if living in Matunga has achieved the same kind of status symbol for some people, as living on Peddar Road.

The exuberance of the stock-market and the subsequent real-estate boom would be able to explain some of the increased valuation. But in an area, where average prices have hovered around 10-12,000, to suddenly talk of 30,000 per sq ft, seems to be too big a jump to make sense.

Unless, Thomas Schelling is more right than even he would know. Last year around the same time, I had written about him and his game theory, which predicts that similar people tend to live together, thus explaining the formation of ghettoes and pockets based on religion, race or caste. Within a year, this has become even more pronounced in Matunga, which is now all about Gujjus and Kutchhis. Though I don’t have official numbers, it wouldn’t be a stretch if I were to put the Gujju/Kutchhi population in Matunga and the Greater Matunga area (parts of Sion, Wadala & Dadar) at around 90%.

So think about this! If you are an upper middle-class Gujju/Kutchhi living in the suburbs, and wanted to live in a place with PLUs (people like us), where would you want to shift to? Obviously…Matunga!. If you have lived your whole life in Matunga and now need a new house, because you and your brother have grown up and each of you wants his own space, where would you continue to live? Most likely, Matunga! Kind of like my sister and other people I know, who were born here, grew up here, studied here, married here and now even go to work here. In Matunga…the classic big village.

Where else would you have at least six good schools that would make any top 25 list in Mumbai, which makes it relatively easy to get admissions, unless of course you want to go to outside-Matunga schools or live in South Mumbai with its limited schools? Add 4-5 good science and commerce colleges, one medical college and two top-rated engineering colleges, all within a radius of about 2km and you get a combination that no part of Mumbai can beat.

With Sahakari Bhandar, Matunga Market and Chheda taking care of the shopping issues and Five Gardens, Maheshwari Udyan and a couple of other places giving us the open spaces that we need, the only things missing are, a large mall with good brands, a couple of fine-dining restaurants (though ITC Parel is almost our own backyard hotel) and a good multiplex with parking, which hopefully Aurora will become in the not-too-distant future.

The big brands have still not taken over the frontages on King’s Circle, but that is just a matter of time. And honestly, the reason Café Coffee Day rocks today and Barista is in suspended animation, can easily be traced to the fact the CCD has an outlet in Matunga and Barista doesn’t. And more about this..next week!

Posted by bhavinj at 10:52 AM | Comments (0)

November 26, 2006

Games kids play

This is in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Bouncing in the Jumping Jack/Moonwalker – Rs 10. Getting tattoos painted – Rs. 25. Swinging wildly on free swings – Priceless.

Young children are really funny. You can get them expensive toys, gift them Xboxes or PSPs or fancy, robot-like, multi-functional dolls, and yet they will often play for hours with just simple “vati-chamchis” or be happy kicking a cheap ball around. As happened this weekend, when we went to my daughter’s school, J B Vachha, which is in Five Gardens, for a fun-n-fair, which was interestingly called “Food Fiesta 2006”.

We first spent some time playing small table games, which were run by volunteers and students – small tests of skills involving throwing rings over soap bars and chocolates, or holding a wet brick with two fingers for a minute as well as games of chance, where you had to snare a hidden potato in a bowl of sand using fondue-like sticks (which the kids loved since they had just had their first taste of fondue a week ago), and black-jack like card-games. They eventually won three games’ coupons, which got them one small prize, and they promptly started fighting over this single item.

The Jumping Jack/Moonwalker has to be among the top-ten toy inventions ever. However agitated or uncontrollable the kids might be, whatever crazy mood they may be in, one look at these monstrosities and everything dissipates in the anticipation of being able to jump up and down with abandon. As a kid, I never had a chance to go into one of these (I am sure they didn’t exist) and as much as I would like to experience them, I know that at this age, no one is going to let me. After a little shoving and pushing (small kids really have no concept of queues), they managed to get their three-minutes tryst with the overblown balloon and had a blast.

We then made our way slowly from one end of the fair to the other, past stalls selling everything from clothes to glass baubles to fortune cookies. I actually bought two fortune cookies, trying to explain the whole concept to the kids. They loved the act of breaking a cookie, finding a piece of paper within, and then eating the cookie, but the fortunes were completely wasted on them. The tattoo-girl was also a great hit, but within minutes of getting them done, the tattoos were smudged by the clothes and bodies of the ever-increasing crowd.

And then there was food… frankies, chaats, pani-puris, kababs, corn, chicken-rolls, bhel, etc..., including Sabina with her gorgeous cakes and a divine banana tart.

We were having a great time, when we reached the end of the concourse. We were wondering what to do, when my daughter pointed out to the swings and slides, which are permanent fixtures in the school-ground, behind the cloth boundary of the Fiesta, which we promptly went past. The kids have finally learnt to swing on their own, without the need of an adult push (which was a pleasant surprise to me) and they kept swinging, as high as possible, competing with each other, sometimes in synchrony, sometimes off-sync, for a good 10 odd minutes, until I had to physically stop the swings to make them get off.

After we reached home, during the post-mortem, I asked them what they had liked the best…was it the games, the Jumping Jack/Moonwalker, the tattoos, the balloons (all of which had cost money), and without hesitation came the answer…the swings! (which had been totally free). Go figure!

Posted by bhavinj at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)

November 08, 2006

Bottlenecks to Progress

This appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

As Matunga becomes more and more crowded, with the insane increase in high-rises and cars, traffic is getting to be completely chaotic, with an exponential increase in travel times.

To understand this, let’s see how many bottlenecks now affect a simple route…say from Matunga gymkhana to the area behind Aurora theatre.Warning: Unless you are a hard-core greater Matungaiite, you might want just want to skip directly to the last paragraph.

Outside the Gymkhana, you can either take a right or a left.

If you turn left, the first bottleneck is at Matunga Market, which of course, is expected as always. Then, a little ahead, comes the new bottleneck, at the Post Office junction, due to the traffic coming from the Bhaudaji road extension. Past this, you then get stuck getting onto the Circle, where you often have no choice but to wait until the Amar Mahal signal turns red, to be able to ease into the consequent reduced flow of vehicles. Then comes the right turn on the Circle itself at the Anand Bhuvan signal, after which you have to quickly take a left turn onto the small Circle-to-Khalsa road. Sometimes, if the traffic is backed-up at the Adenwalla road signal, this can take a good 1-2 minutes. Once on this small road, idiots trying to go to the Natural ice-cream parlor can create another bottleneck, on your way to Rasna Panjab, where you then have to take a left.

Once here, the rest of the road is common even for the route described below.

If you turn right from the Gymkhana, you take a left at Ruia college upto to the main-road signal, where there is usually a wait of upto 7-8 cars, which can sometimes make you miss one turn. Past the signal, you have two choices. You can take a left at Adenwalla road and then drive past the no-entry VJTI right turn and take a right into the small lane, just before the Circle, to reach the Circle-to-Khalsa road. But since this small one-car-at-a-time lane is not a one-way street, if there is a car coming from the opposite side, you can get stuck for quite some time trying to negotiate your way.

The other choice is to go all the way straight upto the St.Joseph’s circle and take a left, where there is often a gridlock. If you manage to get past this, you then immediately hit the Wadala East signal, where unlike in the past, all the cars now want to take a right turn (due to the crazy township development in Wadala East) which leaves very little space to go straight. Once this is negotiated, it is then a nice, quick drive to Rasna Panjab, as in the old days.

Past Rasna Punjab, irrespective of how you’ve reached there, you again get stuck because of the double-parked cars outside Café Coffee Day and Classic. Past these, you take a right and then a left and again get stuck at Sahakari Bhandar, due to all the cars trying to either park there or leave from this new “Walmart of Matunga”. Only then are we home!

Bottom line: The price of progress seems to be increased travel time. Till the last couple of years, we always used to discount the time it took to travel from anywhere to anywhere, within Matunga and Wadala, since it never took more than 5-7 minutes. Now, it can take upto 15-20 minutes! I guess, we’re no longer a village, and progress just doesn’t seem like such a great thing anymore!

Posted by bhavinj at 12:13 PM | Comments (0)

October 26, 2006

Matungaiites Everywhere

This was in today's Mumbai Mirror.

How things have changed! Just a few years ago, Diwali was all about Chopda Pujans, fire-crackers and the rounds of Saal-Mubaraks on Bestu-Varas day, to my kakas, nana-nani, mamas, etc. all of whom thankfully live in the Greater Matunga area, in Wadala, Matunga and Sion.

After the Finance Ministry killed the relevance of Chopda Pujans, when April-March was compulsorily made the financial year for all businesses, things started changing. More and more, Diwali time became “holiday time”, even during the Diwali and Bestu-Varas days, with many families opting to stay away from the city.

The problem unfortunately, is that if you go to hill-stations like like Matheran or Mahabaleshwar or even beach-resorts like Goa, you are sure to find “half of Matunga” in these places. Honestly, it is very likely that your neighbor in the next room is from Matunga or has lived there or has in-laws there.

This Diwali, we split up our Diwali holidays into two short trips year, to areas we were absolutely sure would be devoid of all Matunga flavor.

The first trip was sans-kids, to the Maldives, where we landed up being the only Indian couple at the Taj Coral Reef and unlike the experience in most other tourist places, we were actually over-pampered by the predominantly Indian staff, as compared to the British, Italian and Japanese tourists. Talk of reverse discrimination! And of course, the corals and snorkelling were awesome.

Then, during the Diwali days, we decided to go off to Ahmedabad (at the airport alone, we met two Matunga families on their way to Goa...jeez!). On Sunday, the “dhoka” day, we went to Goyal’s water park (apparently better than Water Kingdom), which was virtually empty and the kids had a blast. In the evening though, we found Vishala to be very crowded, I guess, because locals just love eating out, Though fun, Vishala is now obviously a tourist-focused experience, with the puppet-shows, the "garba" area and of course the cross-legged eating on leaves with earthen crockery, but with average Gujju food. With another “average” experience at a very popular “thali” place on Monday, I realized that though people love eating out, this city still has a long-way to go in terms of the quality of the food and the fine-dining experience.

Overall though, Ahmedabad has become an amazingly vibrant city, both in the inner-city “pol” areas, as well as in the newer parts. And despite our views about him in Mumbai, the locals think the world of Mr. Narendra Modi and give him full credit for this development.

The last evening was topped off with Don, which we all unanimously thought, (despite Khalid Mohamed and his colleagues) is far better than the old Don, which we had all seen the night before, both to refresh our memories and for the kids. The old Don honestly is a B-grade, badly edited and directed film, but is great fun because of AB, Pran and the dialogues, while the new Don…well, it just rocks! I wish I could write a review for all the contrarians.

So, once in a while, it is nice to be away from Matunga, both column-wise and physically. And the trick I’ve realized, is to either go away to really exotic destinations or to other big cities, which are themselves a little “empty”, because their inhabitants too have decided to go away to other touristy places, and yet are large enough to make it unlikely that you’ll meet another Matungaiite!

Posted by bhavinj at 10:58 AM | Comments (1)

October 16, 2006

Injured? You must go to Sion

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

A certain percentage of reader feed-back has always focused on the frivolousness of my writing. “I am sick of your rasam-idli. Do you know the plight of those who have been scammed by the South Indian Co-op Bank? Can’t you write about them?” And so on and so forth. Apart from the fact that what I write about is really nobody’s business, it is amazing how presumptuous people can get.

Having said that, when my dear friend Nobs Roy mailed me some stuff about Emergency Medical Services (EMS) in Mumbai (or rather the lack of), I thought I could use this opportunity to get serious.

Question: If you were to get seriously injured in a road-traffic accident, where would your best chances of survival lie?
a. Public hospital (Sion, KEM, etc)
b. Private hospital (Hinduja, Lilavati, etc)
The answer is (a). The public hospitals have round the clock services including emergency diagnostic and blood facilities, easy handling of police and legal inquiries and no risk of being denied treatment due to non-payment of bills. Virtually all specialties required to handle emergency care (orthopedic surgeons, general surgeons, neurosurgeons, anesthetists, radiologists) are available at all times. And among the public hospitals, Sion has perhaps the best EMS, simply because of the vision of the previous deans and surgeons who worked hard to make the EMS a well-oiled machine.

The problem in Mumbai, unfortunately, is of reaching the EMS services. A common medical fraternity joke is that the only difference between an ambulance and a hearse, is its color. In a city choked with vehicles and the complete absence of civic sense, it is virtually impossible for ambulances to reach any hospital in time. And even if ambulances are given way or are allowed to break signals, it is not uncommon to find a couple of cars behind the ambulance availing of this advantage as well! And so, the study conducted by Arvind Vatkar, Poonam Vaishnav, Pragnya Supe, Ritam Chowdhury and Sandeep Patil, found that only a third of emergency cases were brought in by ambulances. The rest came in police vans, taxis, private vehicles and some even on stretchers by foot.

It is a pity that a country that is supposed to be the next superpower and a city that is the financial capital of that country does not even have a basic EMS for the public. There is no single number to call and no coordinating authority to work with. If a person reaches the hospital in time, it is usually due to the timely arrival of a complete stranger, either the police or a passerby. And contrary to popular belief, the police were actually able to rescue people in about a quarter of accidents and then transported the victims in police vans to the hospital.

With the virtual absence of any kind of civic training in first-aid as well as trained paramedics (even if an ambulance manages to come to you, it is actually just a transportation mode with no trained personnel to handle accidents), about half of the victims receive no first aid on the way and the other receive inappropriate care, which is even worse.

Despite all this, the EMS at Sion Hospital does a great job. And though, as with most things in our daily lives, the authorities are completely useless in terms of providing pre-hospital care during accidents, it is a public Municipal hospital that provides perhaps the best accident care, if you manage to get to it…alive.

Posted by bhavinj at 10:19 AM | Comments (1)

September 17, 2006

South Indian cuppa vs the French press

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

My first memories of coffee are of drinking Mom-made, cold Nescoffee at home. Expresso in those days was the frothy hot coffee you got at fun-n-fairs, from “Expresso” machines. And black coffee, was what I used to make, using two table-spoons of instant Nescafe powder, in boiling water, trying to stay awake at night before important exams.

My favorite filter coffee though, was brewed by Jamuna aunty in her kitchen, where a decoction using filter coffee from Mysore Concerns (MC) was always ready, the added milk and sugar, yielding perhaps the best cuppa in town.

Over the years, I have now learnt how to use a coffee-maker with paper filters, how to differentiate between espressos and ristrettos as well as between lattes, cappuccinos and macchiatos. And, for some time now, I have been using a French press, to make my own cup of wake-me-up morning coffee.

A French press needs a medium-to-course grind, which I’ve always been able to stock up on, during my travels abroad or thanks to traveling relatives.

Three weeks ago, I ran out of coffee for the French press.

Assuming that I could always find coffee powder in Matunga, I made my way to MC. Though MC is one of the four pillars of Tamil Matunga, the only time I’d been there earlier, was about 5-6 years ago, when I had tried to get them to grind some coffee beans I had bought abroad. The person at the counter flatly refused, without any explanations and I finally had to use the grinder at home.

This time around too, I didn’t get much help. MC makes a very fine grind coffee powder, which is not appropriate for a French press. No amount of cajoling, asking them to make a more medium to coarse grind, worked (honestly, how difficult could that have been). I still bought their smallest packet, hoping against hope.

Still, knowing it wouldn’t work (which it didn’t, when I tried it at home that afternoon), I decided to drown my sorrows in a mocha at the local Café Coffee Day (CCD) opposite Don Bosco. While placing the order, I saw a tin of “Dark Forest”, a specialty coffee, on sale. When I asked the barista whether this would work in a French press, he was emphatically negative. The coffee was expensive (Rs. 120 for 200gms) as compared to the Rs. 20 for 100gms at MC, but I decided to give it a try anyway.

After a disappointing attempt with the MC coffee, I opened the Dark Forest tin and made a glass of coffee. The aroma was enticing and the cup turned out great. I then went through the literature that had come with the tin, which apart from all the self-praise, including comments from a famous coffee expert, had this line… “Best used with a French press”. Methinks, the CCD baristas need a wee bit of extra training.

So finally, I did find the medium grind coffee that I wanted…and in my own backyard. But the times…they-are-a-changing. Instead of finding what I wanted, from the local famous David, it was actually the multi-chain Goliath, who came through.

Posted by bhavinj at 06:04 PM | Comments (0)

September 08, 2006

Aamchi Mumbai

This appears in today's Mumbai Mirror.

The two photographs that I invariably turn to, when I am showing off Jehangir Sorabjee’s aerial photo essay of Mumbai, “Above Bombay” (photos courtesy Eminence publishers), are the ones on pages 162 & 163. I had first written about these photographs last year, when I couldn’t help but describe my visceral reaction to the picture on page 163 showing a Beybladish, multi-pronged Maheshwari Udyan (King’s Circle), shot from a helicopter hovering above Don Bosco, as well as the one on page 162, showing the Circle as if it was the face of a wrist-watch, the two limbs of Ambedkar road forming the strap of this watch.

Its amazing how the green Circle has been planned, with its seven arms radiating unequally in multiple directions. If you are facing north, Ambedkar road makes up the 6 and 12o’clock positions with the other roads occupying the various other o’clock positions; 7, 9 & 10 towards the West and 3 and 5 towards the East.

This imagery specifically stands out, because in both these photographs, there is a virtual absence of traffic, except for a few cars facing northwards on the wrong side of the Circle, but with a huge preponderance of people, lining both sides of Ambedkar road and the entire circumference of the Circle. There is one truck, seen opposite Amar Petrol Pump, with an orange statue-like structure jutting out from it. From the height that the photograph was shot, it just about faintly resembles the idol, whose final day this was, the truck on its way to its Shivaji Park destination, where the idol would be laid to rest.

Jehangir couldn’t have chosen a better day to shoot King’s Circle, perhaps the only day, when people-power takes over the roads and the pavements. The photograph does full justice to what the Circle looks like on the evening of Anant Chaturthi. What it is unable to capture though is the energy at ground level.

Last year, we took the kids to be part of this jamboree. At all times, I had one or the other kid on my shoulders (Ganapati-bapa style), trying to make sure they wouldn’t miss the fun. The number of eating carts had doubled, no probably tripled, and there was everything from pav-vada to Chinese American chopsuey, to “golas”, “buddhi-ke-baal”; kulfi and ice-cream vendors with any number of people selling cheap plastic Chinese toys and a variety of balloons.

There were people and people and people everywhere. One image stood out. Outside Monarch, was a bunch of kids, sitting silently on the pavement, with their legs dangling onto the road, probably from the neighboring BJ Home, eating ice-cream cones. Towards Dadar, Ambedkar road was clogged, with Ganpati-laden trucks and hand-carts, trying to make their way through the throngs of people crowding them, with intermittent cries of “Ganpati Bapa Morya” along with the latest “dhin-chak” music, interspersed with people blowing horns, for no reason whatsoever. An equal number of people were settled on the large divider, some enterprising women having brought their plastic chairs and stools to sit on…the mistresses of all they could survey.

As on all Anant Chaturthis, the Circle was throbbing with an indescribable energy, drawing from and then in turn enveloping everyone present, as if part of a huge orgy, in honor of Mumbai’s favorite deity.

I am sure there are other pictures in this book, which invoke similar visceral responses in other people. But for me, its all about pages 163 and 162.

Posted by bhavinj at 10:54 AM | Comments (0)

August 25, 2006

The Power Is Ours

This was in today's Mumbai Mirror.

On Monday night, my Mom called up to ask whether our TV was working, because all she was getting on her TV was snow. For a moment, I thought her cable had been disconnected as well, but we soon realized that the cable operators were on strike.

I thought her cable had been disconnected, because just a couple of days before, I had asked my cable operator to remove ours. Having obtained a Tata-Sky dish connection last week, I finally had the guts to do so, and it felt great to be able to free myself from the clutches of the “Great Indian Cable Conspiracy”.

Matunga, like all other parts of the country, has been carved out into monopolistic territories by the cable operators, and they have complete control not only over our connections, but also the programs that we get to see. Though my local cable operator is actually a nice guy, the fact remains that all cable in India is geared to the lowest common denominator, where we have to suffer poor quality video and audio, a general lethargy for English language channels and to top it off, channels like National Geographic and Disney in Hindi.

In the last week, since I’ve had the dish put-up, I’ve suddenly realized what I’ve been missing out on. I finally have signal quality that makes the 42” plasma really worth the effort, along with a stereo audio signal, which actually sounds good when routed through the sound system.

One really neat thing is the online program guide, which tells you what is currently playing on all channels and the schedules for the next 24 hours. This literally means that we never have to look at a paper program guide again. The bigger revelation however was when I found that many channels, especially the kiddie and sports channels, transmit audio in multiple languages and you can actually choose your language.

The big issue is of choice and power. The choice to see the programs that you want to, in the language that you want to, with a certain quality of video and audio, preferably DVD-like. And eventually, the power to use a DV recorder to record programs that you might want to see later, just as we used to do with VCRs. Thus, I could record all the Desperate Housewives’ episodes, which airs at the ridiculous 10.00PM time slot on Sunday, and then watch four or five episodes back-to-back, on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon…and at the same time skip all the ads and so finish viewing these episodes in almost half the time.

The cable guys have had us by our balls for a long time, but thankfully, no longer. For those who are happy with the current situation, there is nothing further to be said. But for those, who in today’s day and age, want a little more, at least now, there is a choice. And not only a choice between cable and satellite dishes, but even between multiple satellite dish providers.

The power to choose, of course can have funny consequences. Having been forced to watch Power Rangers in Hindi, on the Jetix Toon Disney channel, I thought my kids will immediately switch to English. On the new satellite television, Power Rangers airs in four languages – English, Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. So guess what my English and Hindi-empowered, Gujarati-born daughter does?...she watches entire episodes of Power Rangers in Tamil…apparently because that language has the most punch. Go figure!

Posted by bhavinj at 05:51 PM | Comments (0)

August 13, 2006

A Chinese Tale

This appeared in yesterday's Mumbai Mirror.

A couple of weeks ago, we were returning from a “jagran”, in Bandra/Khar. Luckily, “jagrans” don’t go on through the night anymore and we were able to leave within an hour. It was a Sunday and we thought of eating out in the area…as we cruised along Linking Road, we could see every eatery packed to the gills and with our six-year olds with us, we just didn’t have the courage or energy to wait in line to be fed.

We were discussing our options, when suddenly my wife, in a conspiratorial tone, confessed to a craving for American Chopsuey. And suddenly, as if a partner in crime, I felt the urge to pig out on this dish as well.

It was already past the childrens’ bed-time, so we decided to do a take-out. For people like us, living in Matunga, there is but one logical place for American Chopsuey. Nestled between Koolar and Kamal Towings, in a tiny 100 sq. ft place, with four tables, which at the most can hold fifteen people, Fu-Yong has been around ever since my graduate college days, and therefore at least for the last twenty years, if not more. And John, who oversees the place, seems to have been around for that much time at least. Add in one more waiter, and a cleaner boy and the picture is complete. Though how the waiter is able to serve when the place is full, is one for Ripley’s Believe It or Not.

While growing up, Chinese food was all about American Chopsuey, vegetable spring rolls and sweet corn vegetarian soup. It was only much later, when we first went to China Garden, then at Om Chambers, that I learnt the truth…that American Chopsuey was neither Chinese nor American, but an “Indian” concoction with a “Chinese” taste. I can still remember the supercilious look I got from the maitre, when, in all my junior college confidence, I asked for American Chopsuey, which I then found was not even on the menu.

Years later I also realized that “American Chopsuey” is the one dish you never ask for when traveling abroad. In some places, it could mean a mash of chops (a meat dish), in some other parts, a mash of pasta and in Chinese places on the west coast, a bland mix of vegetables, which some people believe is a corruption of “chopped sewage”. Which may not be a bad term to describe the possible ingredients of some of the variants of American Chopsuey dished out by the roadside Chinese stalls that have sprouted all over Mumbai. After all American Chopsuey is just a mix of vegetables, with soya and hot and sour sauce and crispy, fried noodles, thrown in on top, the most important part being its look…as red as possible.

Over the years, Chinese cuisine has amazingly evolved in Mumbai and we get a phenomenal variety of exotic dishes…with bamboo sprouts, mushrooms, black beans, asparagus, tofu, etc, all with fancy names, such as “Buddha’s delight”, “whatever, whatever, Hunan style or Peking style”, or at the end to make something sound really authentic, “Chef’s Delight”. Along with dim sums, lettuce wraps (kind of like bhel in a rotli) and a terrific variety of bean curd based starters.

And yet with all the Lings and Royal Chinas and Shanghai Clubs, once in a while, it feels really nice to just forget all this “authentic” Chinese stuff and to go back to simpler times…to “Fu-Yong’s American Chopsuey”.

Posted by bhavinj at 08:33 AM | Comments (0)

July 28, 2006

Old, but Distinctive

This was published today in the Mumbai Mirror.

Three weeks ago, a close friend of mine invited me to her small house-warming party. She had moved from her house on RAK Rd in Wadala to a new tower, Dosti Elite, on the road behind CineMax, built in one of the industrial compounds that used to exist there alongside the Premier Automobiles workshop.

Till then (and till now) I had only seen a couple of towers in Mumbai, one in Hiranandani and one in Kandivali (E), and so didn’t really have much to compare with. My friend’s place was impressive. We went in after dark and the swimming pool area was shimmering. We saw a gymnasium, a lovely jogging track, gardens, ample parking and pretty nice apartments and it was difficult to believe that we were just a 5-minutes walk away from the blusteringly busy Sion Circle.

Living as most of us in Matunga do, in our 1 by 3s or 1 by 2s (i.e. 3 or 2 storied plus ground floor), this seemed really nice. For a short while, we kept thinking, how nice it would be to move to such a self-contained residential complex with its own facilities and avoid having to go out to stand-alone clubs or gardens. Apart from being self-contained, they also seem better maintained.

As against that, the older Matunga places offer larger areas for the same price, based on carpet areas and not on super super built-up concepts. The families are more cohesive and as we recently experienced during the summer vacations, the kids really get to form their “gangs” much more easily. But most buildings being landlord-owned, aren’t all that well maintained.

And then Shameem Akthar’s piece, two Tuesdays back, stopped me short. Can it really get that bad living in a cluster of towers? I can completely understand being a “nobody”, getting sucked into a quagmire of insensitivities, such that you start questioning your very being and existence…but I thought this only applied to ICICI internet banking and not to tower homes. And just as I increasingly find that we are better off with our “friendly” neighborhood nationalized banks, who with their “human touch”, prevent us from sinking into the “nobody” syndrome, I wonder if our small 1 by 3s and 1 by 2s are not so bad after all. So what if you have to go Matunga Gymkhana for swimming and listen to a gaggle of mothers in the afternoon besides the swimming pool discussing the best fashion designer in our area. Maybe that is how we retain our sanity and remain “somebodies”.

The sad thing however, is that if you are in the market for a new apartment, you really don’t have a choice, but to go “tower-size”. And if you do decide that you want to live in a small building, these properties are not readily available, unless you buy pre-owned older apartments, which are often rentals, which means you have to pay “pagdi” and you don’t land up owning those places. Yet, the demand for these “old” apartments isn’t really going down, and in the last few weeks, I’ve had at least three colleagues asking me to lookout for any “old” apartments that I might know of that are for sale or rent.

I have now identified my new profession if things go wrong with the current one: Real-Estate Agent for Old Properties in Matunga.

Posted by bhavinj at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)

July 19, 2006

Living with Terror

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Like a lot of people, I always remember precisely what I was doing at times like these. In 1993, I remember, we were in Bombay Hospital, when the first casualties from Dalal Street started pouring in, with head injuries and blood-splattered clothes, accompanied by their broker friends. Those days, without the kind of information dissemination we have now, it was all about rumors and for most of us, that was our first experience with terror of this kind.

On July 11, I was sitting and working at home, when someone casually mentioned some bomb blasts. For at least another half hour, we didn’t think much of it, until we put on the news-channels and saw the mayhem. And they kept mentioning Matunga as one of the sites of the blasts, when in reality that was Matunga Rd station in Matunga West, just before Mahim, not the Matunga we live in.

Matunga in reality, has rarely been affected during either the riots or the blasts. The worst that has ever happened was a major train derailment at the Raoli camp junction, on the harbour line, some years ago. During the 92-93 riots, though adjacent Dharavi was burning, Matunga was a sea of tranquility. We spent most of our time playing cricket on the roads and even the ice-cream parlors opposite Don Bosco were open. The big scare in our lives had been a truck we saw left discarded in one of the bye-lanes, which we thought may have harbored a bomb, but had only been left there for safe-keeping, by a scared truck-owner.

Maybe it’s the homogeneity of the population, maybe it’s the location, but in times of crises, Matunga seems an oasis of peace. Unless of course the crisis we are talking about involves the rains, in which case your sense of well-being completely depends on which side of Gandhi market you live in.

And all this is only true provided you’ve managed to get home to Matunga, in the first place. Which is not always an easy thing to do, when the city is hit.

As the face of terror becomes more and more visible in our lives, as terrorists from conflict areas around the world step up their activities, often without any reason or sense, we also will need to start accepting the presence of terror in our midst and then to get on with our lives. Which is what most of us did the day after, returning to or staying on at work …and thus deny them any sense of victory that the terrorists might have otherwise felt if they had succeeded in disrupting our daily routines.

Posted by bhavinj at 10:51 AM | Comments (0)

July 09, 2006

Concerts in Contrast

This appears in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Last Sunday, despite my protests, I accompanied my family to a Sonu Nigam concert, a the Shanmukhananda Hall. Honestly, if it wasn’t the fact that the hall is a four-minutes walk from my house, I doubt if I would have gone. Let’s face it; no parking facilities, a screwed up approach road and a concert by a singer whose only song I really know is “Har Ghadi” from “KHNH”…the deal didn’t seem all that great. And with my past experience with “Musical Nights” and “Voice of Mukesh” and “Voice of falana dhikna”, I wasn’t particularly enthusiastic.

And things didn’t get better. It rained heavily during our short walk to the auditorium. Then, the musicians had gotten late, so until they were ready with their instruments, we were made to wait out in the hot and humid foyer…which wasn’t so bad in retrospect, since I got to meet quite a few of my professional colleagues. Then the show started an hour late, because everyone was waiting…as we all do all the time.

Anyway, finally, after some felicitations, a forgettable opening act by an upcoming female singer, but a nice ensemble rendering by his musicians, Mr. Nigam came on stage.

And all I can say is that I am glad I was there.

Mr. Nigam is a consummate entertainer. He has a great voice and is supremely confident of his ability to handle it. He also has a great self-deprecating manner and is not above making fun of himself and last Sunday he used all these abilities to the hilt. He bantered with the audience, kept drawing them in and his words of “wisdom” to the crying infant at the very beginning of the show, made all us warm to him immediately. It was fun seeing an “Indian” singer entertaining the audience, in a manner more reminiscent of rock stars rather than the sedate “Hindi” singers of yore.

Just as Ian Anderson had done in February during the Tull concert. Having grown up with Tull and having missed his previous concerts in Mumbai, I had made sure that I had the time and tickets to be there on the second day, at Shanmukhananda Hall. Again, everything started late, and the opening act by Alms for Shanti was a bit of “pseudo – sopho” patchwork, but once Mr. Anderson was on stage, it was a different story. He held his audience by the palm of his hands. And though he couldn’t really hit the high notes and the music at times felt desultory, it didn’t matter. It was good fun.

I wish I was a classical music aficionado, because then Shanmukhananda Hall would have met my “live performance” needs with ease. Unfortunately, though in my distant “thelawala” past I tried to “understand” classical music, all that ever happened was that I woke up at the end…refreshed and ready to go home.

Hopefully though, we should see the Hall being used for more “popular” entertainment, so that when it rains and the entire city is flooded and you are stuck at home, you can go someplace else apart from Aurora and watch something else than Krrish, though in all fairness, watching Krrish wasn’t a bad use of 2 ½ hours last Monday evening.

Considering though, that even if Shanmukhananda Hall had something, there would have been no way of reaching it, through all that water that always collects around it during the rains.

Posted by bhavinj at 11:00 AM | Comments (0)

June 16, 2006

Thoda hai, thode ki zaroorat hai

This appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Stanmore is a suburb in North London, where I was vacationing last month. My niece and her husband had moved into their new home just a fortnight back and still hadn’t gotten around to knowing the area well.

The holiday was a lazy one, but like a fool, since I had brought my running shoes along, and that too, after a lot of struggle and acrimony over their presence, especially with the already over-loaded baggage, there was no way I could escape not using them. Which meant I had to go out running in the mornings, whilst everyone else was sleeping away till as late as possible.

I ran thrice on alternate days for about 45 minutes each, until I finally (thankfully) fell down while playing football in a parking lot and injured myself enough to have an excuse to avoid running for the rest of the holiday. Each of those three times though, running in different directions within a mile’s radius from the house, I found a new park. The first was a school-ground, belonging to a regular middle school – the ground was larger than Don Bosco, which we proudly claim to be the biggest in Matunga and Mumbai. The other two were community parks, each larger than all the gardens in Five Gardens combined.

Three large parks in a radius of 1 mile from the house. And just was one small part of Stanmore, which still had other parks and gardens further away as well. Typically, as one of my uncles told me, it is unlikely that you would have to walk more than half a kilometre to get to a park, anywhere in London.

Open spaces make a difference. On multiple levels. Whether they are for kids to play in or for adults to run and walk in, or for grand-parents to have a place to congregate in or just to fulfill our need for greenery and openness – their presence determines the quality of the area that you live in.

People crib about the high taxes in London. But those high taxes get you gardens, clean pavements, good-quality roads, uninterrupted electricity, regular waste pick-up…you get the picture. Small things that make living easier and less of a struggle.

We also pay our taxes in Mumbai…which go mainly towards the salaries of the BMC employees…who then convert our gardens and open spaces into shopping malls or parking lots or building complexes or open toilets…and leave us with cratered roads and pavements.

Yet, despite the apathy among the authorities and the lack of planning in the past, Matunga is still one of the few places in Mumbai, with decent open spaces. And this is one of the reasons that Matunga is still a popular place to live in. We have Maheshwari Udyan and Five Gardens, other smaller gardens nearby in Parsi Colony, gardens such as the one near Nappoo Hall, the Cosmopolitan grounds, the ground opposite Ruia and Poddar and the one outside Indian Gymkhana, apart from the many private grounds of all the eight or ten schools in the area as well as the colleges such as Khalsa, VJTI and UDCT. Which isn’t such a bad tally, when you think of it!

So though Matunga can never be Stanmore, very few places in Mumbai can be like Matunga as well. Which is actually a shame...both ways!

Posted by bhavinj at 11:19 PM | Comments (0)

May 26, 2006

Water, water everywhere, but not a tissue to dry

This appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Two Mondays back, this paper ran a hilarious story on the absence of water in the wash-rooms of some of the five-star hotels in the suburbs. Apparently, the individual concerned had filed a complaint with the BMC and there was a graphic description of how people who needed to wash rather than use tissue might have to climb up on the basin to fulfill their water needs. I wonder why Morparia hasn’t done a cartoon on this – I just can’t get this picture out of my head.

His biggest grouse of course was that we Indians are water-based people and to provide only tissues and no water for cleaning goes against the “Indian” grain and therefore is not acceptable. Many years ago, Mrs. Maneka Gandhi had also commented on this, finding the use of tissue paper abhorrent, but I presume, more from the environmental paper-conservation issue than anything else.

Both of them will love Matunga. Specifically, the restaurants in Matunga, since Matunga in any case does not have five-star hotels and the nearest one at Parel, the ITC Grand, also is water-less in its toilets.

A good number of restaurants in Matunga don’t have rest-rooms anyway, so there is no problem. But there are some, which do have toilets. And these are the ones that have only water for cleaning, with absolutely no tissues at all.

Picture this. You’ve had some awesome fiery pav-bhaji or mysore masala and suddenly you feel the urge. You rush to the restroom, do your business and then clean yourself with the water. And then you’re stuck. With no tissues, how do you wipe yourself dry? Do you just wait for your underwear/panty to absorb the water, or do you wait till natural drying occurs.

The absence of paper manifests itself at the wash-basins as well. After eating (and don’t tell me you have dosas and idlis with a fork and knife), you need to wash your hands. Washing is fine, because there is ample water. But after that you need to dry them. And that’s where the problem arises. Most provide a towel for wiping your hands on. But this towel has been used a good number of times by people before you and unless you can find a corner which is still dry and therefore has not been wiped on before, you’re stuck.

Most of the times, you then land up using your handkerchief or the front of your jeans, if you are wearing one. Which is ridiculous. The best option here would be to provide paper napkins from dispensers, like the ones from Kimberly-Clark, which are ubiquitous now at airports, in malls and in those famous rest-rooms of the five-star hotels.

Which of course brings us right back to the use of paper and its many critics. But honestly, give me hygiene and disposable material for wiping and cleaning anyday over having water dripping from all parts of your body or having to use a towel or napkin that someone earlier has used.

Of course, the best solution would be to have the all-in-one, no-touch Japanese toilets, which dispense water for cleaning, provide air jets for drying, warm your exposed skin and also check your urine for sugar and alcohol. The only problem then would be that you might not want to leave the toilet room at all. Which on a bad day may not be such a bad idea…especially if the toilet came with a DVD viewer as well!

Posted by bhavinj at 11:15 PM | Comments (1)

May 09, 2006

Much Ado Over Khakhras

This appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Last month, I had to travel to a Middle-Eastern country for two days. I called a friend of mine who lives there to tell him that I was coming and we fixed up to meet for lunch, the day after my arrival. I then asked him if he wanted anything. He hesitated for a moment and then said “Can you get me some khakhras?”

I can understand Gujjus pining for khakhras, but a true-blood CKP wanting khakhras? Apparently, even though he is the general manager of one of the biggest supermarket chains in that country, which specifically caters to the large Indian population as well, they don’t stock khakhras.

I have grown up with khakhras. As a child, I would see my Mom take left-over chapatis from the previous day and then on a tava, using a thick, cloth-covered “datto”, deliver a constant pressure to the chapati, until it became thin and crisp. And we had to make sure that the khakhra dabba was packed air-tight and not left open under the fan, otherwise the khakhras would become un-crisp within minutes.

Many years ago, we used to eat khakhras with ghee and sugar, usually for breakfast or in the afternoon as a snack. Then for a long time, I didn’t really have much to do with them, except during my earlier trips abroad, when khakhras and theplas were packed for me just in case I didn’t find vegetarian food to eat in the “phoren” countries.

In the last few months though, thanks to the need to start eating healthier foods, I’ve re-stared having them as an evening snack. I quickly learnt that instead of ghee and sugar, its better to lather them with mustard and mayonnaise. Mmm…a mustard-mayo combo on a plain khakhra…just try it – its awesome.

Since my Mom no longer makes khakhras, and not knowing where they come from these days, I stopped over at Chheda (remember the four pillars of Matunga?) on my way home. I asked for their khakhra counter, hoping to quickly pick-up a couple of packets. Quickly? Couple? I was suddenly faced with khakhra choice-fatigue. There were more than 30 types of khakhras – plain, masala, low-cal, methi, Jain and even Schezwan. And in different sizes. I called my friend again and asked him what he wanted. After asking me how many types there were and listening to my incredulous answer, he opted for plain, masala and (how can you resist this) Schezwan.

I picked up these packets and then bubble-wrapped them to make sure they wouldn’t crack. This incident made for good dinner-table conversation that day and I also learnt that our khakhras now came from a co-operative in Nallasopara, where my mother-in-law helps out members of this co-op who make khakhras for a living. It is a time-consuming, labor-intensive job, but it does generate income. And apparently, there are many such co-ops, as well as individual women who make khakhras in their homes and sell them to make some extra money.

Over coffee at a Starbucks, after a great Mexican meal, as I handed over the khakhras to my friend he told me that they were actually now going to try and source khakhras from India to stock in their stores. Which I guess means that I don’t need to carry khakhras the next time I visit that country.

Posted by bhavinj at 11:36 AM | Comments (2)

April 16, 2006

Flash from an SLR past

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Last Sunday, we suddenly realized that the one-year old, passport-sized photos of our fast-growing, six-years old twins, would not do for some visas that we were applying for. They already look different.

So, just before our biweekly Sunday Udipi ritual, we trooped to Foto Circle, which we have been frequenting for the last God-knows how many years and with a brief nod to the owners, mouthing the words “passport photos”, we promptly walked out through the rear entrance, onto the landing of the building that Foto Circle belongs to, and then climbed up to the first floor to their studio. Why didn’t we go directly up to the studio? I have no answer…I guess, just force of habit.

In today’s day and age of 5 and 6 mega pixel cameras and other fancy digital photography equipment, photo studios may seem anachronistic. But, as long as we need visas and as long as the visa people insist on 35mmx35mm or 45mmx35mm or 2”x2” or some such rubbish size, with a white background and blue shirt with the ears seen and shoulders straight, and teeth brushed with only Colgate and not Pepsodent, photo studios will live.

But there are photo studios and there are photo studios.

As long as I can remember, Ramesh Kandari (and I bothered to learn his name only this time), has been around shooting faces on his SLR. He exemplifies the saying “whatever you do, do it well”. Ramesh does not just click photos as if for a passport. He clicks photos to be treasured.

I have been to a few other studios and identity-photo shoots. You come in front of the camera, the photographer says “smile” and sometimes not even that, you hear a click and see the flash and you’re out.

Ramesh takes his own time. He first adjusts the bulbs and flash-stands for about a minute. He then fusses over your posture, making sure your shoulders are straight. Your chin has to be upright just so. He then looks through the view-finder to check whether everything is fine. Invariably, he is not satisfied and he makes a few more adjustments. Then comes the “please smile” followed by the click and flash. And just to be sure, he clicks once more.

He doesn’t have to do all this. But he takes pride in his work and that’s what counts. To the extent that he repeated the entire session with the kids, once again, when he found that one of the flash-bulbs had not been triggering properly.

This is the reason why, despite being personally reasonably photo-savvy, we’ve been going to him for other photographs as well. When the kids were six months old, we took them for a photo-shoot in their cribs. Then, when they were around three years old, and dressed to the hilt for a Navratri evening, we took them for a photo-session.

And this time, after the passport photos were done, we did another session to record my son’s first fallen left upper central incisor, which had been moving for the last six months, but finally came out, just four days ago, And since the tooth fairy had anyway left him a video-game in exchange for his tooth, we realized we needed to record for posterity his one-tooth-less grin as well. With a professional photo-shoot to boot.

And like the other photos shot by Ramesh, this one will also take pride of place in the photo-collage in the kids’ room.

Posted by bhavinj at 06:26 PM | Comments (0)

March 31, 2006

Hair comes the salon revolution

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

This is one thing I find difficult to understand. We all need hair-cuts, which we get done at regular intervals …anywhere from once in 2-3 weeks to once in 2-3 months, depending on our sex, amount of hair and need. Which means that the number of people getting their hair cut in a day is reasonably fixed and would increase only with an increase in the population.

Uptil three years ago, King’s Circle had two saloons, Capitol and Star, both for men, with a couple of more saloons near the Market and on Bhaudaji road and a couple more for women. Most women mGSBs (Matunga Gujaratis aspiring to be South Bombayites), however used to go outside Matunga for their “parlor” needs.

As a kid, I, I used to frequent a parlor in Brahmanwada. I stopped going when one day the “barber” found it more interesting to watch an ongoing Amitabh movie on cable than the state of my hair and gave me a nick on my ear-lobe. I then moved to Star, which has always been a popular, no-frills saloon and does a better-than-average job at cutting hair, but stopped going there, when I found it more convenient to get my hair-jobs done near my place of work.

And then suddenly about two years ago, started the saloon revolution. Enrich first opened on the Circle, followed by Aakruti, which along with Naturals (the ice-cream parlor) has erased all signs of the late Dr. U B Rao’s clinic. And then just last week, I saw another new fancy saloon next to Foto Circle.

So I come back to the original question. What is the reason for this sudden spurt in the number of saloons in Matunga? Is it that 20 somethings and teens are getting their hair done more often than when we were their age? Or is it because mGSBs have stopped going out of Matunga for their hair-related issues and are now patronizing these new places? Or is it because more and more boys and men have started getting facials, manicures and pedicures done…sheesh!

Yet, with all these “glam” saloons taking over Matunga hair-dos, the road-side barber with his “istra”, still flourishes outside Aurora with a reasonable clientele of taxi-drivers and household help, offerring his services at an unbeatable price.

In the midst of this “saloon” awakening, what has quietly gone unnoticed is another revolution. In drearily conservative and boring Matunga, where all shops now sell egg-less pastries and cakes with eggs are amazingly difficult to find, where women would always go to “women” parlors, at special times, out-of-sight of men or behind curtains, we now suddenly have unisex saloons, and no one seems to be raising even a third of an eyebrow.

A few months ago, a nephew of mine from abroad, wanted a special type of hair-cut. When we asked around, we were told of a “designer” hair-dresser between Matunga and Dadar. When we called him, his receptionist said that the earliest appointment would be after 4 days. Four days? For a hair-cut? Honestly? He quietly went to Star and they managed to do what he wanted them to do, within the hour, at probably one-fourth the price. Some things in life (and hair-cuts fall in this category) are definitely not worth waiting for!

Posted by bhavinj at 06:22 PM | Comments (0)

March 11, 2006

Opingo Batingo

This appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

A couple of weeks ago, we went to the 10th wedding anniversary of a close school friend. While mingling with some other friends who were there, I suddenly had the wind blown out of me by a big thump on my back. I turned around and found another old school friend, with his index finger raised, mouthing the word “Opingo”.

We must be the only two over-40 relics still playing this game. It started in Don Bosco and we’ve carried it through college and graduate school, till the present.. For those who came in late (a la the Ghost Who Walks), it is a very simple game, played for the sole purpose of inflicting pain by hitting the other person as hard as possible. In brief, if you stand, you have to raise your index finger and say “Opingo” and if you sit, you have to put up your index and middle fingers and say “Batingo”. If you don’t, the person with whom you are playing the game has the right to hit you.

It is somewhat like “statue”, but honestly, “statue” is an amazingly silly game, which works only on the premise that the other person will follow your command. If he/she refuses to, there is not a damn thing you can do. Here if the other person does not say “Opingo” or “Batingo”, you can hit him/her. Hard! Wow!

Probably the closest game to this was “Apadhubi”. In this game, you took a rubber ball and just hit whoever was nearest you with as much force as possible. As simple as that. It was a great game to vent out your anger, angst and energy. Square-ball and dodge-ball came a close second, the aim again being to hit someone as hard as possible with the ball and to get that person out. I still remember playing square-ball in my building compound and hitting a young girl on her chest when we were both I guess around 10-12 years old. She started crying and I kept laughing. No wonder, we are from Mars and girls…forget Venus, they used to be from another universe in those days.

Obviously the next thing to say would be “where have these good old days gone”, “children today don’t play…they only watch television or are on the PC…”. These are such clichés as well. Though my kids love to watch their movies and television (restricted to weekends), they are now part of a gang of kids, that is constantly out in the compounds of the buildings in our block, playing the usual games that kids do (icespice, catching cook, kicking the ball, cycling). Plus they play in Don Bosco in the evenings, attend basketball coaching and have become karate brown belts.

Not only them, there is always someone or the other in the gully playing cricket, while others play football or basketball in the school grounds, and some land up in the nearby gyms.

My kids may never land up playing “Apadhubi” or lagori, or gilli-danda, but they still are outdoors for a good amount of time. My take? Television and PCs are so ubiquitous that they are just becoming another set of tools for entertainment, taken as matter of fact by the current generation of kids. It is in fact our generation that seems to be addicted, most likely because we didn’t have these gadgets when we were growing up.

Or maybe this is all just a Matunga thing!

Posted by bhavinj at 01:52 AM | Comments (2)

February 06, 2006

King Kong is Shrinking in Sion

This piece appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Sometimes, to appreciate greatness, it helps to have something inferior nearby. Last Saturday, we finished watching John Guillermin’s 1976 King Kong version at home, and then the next day, we landed up watching Peter Jackson’s recent version at CineMax, Sion.

We hadn’t been to CinePlanet/CineMax for quite some time and were pleasantly surprised at the changes. They now check tickets at the entry to the foyer, the ground and first floor floyer arrangements for food and drink have changed and the place seems cleaner. More importantly, the staff has had an amazing make-over. Even after we spilt an entire popcorn bucket, they all just smiled, cleaned up the mess and to top it all, gave us another one for free. But some things remain the same. In Planet3, on the 3rd floor, they no longer have ice-cream and cold coffee, and you still have to trudge down to the first floor for these.

Peter Jackson is on his way to becoming an all-time great. With the pressure of having to do as well as the Lord of the Rings, if not better, it couldn’t have been easy. Unlike Ramesh Sippy, who after Sholay (which more and more seems to be a fluke) actually made turkey after turkey and movies like Brashtachar, Peter Jackson almost betters himself. Sure, he could have gone easy on the dinosaurs and the large insects and the overdone natives who look like leftovers from Lord of the Rings, but the rest of the film is rich, intense and captures the “It wasn’t the airplanes. It was Beauty that killed the Beast” ethos perfectly. And unlike George Lucas, who has serious problems getting his Stars Wars actors to emote, Peter Jackson is not only amazing with his CGI stuff, but also a good director, definitely more Spielbergen than Lucasan or Ramirezan.

And it helps to have someone like Naomi Watts. She plays Ann Darrow so well, you wonder how the script-writers and the director could have justified Jessica Lange’s floozy character in the 1976 version. Except for Jeff Bridges, who would have made a better Jack Driscoll than Adrien Brody, everyone else is better cast and better sketched as well. While John Guillermin’s version is cliched, in parts ridiculous and in parts a parody, Peter Jackson’s version takes itself seriously while remaining unabashedly emotional.

But I wish I could have seen this is a larger theatre, like Metro, Regal or Sterling. More and more, with multiplexes, our theatre experience is shrinking. Even though the screen sizes are the same as before, the smaller size of the halls almost makes you think you are at home, in front of your 42”. And though the recent King Kong film is better than the earlier one, Rupam, where CineMax now stands was more fun. I can still remember the collective sigh from all the girls (and their mothers) in the audience, when Kumar Gaurav first turns his face towards the camera, while in the aircraft, in Love Story. Or the frenzy of getting tickets for the opening day of Karz (Subhash Ghai, what has happened to you?) and standing in line from 8.00AM onwards on a Monday, just to see Rishi Kapoor, on Friday, prancing around singing Om Shanti Om, and then realizing what a great villain Simi Garewal could be.

Of couse, for the big-screen appearance, Aurora is still around, but with the large hall, come the large mosquitoes as well…but, that’s fodder for another story

Posted by bhavinj at 01:48 AM | Comments (0)

January 28, 2006

Of the idli ilk

This is my new piece that came in today's Mumbai Mirror.

After having been around for 40 odd years, you often start believing that you’ve been there, done that and seen it all. Fewer and fewer things (unless they are IPODian gadgets or large-screen plasmas) get you excited. More and more, everything starts becoming routine. But then…once in a while…something happens….

Being in Matunga, I thought I knew everything that I had to about idlis. I’ve had idlis in all sizes and shapes; from simple idlis to idli-vada combinations, to dahi idli, butter-idli, fried idli, and masala idlis with cashews, etc embedded in them. I’ve had Muthu’s idlis, my Mom’s idlis, cocktail idlis, and the idli-like khottos and mudhos.

I’ve had idlis outside of Matunga, the best ever in Leela Goa, as well as in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, in Gujarat, Punjab, in London, San Diego, Dubai and God knows where else. I’ve had idlis without anything, with sambhar, with sambhar and chutney separately or sometimes even together and sometimes just with butter. I’ve fought with restaurateurs over their coconut chutneys, facing shameful admissions of embellishments with “daaliya” and “chana” or peanuts, as well as incredulous expressions of “how can you even ask if our chutney is pure coconut or no”.

Last week, on a lazy Sunday morning, we decided to go to Anand Bhuvan for breakfast. Wondering what to order apart from the usual idlis and dosas, my eyes fell on a name, written in chalk on a blackboard, in “Today’s Specials”, a dish I had never had before. There was nothing really great about the name itself, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I had never before had this combination….a combination of rasam and idli forming a dish called…“rasam idli”. Rasam vadas, yes… rasam on its own, yes… rasam with rice…yes, but rasam idli…that was a new one.

And…the rasam idlis were absolutely to die for. As I put each portion into my mouth, the rasam-soaked pieces would melt immediately, releasing an explosive mix of a difficult to describe but a predominantly tangy mix of flavors and aromas. The combination was amazing and between the two of us, my wife and I finished another plate as well.

I guess it’s all in the combination. Unlike sambhar, which is much too thick, idlis just soak up the rasam. With that, I guess, they become softer and the rasam becomes part of the idli itself. When you then eat that idli, the combination becomes unbeatable.

Its amazing, isn’t it. Nothing fancy, no fusion, just a change from sambhar to rasam and boom!

I am sure that I will be besieged by emails from people telling me that this is a very usual, ordinary experience for many of them and that they have been having rasam idlis for years and years. Maybe so, but it is not listed as an item in most menus (unless I have been blind) and for some strange reason, in the last forty years (OK, 30, to count only the conscious, idli-eating years), I’ve have never had this combination before.

So from now, its going to be rasam idlis, for a long time to come…until the next Nirvanic experience (which I actually had with some home-cooked red Thai curry, but I can’t talk about it, since neither the chef nor the experience was in Matunga or Greater Matunga).

Posted by bhavinj at 06:47 AM | Comments (2)

January 18, 2006

Kati Patang

This has been published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

The crease between the middle and distal phalanges of my right index finger digit is burning and hurting a bit, because of a small cut, along the outer aspect, which like the black ink on the nail during voting time, is my mark of having flown kites on Sankrant.

The “maanjha”, because of the embedded fine glass, cuts and cuts badly. As a kid, I often used to fly kites with a Band-Aid around the index finger tip and many older kids I knew had developed calluses, due to the chronic friction with the “maanjha”. Today, I guess, you would only find cuts, since no one in Mumbai, and especially in Matunga, seems to fly kites except on Sankrant.

Last Saturday, the whole family was up on the terrace; we were trying to get the kids and some of their neighboring friends involved in the kite-flying process as well. Kids being kids, they were excited to begin with, but when they realized that they couldn’t fly the kites on their own, their interest kept waxing and waning. Whenever someone “kataoed” our kite, they would suddenly get animated (we lost 4 kites), and when we let them hold the kites or give some “dheel”, they would be fine, but otherwise, they would go back to playing their silly games.

The worst thing about losing the kites was that not even once did I see the “pech” happen. Talk about loss of practice. Also, each time we lost our kite, we had to draw the “maanjha” back in and the kids were terrible at handling the “firkees”. As kids, we used to palm the two handles of the “firkees” in our two hands and then start rocking the palms to roll in the “maanjha” as fast as possible – the aim was to be the “fastest firkee drawer” around. The current generation of kids have no clue about how to handle these instruments, and eventually, after each kite-loss, my father-in-law or I had to take over the “firkee”.

Just after dusk, we let up our first lantern – a paper one with a candle inside. We tied it to one of our kites that was already up. It looked gorgeous, snaking its way up slowly as we gave more “dheel”, but no sooner had it reached a good height (and was the only lantern in the sky), someone cut the kite it was attached to and we lost the kite and the lantern. Luckily, one of the American, LED-lit contraptions, which we had attached to another one, stayed put and we managed to get that one safely back.

Every other terrace in the locality had families flying kites and just before dusk, there were more than 20 kites in the air. Of course, this number is miniscule compared to the situation in Bhuleshwar and Ahmedabad, but for Matunga, 20 kites over Manikrao Lotlikar Marg was a good number.

The kids of course, kept asking why we were flying kites on this particular day. Thank God for Google and the ability to get quick answers. Obviously Makar Sankrant is the day of transition, from when the days become longer and the nights shorter, etc… and is also celebrated as Lohri in Punjab and Pongal in the South, but what I couldn’t find easily was the relationship between kite-flying and Makar Sankrant. Unless, it just started as an excuse to celebrate and to meet up on terraces.

Posted by bhavinj at 02:43 AM | Comments (0)

January 13, 2006

Tull they come

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

A few weeks ago, a senior colleague who lives in South Mumbai, walked into my office and mentioned how he enjoyed reading about Matunga. He then asked me why I did not write about the culture in Matunga, about the dance recitals and classical music concerts, etc. that are held in Mysore Sabha and Shanmukhananda Halls. His main contact with Matunga, was not the Udipi restaurants, as is usual, but these auditoria. I was nonplussed.

Never having learnt the fine art of fine arts appreciation, I am a little lost when people talk of Carnatic music or Hindustani classical or this or that gharana or arangetrams, etc.
To me, a music concert, until recently meant going to Rang Bhavan and listening to whichever act deigned to perform in our city or the Jazz Yatra every other year. Unfortunately, due to the High Court ruling on sound pollution, Rang Bhavan has met an untimely (hopefully temporary) death and the thought of going to the Andheri Sports Ground and other similar venues has stifled all further concert attendances.

Though some acts have started playing in closed halls, they don’t always work out well for jazz or rock concerts as a friend of mine discovered a couple of weeks ago, when he went for the Buddy Guy concert at the NCPA. Though the music was great, the reverberations in the hall were not!

For many years, Shanmukhananda Hall was the place where our annual school day programs were held, until they finally shifted to the quadrangle in the school itself. I also remembering attending “musical nights”, by the “voices” of Kishore Kumar, Mukesh, Mohammed Rafi, etc. These used to be extremely popular in the days when we only had 3 male and 2 female playback singers to listen to.

I also remember attending a rock competition in the late 70s, at a time when Nandu Bhende and his group used to rule the roost. A Filipino rock star whose name I just can’t remember had come down to Mumbai and someone had hastily organized this competition. We were there from 10AM to 6PM and must have heard at least 20 odd bands. I don’t know who won, but I don’t think the Hall has ever hosted such an event since.

Mysore Sabha these days often becomes a surrogate Prithvi, with a good number of plays being held there. These are however poorly advertised and often we come to know of them either on the day of the show or just a day before (or sometimes after) when it becomes almost impossible to reschedule our weekends, especially when we’ve already worked out the kids’ activities in advance. I really miss the days when you could walk into Chhabildas School and for five rupees, sit on the wooden floor and from a touching distance, watch Naseer and Ratna stage their pre-opening day productions.

And so I am just praying that Jethro Tull at the end of this month, makes the cut in Shanmukhanda Hall. If it all works out, then maybe, just maybe, Matunga / Sion, may become a rock concert hub. Though where people will find the place to smoke their joints is another question!

PS: I had wondered in one of the earlier columns, what Shiv (the vernacular name for Sion) meant. Many readers emailed saying that it means the “boundary”, “exit point” or “threshold”, which Sion in the older days was, when Mumbai ended at Sion.

Posted by bhavinj at 06:00 PM | Comments (0)

December 26, 2005

80 batch reunion

This piece appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

One of the benefits of contributing to “Writer’s Bloc” is of suddenly being contactable publicly. A few weeks ago, Mohun, an old school-mate, emailed me and we touched base after almost a decade. A couple of non-committed Sundays later, he just dropped in home and along with Krishnan, who lives nearby in the same “gulli”, we gup-shupped through the morning.

Earlier this year, I went to Ashdin’s wedding, probably the last of my school friends to get married, where I ran into Cedric, who I hadn’t seen in over 20 years. Cedric now lives in Bangkok and eventually later this year, we actually landed up visiting him and having a great time.

Last week, Cedric was in town and Mohun was dying to meet up with some of the others of our Don Bosco batch of 80, who meet up every once in a while. With a minimum of fuss, around 15 of us met up last week.

Irrespective of where we initially decide to meet, eventually, we always land up at just one place, Rasna Punjab. Rasna has been around for donkeys years and serves better-than-average Punjabi food with reasonably cheap booze. Though highly under-rated compared to the other restaurants in Matunga, it gives us a lot of rope and accommodates the din we create, with all our cussing and shouting, fending off with ease, complaints from the nearby tables.

A meeting of school-friends is almost always about nostalgia. Remembering all the crazy and wild things that we had all done during school, catching up on what everyone is doing now and remembering and bitching about those who aren’t around. The school, the Matunga environs and the people concerned…all evoke extremely strong memories and sometimes, strong emotions as well, along with some baggage that you’d have thought would have been off-loaded a long time back over the last twenty-five years.

One such baggage that we have all offloaded is of being SSC students. I still remember how ICSE kids used to have this la-di-la, superior attitude even in those days, which apparently has gotten even worse. Now, looking back, I think that was actually a good thing; the hunger to “show them”, combined with the rounded-education from a top ten school, I am sure, played no small part in driving us to where we are today.

The sad part though is that, this year marks 25 years since we left school and we forgot to celebrate this anniversary. Forgot…just like that! We’ve decided to do one now, but Mehul is so pessimistic, he thinks that not more than 50 people (25 couples) will turn up for a reunion. I am overly optimistic, and am sure that at least 125 ex-students will turn up (wives extra), my argument being that even if you didn’t like the school or your friends, you would come to a reunion at least once in 10-15 years. At least out of curiosity, if nothing else, to see how everyone else was doing, how the teachers were and whether Matunga and the school environs had changed or not changed or whatever. We finally laid a bet and come Dec 16, 2006, we’ll know who wins. And I know that Mehul wouldn’t really like to win this bet.

Posted by bhavinj at 05:47 PM | Comments (2)

December 16, 2005

The next door denizen

This one appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Ravi, last week emailed me asking me when Sion would be covered in Writer’s Bloc, saying, “as one of the Onida ads says, ‘Neighbors Envy Owner’s Pride’”. I had anyway included Sion as part of the greater Matunga area, but when Anita on Sunday, muscled in, I realized I would have to move fast to protect my territorial interests (grin).

Sion, like Wadala is nothing but another Matunga, with a few pockets of difference. Most of it is populated by Gujjus…and we actually have a “Jain Society”. In Dr. Kusum Doshi’s words “Housing was also not neglected by the Gujjus of this area. A few of them got together and formed a society and constructed 18 buildings on a co-operative
basis—popularly known as Jain Society. This possibly may be the first co-operative housing society formed in this area. Here every member got one building as his share”.

Even those “townies” who don’t know where Matunga is, know where Sion is. If you want to leave town to go either to Lonavla/Pune or beyond Dahisar, etc. Sion till a few years ago was the only way out and even today is still the best way out. Both the highways converge to this central suburb, the Western Express via Dharavi and the Eastern Express via Everard Nagar. In fact, there was a time when to go from Thane to Juhu, you had no alternative but to come all the way to Sion and then turn around and go to Juhu. Thankfully these days, with the many east-west link roads that have come up, these round-about trips are slowly become a thing of the past.

And yet the traffic snarls don’t stop. The first one is at the Sion Hospital signal. The second is on Sion circle (try taking a turn to CineMax when you have come from Matunga) and the third is on the opposite side when you are coming from Chembur. Last Sunday, we managed Dehu Road to Sion in about 90 minutes and then spent around 30 minutes getting from just beyond Everard Nagar to Sion circle. I am sure the guys who conceived of the Sion circle flyover did all their home-work and are and were extremely wise; but a one-way flyover only from South-North and none in the opposite direction…makes no sense whatsoever. Another traffic snarl is outside CineMax, with a combination of tourist buses, the cars coming in and going out of the theatre’s parking lot and the cars being parked by the Peninsula valets.

As kids, we used to frequent the Gurukripa building to play in their game machines and to pig out on their samosas. Once in college, with most of my friends in SIES, that place became a kind of second home. And, with almost a decade of graduate and post-graduate education in Sion, and my wife being Sionite and my in-laws still living there…I guess my claim is well-established.

Sion has interesting neighbors. To the East is Koliwada with the repair shops and the Punjabi colonies as well as the entire CGHS quarters, now populated by Malayalees. On the West, is Dharavi, and unless you go back via Dadar and Mahim, that is the only way out of Sion to the Western suburbs.

But I still can’t figure out why Sion is called “Shiv” in Marathi and Hindi. Probably because of the fort?

Posted by bhavinj at 05:40 PM | Comments (0)

December 08, 2005

Story of Khotto (and that's not Gujarati)

This is my new piece that was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

“Ek khotto do”. Sounds really weird in Gujarati, since this translates into “give me a wrong ‘un” (and we’re not even bowling). As in “khotto sikko” – “false coin”. But, this is what we kept hearing at Idli House, the new idli place on the circle.

Funnily, we actually landed up at this place, because we had no money. One Sunday morning, after finishing a run in our favorite ground, the kids wanted to do an “idli-dosa” breakfast. We decided on Anand Bhuvan, but while walking there, when we checked the pockets of our virtually empty running shorts, we realized that we barely had a hundred rupees. We had already reached Garnish, when we saw Idli House, which as we found out later, had just started a couple of weeks back. Being suckers for that “new” eating experience, we decided to go in, but only after we had looked at the prices. When we saw that the most expensive item (the mudho) was just Rs. 12, we realized that we wouldn’t have to go back home to get more money and we went in and settled ourselves on one of the only three tables there.

My wife and daughter ordered two plain idlis, whereas I had a mudho, followed by a khotto. The mudho is an idli steamed in a kedki leaf and has to be unrolled from the leaf and then eaten, whereas the khotto is steamed in a jackfruit leaf shaped like a cup and can be spooned from the leaf itself. There was unlimited pure coconut chutney, sambhar and malgapuri to go with the idlis. The mudho was really nice, though the khotto tasted just like a regular plain idli… I guess it requires a slightly more refined palate than mine to make out the difference in taste. And finally when we finished along with two cups of coffee, the bill was still under Rs. 50. Wow!

Yet, when talking of idlis, how can we not talk about Muthuswamy’s fabulous “rice pancakes”– they are the softest idlis this side of the Vindhyas and melt like butter in your mouth – if you’ve not attended a birthday party or similar event where he has catered, you are obviously not part of the “with-it” Greater Matunga crowd. Just kidding! Unfortunately, Muthuswamy does not have a restaurant and is available only on phone, assuming of course, that he deigns to talk to you.

Yet, even his idlis don’t compare to the ones we had at the Leela Goa, around 3-4 years ago! It was an epiphanic moment, from which time our lives have been a bit miserable, since no idli from then on has tasted as divine!. Kind of like the “dahi” at the top of the Palitana shikhar, if you know what I’m talking about!

I have been using the word “South Indian” a bit too loosely and a recent email by Mrs. Hegdewar set things a bit straight. Just for the record, all the “South Indian” eateries in Matunga are in fact GSB (Gaud Saraswat Brahmans, for those who need full-forms) run, and khottos and mudhos are GSB and not Tamil or Malayalee delicacies. But what really got me thinking was this sentence of hers “Maybe we did not merit a mention from you as we are a quiet lot, seen and not heard, unlike the Gujjus.” The question is, “Are we Gujjus really all that loud?”

Posted by bhavinj at 04:40 PM | Comments (3)

November 22, 2005

Good food, palatable prices

This was the piece that was published in the Mumbai Mirror, today.

In a previous pseudo-socialist lifetime, mesmerized by Ayn Rand and living on endless cups of canteen chai, an article that Mr. Anil Dharker wrote, helped us fill at least three days of “serious” argument time, between our bridge breaks. Though my memory is a little weak twenty years later, it was probably in the now defunct Sunday Observer, that he wrote about a Rs. 10,000 dinner for two, that could be had at the Rotisserie, at that time the new French/Italian restaurant at The Oberoi.

Used to situations where even a Rs. 1000 bill in a “five-star” hotel restaurant was an expense you undertook only on the most memorable occasions, we were aghast that anyone would even think of dropping ten times that amount at a restaurant table.

Today, a simple vegetarian dinner for four with a decent bottle of wine, at restaurants like Wasabi, the Zodiac Grill or any of the ITC Grand or Hyatt Grand restaurants, puts you back by Rs. 10,000 or more. With a few exceptions (thank God for Bellissima with its seven course dinner for under Rs. 800), fine dining in Mumbai has become ridiculously expensive, especially when compared to many other parts of the world. For example, a dining experience at the Sirocco, in Bangkok, on the 64th floor terrace of one of the tallest buildings there, costs a quarter of that amount, the wine included.

Which is why it feels so nice to dine out in Matunga. You can take twelve people to the Matunga Gymkhana and keep the bill for vegetarian food, to under a thousand rupees, and that too, thanks to Nandita and Amit, for above average food. Or you can go to Rasna Punjab or Peninsula for “Punjabi” food, for rates maybe a little bit higher, or to Fu Yong, for probably the cheapest, decent Chinese food this side of town.

A few of us school-friends “try” to meet every three-six months. Our usual adda is Rasna Punjab, where the food is cheap and the drinks flow freely and cheaply. Once, a little tired of the same interiors, we decided to go to the Sports Bar in the Phoenix Mills Complex. The place was too loud to begin with and after two rounds, when someone actually looked at the prices, we shuddered, paid the bill and promptly drove back to Rasna to finish the other two rounds, topped finally with a little dinner.

Matunga must be the only place where the food gets cheaper as it gets better. You can take twelve people to any of the Udipi restaurants, and the bill will be cheaper than even at Matunga Gymkhana and that too for some of the best South Indian food outside the South Indian states.

And if you want to see really jaw-dropping prices, with some jaw-shutting food, think of trying the “khotto” and “mudho”, the next time you want to dine out. But more of that next week…..

PS: Having said all this, I did go to the Rotisserie when I was courting my girl-friend and managed to have a terrific seven course vegetarian meal for one-fifth of Mr. Dharker’s amount, with amazing service to boot, since we were the only table that night. She was so impressed that I am sure this played no mean part in her decision to finally agree to marry me.

Posted by bhavinj at 03:45 AM | Comments (1)

November 16, 2005

The Bollywood Walk of Fame

This article appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

A few days ago, a friend of mine was telling me about his brother-in-law who was cribbing about the high rates in a new building in one of the back roads of Matunga. Apart from the fact that new buildings in this area do command a premium, this particular lane commands an even higher premium for a variety of reasons, one of which is its history.

Way before the Kapoors moved to Anita’s glamorous Chembur gully, they first came to this small road in Matunga, then called the “College Back Road”, so called because of its location behind a famous college. After the Kapoors moved in, as Mr. Shammi Kapoor reminisces on his website, “With them came the Saigals (K.L. and Mahender), the Sethis' (Jagdish and Sudershan), the Puris' (Chaman and Madan), the Nandas' (J.K.), the Biswases' (Anil and Ashalata), the Singhs' (K.N.), the Zakarias' (Jayant), the Jairajs' (P.), the Mazumdars' (Phani), the Peshawaris' (Bismil), the Aroras'(P.N.), the Devis' (Sitara).” This was in the late 30s and 40s and for some time, this lane was often called the Hollywood of India. Many other actors and directors took up residence in some of the neighboring lanes as well, though College Back Road was the hub.

However, once the Kapoors moved to Chembur in the 50s, the exodus started, many moving with them and the rest going to Pali, Hill, Santacruz, etc. When Ram, the late actor and director, Mr. Manmohan Krishna’s son was growing up in the 70s, most of the first generation had already moved on and Ram grew up among those who had stayed back, most of whose kids, like him, have moved on to different professions.

In those days, as Ram put it, the lane had quite a reputation and was not as quiet as it now is. The triumvirate of Mr. Prithiviraj Kapoor, Mr. Jagdish Sethi and Mr. J K Nanda, used to walk in the lane, in the evenings, bare-chested in their lungis, creating quite a ruckus, in what was even then a predominantly Tamil and Gujjju area.

Today, the College Back Road has no living actor / actress left, and the entertainment industry has passed Matunga by. Mr. Shammi Kapoor still however sees this road with, sepia-tinged, nostalgia-rimmed spectacles, “A suburb of Bombay called Matunga housed those pages which would bedeck the golden annals of Indian Motion Picture and one day rightfully step into the archives of International Cinema.” That’s a lot of baggage to carry, for what is now, a quiet, tree-lined road, not easy to find, if you are not from Matunga, but like Altamount, Carmichael and Narayan Dabholkar roads, has become “the” address to have, if you live in Matunga, a step ahead of “Adenwalla Road”, “Jam-e-Jamshed Road”, and “Manikrao Lotlikar Marg”.

My friend’s brother-in-law was not from Matunga, and had no clue about all this. One reason also was that, as with all other roads in Mumbai, “College Back Road” (the college being either VJTI, or Khalsa), has also been renamed and is now called…“R P Masani Road”. And yes, Ram still lives here.

Posted by bhavinj at 06:55 PM | Comments (2)

November 07, 2005

Birds of a Feather....

This article appeared in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Thomas Schelling won the Nobel Prize for Economics a few weeks ago, mainly for his work on “game theory”. One of his many theories, that has since been shown to be accurate, is the one on “racial segregation” where he shows that even with secular-minded families, there is a tendency to live with one’s own kind so that eventually, without pre-meditation, most neighborhoods become segregated.

He uses the example of white and black communities in the US to show that in predominantly white communities, the advent of black families can quickly tilt the balance towards a black neighborhood, as neighboring white families often move away and other black families quickly come in to take their place.

In Greater Matunga, the segregation is not color-based, but is community-based. Gujjus and Kutchhis predominate in virtually all neighborhoods, to the extent that in some areas (e.g. Manikrao Lotlikar Marg, the lane where I live), they form virtually 99% of all households. Tamils are now mainly in the area around Indian Gymkhana, the Maharashtrians in Hindu colony, the Roman Catholics between Don Bosco and St. Joseph’s and the Parsis in Parsi colony.

Within these segregated areas however, individual buildings may sometimes be different. So we have a building for Syrian Christians off RAK Rd near Talwalkar’s, and a bunch of Sindhi families and buildings near SIWS college and on RAK Rd.

Even the help congregates in specific areas. The cooks, all hailing from near the Udaipur area, live together in small hovels in Dharavi. Virtually, all our maids and menservants live in the Matunga Labor Camp area and the chauffeurs live in Antop Hill, Dharavi or the shanties behind Auxilium.

Amma explained to me that the first Tamil inhabitant, more than a 100 years ago, was probably a station master who moved to Matunga, from Parel, maybe because Matunga was cheaper and had more open spaces. Soon, English-educated, Tamm-Brahm bachelors started coming in droves, living in rented one-room places, in buildings owned by Gujjus/Kutchhis, working in town, with the Railways, the Government or the MNCs. In the early part of the century, Matunga was predominantly Tamil. Around WWII, many moved back to their home towns due to the fear of being bombed, and when they returned, they found that the Gujjus had discovered Matunga as a place to live in and the “pagdi” system had started. Those who could afford to, stayed on, but many then moved on to Chembur, Deonar, etc.

Gujjus and Kutchhis moved in here simply because it was cheaper than Walkeshwar and Princess Street. Though the law prohibits discrimination, since the majority of buildings were and still are landlord-owned properties, it was very easy to make sure that like-minded families came to live into these buildings.

Schelling is now proving to be more and more accurate. As the Tamils move to Cincinnati and Houston, as Hindu Colony migrates to Chicago and San Francisco, as the Roman Catholics move to Toronto, Sydney and Auckland, as the Parsis fail to replenish themselves and move to London, England and London, Ontario; the Gujjus/Kutchhis are taking over.

The day is not far before Narendra Modi or his successors establish a second capital in Greater Matunga.

Posted by bhavinj at 06:54 PM | Comments (0)

November 02, 2005

A Bit Listless

This is my Mumbai Mirror piece that was published yesterday.

A good number of people in Matunga have been born here, have studied here, married in the greater Matunga area, have delivered here, have had their children go to schools here and their children seem to be continuing the same tradition. There must be a reason for this.

In David Letterman style….

The Top Ten Reasons for Living in Matunga

10. Equidistant from Colaba and Borivli
9. Being a Gujju or Kutcchi and even better Jain…yes Tamil as well
8. Matunga gymkhana
7 All the other schools and colleges, excluding Don Bosco
6. The bhuttawala outside Jonette
5. Don Bosco
4. Matunga Market
3. The overall greenery
2. Five Gardens
1. The Udipi joints

The Top Ten Reasons for Not Living in Matunga
10.
9. No malls, multiplexes
8. No lounges, pubs, discos and fine-dining restaurants
7. Completely “non-happening”
6. Too many Gujjus, Kutchhis…and Tamils
5. The disappearance of all Navratri and dandia celebrations
4. Noise and air pollution on the main RAK and Ambedkar roads
3. The new monstrosities coming up all over Five Gardens, Adenwalla road, etc
2. The yearly constant flooding outside Gandhi market
1.

It doesn’t take much to figure why the “good” list is longer than the “bad”.

Posted by bhavinj at 12:44 PM | Comments (4)

October 20, 2005

How Green is My Matunga

This is the new Mumbai Mirror piece.

For some time now, I have begun to believe that I know almost everything there is to know about Matunga. And then last week, I saw Matunga from such a completely different perspective, that it punctured my balloon of presumptuousness, virtually immediately.

Jehangir Sorabjee, a friend and colleague, has been clicking different parts of the city, for the last seven odd years, from the sky. Literally! Whenever he gets the chance, he gets into a chopper and flies over the city, shooting pictures from overhead vantage points. He emailed me two pictures of Matunga, centred over King’s Circle, one from the north end, just above the flyover and one, as if he was hovering above Don Bosco.

Words cannot really replace the impact of the visual imagery, but until his book “Above Bombay” is out in December, they will have to do. King’s Circle takes centre-stage, seen as a round, completely green island, flourishingly verdant, rimmed by a grey concrete road, in turn rimmed by squat, flat buildings, all around the same height. Radiating from the circle, in a Beybladish manner, are seven spidery arms, which are the seven roads, including the main arterial Ambedkar road, which in turn resembles the quadriceps apparatus, the two parts of which appear interrupted by the sesamoid patella-like circle.

More importantly, except for the main arterial Ambedkar road, all the other five exits are tree-lined and green, to the extent that you can barely see the concrete, and their existence is apparent only because of the cars and people.

He then sent me one more high-resolution photograph centred over the Matunga railway tracks looking east. In this picture, the entire Greater Matunga area looks like a forest, the monotony as if broken by the buildings and the larger arterial roads, which are the only ones where you can see the concrete on the roads. You actually get a sense of the planning and thought that must have gone in at the time when this area was being developed.

And then, as Jehangir mentioned, you come down to ground reality; to the chaos and the filth, the paan-streaks and spittle-dabs … and it makes you want to cry. The beauty of an overhead shot is that it masks the griminess of the unpainted buildings with their peeling plaster and rain-water streaks and funnily, in an aerial shot, the drab gray, which is the hallmark of virtually all our landlord-owned buildings, actually helps make the green stand out, in contrast.

I tried to see if King’s Circle would show up on Google Earth in a similar manner, but it looks as if Google Earth is run by South Mumbaiites. All the lovely, high-resolution imagery ends at Mahalaxmi, and the rest of Mumbai is seen with such low-resolution that you can barely just make out the main arterial roads. But even here, the one thing that stands out among all the brown and grey terrain, is the green blob that is King’s Circle / Matunga.

Posted by bhavinj at 03:50 AM | Comments (0)

October 11, 2005

ABC to PhD

This was published in today's Mumbai Mirror.

Quiz Question: In which part of Mumbai, do you get four major institutions, meeting at one crossroad? Answer: Matunga.

Don Bosco, Khalsa College, VJTI and UDCT, all meet at a cross-road, which would deserve its own two-page spread, in any coffee-table book on famous cross-roads in India.

Before I proceed, its high time I added one more term to our vocabulary. “Greater Matunga”. Greater Matunga is the area from just before the Dadar circle, all the way upto Sion circle, with Matunga in the centre, encompassing parts of Wadala, Dadar and Sion. Not only do these areas have a connected history, they all share the same Matunga mentality.

Since I work in Girgaum, a large number of my colleagues believe I live somewhere in South Mumbai and express surprise at my knowledge of Matunga and the Greater Matunga area. But honestly, if you’ve lived your entire educational life in this area, if “Dadar to Sion” was your entire world for 21 years, wouldn’t you know the roads, the shops, the theatres, the gardens, the paanwallas, the doodhwala bhaiyyas, the railway stations, track crossings, the lover’s lanes, the speed-breakers and the traffic signal timings like the back of your hand?

And the funny thing is, it is actually possible to live your entire life in this area, without having to move out at all, except for social and entertainment purposes. You can live in the Greater Matunga area, go to school here as well as to junior college and if it happens, as it did in my case, even to a post-graduate college in this part of the world. Two major engineering institutes (UDCT and VJTI) and the second best medical college in the city (LTMMC, part of Sion Hospital) are to be found in this area, among other institutes of higher learning.

It must have been the cheap availability of land in the past that led to so many educational institutions starting in this area. The Greater Matunga area has a disproportionate number of schools and colleges, compared to the population that resides here. Starting with J B Vachha beyond Five Gardens, past St. Joseph’s and Auxilium, all the way upto Our Lady of Good Counsel in Sion, schools in this area comes in all shapes, sizes and budgets.

Upto about 10-15 years ago, kids would come from outside Matunga, to study in the Matunga schools. However, in the last decade or so, there has been a dramatic turn-around, where, despite the large number of schools in this area, a good number of kids go outside Matunga, to schools like Bombay Scottish, AVM, Dhirubhai Ambani, some even traveling all the way upto Mazgaon to St. Mary’s. The reason? One word…ICSE.

There is just one ICSE school in Matunga…Shishuvan. The rest are all SSC schools and today with SSC schools being considered inferior to ICSE schools, the so-called, well-heeled and connected Matungaens, follow the herd to the ICSE schools outside the area. To the extent that kids last year, were uprooted from many Matunga schools and put in a new school in Mahim, just beyond Bombay Scottish, despite this school being absolutely new, with no background, no track record and no history whatsoever.

However, when ICSE boys refuse to date SSC girls (the latest one from the rumor mills), and may in the future refuse to marry them as well, can you really blame parents for wanting the ICSE label for their children?

Posted by bhavinj at 07:14 PM | Comments (2)

September 27, 2005

Death do us together - Musubiai

This is my new piece that was published today in Mumbai Mirror. Not mentioned in the article, is the fact that musubiai is a term that I came upon while trolling the net at J Ito's site.

A few weeks ago, as I drove out of the Sion crematorium at around midnight, I couldn’t but help think of musubiai. Musubiai, in Japanese, describes the special relationship that develops among neighbors, usually in a village, where they will do anything for each other, a relationship whose value typically becomes most apparent during a death.

With only two degrees of separation in most of Matunga, as well as Wadala, Sion and parts of Dadar, the mentality is still reminiscent of a largish village and help in times of acute need is easily and spontaneously available. And nothing brings this out better than a death in the family.

The moment it comes to be known that someone has died, not only do the relatives converge on the apartment, but the neighbors throw open their doors and hearts without the need to be told. If the relatives are few or none, the neighbors take on a more important role, but even otherwise they are amazingly supportive.

Everything from clothing the body, arranging it carefully, calling the hearse, or making the pall with bamboo sticks, carrying the body, either into the hearse or all the way upto the crematorium, making sure that the cremation occurs as per tradition and in time, helping with feeding the relatives, opening up their apartments for relatives and friends, when there is lack of space, or providing chairs and other furniture, taking care of young, bewildered children, providing a shoulder to cry upon and giving time…are all things that …just happen.

Its funny. Despite all the sloganeering about “our Indian culture”, we provide no dignity to the living and dying. But dignity after death is a given, whether it is an unclaimed, roadside body or you and I. You can see it when the traffic parts to let the pall-bearers and the procession walk through. Or when people drop everything they are doing to fulfill their musubiai. And surprisingly this attitude even extends to the BMC employees in the Sion crematorium, which can come as a pleasant surprise to all those who have ever dealt with any department in the BMC. Even to get the body out of a morgue takes money, but once you are in the crematorium, the workers are really helpful, non-obstructive and make it very easy for the entire process to be completed without any major fuss.

Musubiai also helps in keeping the grief in check. When friends and family rally around, and lunch and dinner have to be cooked and guests have to be taken care off, and many small details and rituals need to be attended to, it helps take your mind off the loss. It is only later, when everyone has gone and all the neighbors are back to their usual grind, that the loneliness and that gnawing, empty feeling in your heart hit you, yet a little less hard than it would have otherwise.

However, there will come a day, when even in Matunga, musubiai will become an alien concept. There are too many high-rises that are coming up now, where people won’t even know their next-door neighbors and until the stink escapes the room into the landing, will have no idea that their neighbor staying alone has been dead for over a week. But until then, musubiai”, even though some of us find it obtrusive, is well and alive and kicking in our part of the world.

Posted by bhavinj at 02:38 PM | Comments (0)

September 19, 2005

Ganpati Hopping

This is my new piece for Mumbai Mirror, that appeared today.

Saturday before last, we made a big mistake. We decided to take the kids out for Ganpati darshan, and unfortunately, we started first with the GSB Ganpati at the Cosmopolitan grounds. It was like starting an Agatha Christie book from the last page – every pandal we saw later that day seemed a little disappointing.

There were people everywhere, queuing up for long periods of time, just to be able to get a short glimpse of their favorite God. Ravi gave us a guided tour and some of the numbers he reeled out were mind-boggling - jewellery and gold valued at almost Rs 6 crores adorning the idol, more than 20 lakhs of people visiting in the five days that the Ganpati is kept for and more than 15,000 people fed every afternoon and evening. Maybe, if we ran our disaster management with the same logistics, the city would be far better off.

We then took a cab to the crossroad before Matunga Gymkhana and started our Ganpati hopping. Most of these were located in building compounds or on the roads and in a short 100 meter area upto the market, there must have been at least eight or so. The kids were excited with the first two or three, especially since they could see the idols from a close distance, but after that, Ganpati fatigue took over. In the end there are just so many museums, towers or monuments that you can visit when you are touring, just so many bars that you can crawl into at night and just so many chocolates that you can eat at one time.

Last Sunday, on Anant Chaturthi, we again took the kids out for Ganpati darshan, this time onto the main road. The entire place resembled a “mela” from an old 70s film with road-side stalls selling every thing from vada-pav to toys and even multi-colored bangles. Except for a small lane for cars, the entire stretch from Sion to Dadar was just filled with people. We clung to the kids hoping not to repeat a “lost and found” scene.

This is probably the only time when you see so many people at one time in Matunga. There were old ladies sitting on the road on their own plastic chairs, kids from the BJ Home sitting quietly in three rows on the kerbside, parents holding their kids up Ganpati style on their shoulders so that they could get a better view of the idols, bystanders breaking spontaneously into shuffle-dances when the idols came near, people scrambling behind the trucks trying to pick up some “prasad” and some people just circumambulating, trying not to miss any sight or a single idol.

Unlike a cricket match, this atmosphere can never be captured by live coverage on TV. Though it’s pretty hilarious when the commentators keep saying things like “See that Ganpati is going (or coming)” or “Now everyone is dancing” or “Now everyone is happy”, etc.

Finally after having had our fill of Ganpatis and the noise and the crowds, we went for dinner. At the table, seriously in thought, my son, whose current favorite superhero is Hanuman, turned to me. “Who is stronger, Bheem or Hanuman?”. I said, “Hanuman”. He continued, “Then who is stronger, Hanuman or Ganpati?”. I said, “Ganpati”. He slowly shook his head in disagreement and till we finished dinner, there was nothing I could say that would convince him. Can anyone tell for sure?

Posted by bhavinj at 05:39 PM | Comments (4)

September 11, 2005

Matunga's Running Problem

This is today's Mumbai Mirror piece.

"2BHK, 5 minutes from Five Gardens”. Ads such as these are guaranteed to catch your eye. Never mind that the building is actually in Parel and the promised “5 minutes” to Five Gardens, is actually a fast drive at 5AM in the morning, without traffic and signals.

But, that is the pull of the “Five Gardens”, which together form one of the largest green spaces in the Matunga, Wadala area. Not only do these gardens provide the necessary open space and greenery, they also serve as community place, where people of all kinds converge: to walk, run, exercise, play, socialize, flirt and neck.

The perimeter of the gardens provides a concrete walkway, where in the early mornings and late evenings, you find people of all shapes and sizes; most walking, a few running, some slow, some fast, some working-out and some just preening. The place has its own pecking order, but you need to be a regular to understand it.

And yet, running or walking in Five Gardens, is not as great as it is made out to be. Since the perimeter is bisected by two large roads, you have to stop virtually every quarter of the way along, to let traffic pass. And though less, there is still no getting away from the noise and smoke that comes with the buses, taxis and cars passing by. And as with all decent open spaces in this city, peak walking times often resemble busy Bhuleshwar streets.

Furthermore, walking on concrete is not the best way to learn Newton’s second law; you know, the one that says that “every action has an equal and opposite reaction”. The more you pound the concrete, the more it pounds your cartilage back, and it’s just a matter of time before the complaining knees start creaking and groaning.

The problem is, there aren’t too many alternatives. Walking or running inside the gardens is not easy because of the grass and gravel. Some of the smaller nearby lanes, such as RP Masani Lane, the VJTI lane and the roads around Don Bosco help if you don’t want to bump into people all the time, but the concrete and pollution remain. One friend of mine, just to get away from the crowds, actually runs at 5.30AM on RAK Rd (char rasta) in the middle two lanes, upto Sewri and back.

Unfortunately, Matunga lacks an enclosed space like a Jogger’s Park or a Priyardarshini. Maheshwari Udyan is too small and not exercise-friendly at all. The nearest large garden is Bhakti Park in Wadala East, near the IMAX, but that’s a good 20 minutes drive away from Matunga and is slowly getting crowded as well.

For those who don't want to run, there are alternatives like the gyms at Matunga Gujarati Club, Matunga Gymkhana and Talwalkar's in Wadala. Which are not bad options, but they lack the glamour of some of the newer, trendier gyms that have come up in other parts of town.

Having said that, one of Mumbai's best mud-tracks for walking and jogging is also one of Matunga's best-kept secrets. Few people know about it, and even fewer use it. .....and honestly, Viplav