beingdesh

Category: Korba

  • Recalling Indian Coffee House

    I am a frequent visitor to the multiple coffee shops in Mumbai. During these visits I have developed a special affection for the filter coffee joints at Matunga, and a growing admiration for the multiple homegrown and international brands setting shop in the city. But for me, and many more like me, coffee had humble beginnings. Sometime it was the whisked, often cardamom-flavored home made Nescafe, or the shake-shake-shake blue plastic shaker mixed cold coffee, or the tongue-tingling espresso served at weddings. But none of the experiences have left a deeper impression on my memory than the turban-clad waiters of the Indian Coffee House. And more than the Coffee, this note is about the institution which will always remind me of the word Coffee.

    Indian Coffee House or ICH are restaurants run by a set of co-operative societies across the country with strong presence across Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and some other cities including Bangalore, Kolkata and Shimla. They have their origins in the Coffee Board of India, and were the first proponents of the coffee-promotion movement some 60 odd years back. Apart from the Coffee they serve, their menu also includes breakfast snacks, primarily South Indian, eggs made in different styles, cutlets, their unique version of Chana-bhaturas, with some branches even serving the full meal. They also have a catering business spawning majorly Public Sector Enterprises.

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    Indian Coffee House at NTPC Township, Korba

    As a child growing up in a small Chhattisgarh township in Korba, ICH was the epitome of having a good time. In those days when eating out was a rarity and swallowing fizzy drinks a luxury, ICH was a break from the routine, one of the only ways of us spending some money on pampering ourselves. It was a destination for family dinners and get-togethers, for some memorable birthday treats, and the best place for watching the annual ritual of township Dusshera celebration (it was mighty difficult to get a good spot, but a Gold Spot did come to rescue).

    Drawing from the words of my childhood friend, there was and always will be a certain charm about ICH. I might expect some of the younger kids to go in and find the place a bit morose by coffee shop standards, but then perceptions of all things which I fancied as a kid has changed.

    At ICH the dishes were served on thick china plates, something we were not used to at home. The waiters moved around in a quick orderly fashion, with the right hand carrying the serving tray, exactly raised to shoulder length. Their walking was accompanied with a clinging sound of shiny Salem steel cutlery hitting the china. We also learned our first lessons of slightly alien-table manners (using cutlery- knife and fork, wiping hands using tissues), although I personally never got a hang of it. I am still not comfortable eating that way. The glasses reminded me of a curved conical frustum, something which we did come to haunt us during our Xth board Mathematics examination.

    The interiors were mostly dull with the only striking colors noticed on the ribbon stripes of turbans wore by waiters. I could never figure out the color coding though, it was green for some, and maroon for others, with a rare occurrence of navy blue. The smell of Sambhar dominated the air, pleasantly interrupted by the fragrant whiff of Khus from the Water Cooler and the scent of freshly brewed Filter Coffee from the kitchen. Add to that the wonderful sound of forks and spoons hitting the cutlery while eating and ICH ruled all our senses.

    But the sense of taste was never undermined. All variants of Dosa were served fresh and crisp, and yes you could always ask the waiter uncle to make it extra crispy. The Chutney was more daal than coconut kinds, and the sambhar had a majority share of pumpkins and drumsticks. The Wadas were crisp, Idilis soft, Omelets as trustworthy as ever, French Toasts unique, and Cutlets delightful with those chunky pieces of beetroot and carrot. Rs. 14 could buy you a Masala Dosa, Rs. 16 a Special Masala Dosa (with two pieces of cashew nuts in the masala to make it special), Rs. 12 a plate of Idli, and Rs. 6 a filter coffee (this must be the rates in the mid 90s I guess). And yes the Coffee was a delight. I was introduced to the magic of Filter Coffee here, for which I would be forever indebted to ICH.

    I have faint memories of dessert too, they kept Dinshaw’s Ice Cream (a Nagpur based brand prevalent in Central India), a kitchen-made Vanilla Ice-Cream (frozen custard, topped with Fruits). The Lassi Ice-Cream combo was good too.

    And when the meal ended, the bill was always brought to you neatly tucked in a pile of saunf. Tips if any were all stuffed in a common piggy bank kept on the manager’s desk.

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    Indian Coffee House at The Mall, Shimla

    Over the years I have got a chance to visit Indian Coffee House across various cities. Delhi’s ICH is at Connaught Place is now a poor cousin of the much popular United Coffee House (not related to the society) and is not in a good shape, and Shimla’s ICH is a place dominated by Lawyers and Government Officers at the Mall which does give it a very true to the ICH feel (there is a new one at Kasumpti now, very dull though). ICH’s across Kerala are the busiest, with people from all age groups coming in for a Coffee and a Cutlet (Beef Cutlets were visibly selling more), and the Bangalore one has been relocated to a neat and new location on Church Street from MG Road post the Metro construction. But it is MP and Chhattisgarh which have kept the institution running outside Kerala in a well spread out and popular manner. I do want to visit the ICHs across Kolkata though, have heard they still retain the old world ICH Charm.

    I am scared that like all things good, ICH will cease to exist in a few years from now. So what is the place of an age-old institution with socialist roots in the new India with chic cafes and upmarket restaurants?

    Their place is sealed in my memories, forever.

    With inputs from Amey.

  • Return to Korba

    Over the past 2-3 years I have travelled across various parts of the country. Most of these trips were planned and executed around a friend’s wedding, and given I have had so many friends getting married in the recent past, and at locations such as Indore, Dhanbad, Raipur, Kerala, Rajasthan, Interiors of Maharashtra, and Delhi, these trips have resulted in experiences worth mentioning. On some trips the destination overpowered the entire wedding experience, and at some the wedding was an event to remember. Needless to mention I have also returned gastronomically satisfied from most of these trips, learning a lot about the diversity across Indian food preparations, wedding delicacies and food on the road, rail, air and even water.

    But out of all the trips the one which I made this weekend holds a special place, simply because of the people and place involved. And yes as always slightly because of my flirtations with food on the trip.

    I was going back to Korba after about 9 years, a period in which I have moved away significantly from what I was at Korba. A relatively simple person who was mostly immersed in books, gully cricket, and mostly lost in his own thoughts went on to talk, travel, eat, make friends, and talk a lot. I became more expressive and confident, adapted new habits – both good and bad, met a lot of people from different backgrounds, slowly started spending more money and became more experimental about life in general.

    It is interesting to note how roles change once we are back in Korba, whatever we have done in the past so many years, when my school friends get together, we behave as we behaved for all those 14 years in school. Surprisingly, they are the only ones who know how to make me sit quiet. Very rare! And for us everyone is still the same, no one is a Doctor, MBA, Engineer, CA, or a businessman; everyone is just the same old DPS Korba student they were, and I am still the Pattu they met in 2002.

    Korba has changed, the township hasn’t. The city seems well maintained with brilliant roads, shining shopping complexes and even a flyover! Although all the forests around the city have disappeared and all I saw on the road from Churri towards Korba and beyond were just power plants.

    The township remains the same, all our addas are still there as we left them. But I heard that the kids are gone (after 6th most of them are packed away to a IIT/Medical coaching location), people hardly come out, there are no fights in club for badminton courts or on Mansarovar to play cricket, and those community gatherings and activities which gave the township its life have become rare.

     

    Random pic about Korba

    Oh, by the way I also tasted the famous Chhattisgarhi Daal Wada with the spicy brick red chutney (a cross between a schezwan sauce and a pickle masala), my favorite Indian Coffee House Cutlets –potato and beetroot stuffed and shallow fried tikkis (although I tasted them in Nagpur as I knew I won’t have time in Korba), 4 different dosas (one outside the CST subway, value for money Butter Sada; second from Nagpur Coffee House, now Rs. 40 as compared to Rs. 14 back in the days of school; third at a friend’s home at Bilaspur, simple homemade dosas served with a spicy peanut and dal chutney; fourth on the return journey at Bhusaval junction, a regular dosa with a Jeervan like spice sprinkled on top, hot and fresh), and some good food at the wedding. But for me the cutlets stood out, and to benchmark them I even had the railway cutlets (https://beingdesh.com/2010/04/the-story-of-indian-railway-cutlet/), but I would say the Coffee House ones win, again because of the memories attached to it. On the healthier side we munched onto tonnes of Oranges and Sandwiches parceled in Raipur. The craving for sweets was satisfied through Spongy Rasgullas, Flavored Dry Fruit Bites (a sweet which according to me is the true competition to my other favorite, Mysore Pak), and Santara Barfi (a petha style sweet, flavored with orange juice).

    As always I have deviated from the core discussion around Korba to food, but then things have been this way since back I was child, food has always been a key component of my discussion, at Korba, or after that.

    In hindsight moving out of Korba was probably good for me, as I understood life and India in a better way and become truly Desi. But still Pattu remains a part of me, and I hope it continues to be.

  • Rattu ka Dabba

    He could feel a few giggles right behind his back, he knew it was gone. Again!

    As Rattu turned back and put his hand into his bag’s tiffin box pocket, he felt plastic and not the usual steel, infact before the lunch break this is all Rattu did with his tiffin, as he always scared to eat it before lunch. He kept feeling his steel lunch box between the classes, and almost every day, he would find someone else’s tiffin box in his bag. A yellow colored plastic one, from the one for him (as declared by all his friends). His dabba was always swapped with his supposedly the one’s dabba which usually resulted in uncountable hours of leg pulling (aahhh…who would touch those beastly legs, like Wodehouse said long time ago) and Rattu going mad throwing his Milton water bottle all over his friends.

    But Rattu really liked what Vaifav Ghar usually did with his tiffin, mostly an omlette sandwich, it was always munched during the history period. Ghar used to stand as our history teacher looked somewhere else, showed the omlette bread to everyone, used to take a bow towards our history teacher and start hogging. Everyone giggled as the teacher talked about 3 points for 3 marks, 6 points for 6 marks and so on.

    Lunch break was always a nice time, there were different kinds of people, firstly the looteras. Loot lo iska dabba they said, and started running behind the ones with their dabbas intact. There was always a gang for whom lunch breaks meant playing leg cricket, it had been going on from very junior sections till almost Class 12th.

    As everyone did this Rattu with his group of friends usually used to enjoy our dabbas, saving them from the looteras on the open terrace. The paratha subjis, maggis, sandwiches, idlis, all of them being shared over general chit chat of cricket, entrances, studies, girls, new possible couples, boring classes, good classes, the smell from chemistry lab etc etc.

    Although there was always one weird thing about the lunch break, the girls were always quite. They used to finish off their dabbas, quietly, nicely sharing the stuff among themselves and then go back to the class mostly. Very peaceful. And unlike the boys they never had yellow oil stains on their uniforms.

    Talking of stains almost every bag had a very oily patch in the area where lunch box was kept. Speaks volumes about our Parathas, Subjis and Achaars.

    And then there was the case of Dabba not brought, which was then given to Dutta Bhaiya on the school gate later by the parents, and delivered in between a classroom by Dashrath Bhaiya.

    Rattu’s school never had a canteen once which was closed after cockroaches were found instead of aloo inside samosa.

    Post lunch break was the time for a nap, a slight nap. It was a deadly period to take for a teacher I assume. Much more challenging than anything to keep students awake at that time. Somehow Rattu never fell asleep in school, never ever, even after a nice lunch break. School was always so much fun.

    And so were the Dabbas.

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    Do you have any memories associated with school lunch box?

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  • Positive thoughts?

    Life has been a bit off colour lately, as if what happened last month wasn’t enough here I am at home, for the past two weeks, eating boiled food and fruits and sleeping like kumbhakaran throughout the day. In the past few days I have developed love for idlis and extreme hatred for daliya, spinach, hospital and medicines. In a lazy weak format, deprived of all the chutputa food and chutputy bakar in the world here is a man just lying in his room, and bored. And uff, this needle on my hand bugs me.

    Given I sleep so much I am having my fair share of dreams, and they have been mostly horrifying. From playing with my worst fears and flirting with my weirdest nightmares they have ensured that I don’t sleep that soundly. To fight with them, I go on kickstart my own train of thoughts, those lovely memories which have kept me happy over the past few years now.

    So everytime I wake up from a bad thought here is what I do, I close my eyes, take a deep breath and think of:

    Omlettes: Of the lovely ones I had in Goa, or on that Trihun trek (with a chai sipper, choc eater, and great driver), ones which are so videshi with minimal spices and loads of cheese, ones with all the masala tones of green chilies and kanda. World’s best anda bhurji at Andheri station, or that decent one which I used to have at SP mess to help me go through with the food, or the egg biryani be at Raj Palace, or be it at Paradise Hyderabad. And those lovely Gadar Andes I cooked along with Abhishek at Gurgaon with loads of Jeera.

    Indori Food: Well I have talked about it so many times, but aloo ki kachori at lal balti/GSITS, poha/jalebi anywhere, sawariya ki sabudana khichdi, namkeen (double laung), Sarafa ki galiyo main Jaleba, shikanji, vijay chaat house ki batla patties, joshiji ke dahi vade, bhutte ka kis, garadu, gurukripa main bhojan, aur ghar pe mangode aur daal baafle. Did I mention mawa baati, shikanji and ASPI? Indore mahaan hai.

    Lazy trips: With mostly nothing to do apart from changing CDs in car, pepping up the greatest driver in the world by offering him cans of Red Bull, eating dhaba food, enjoying the scenery, talking to other car-mates. Jannat.

    Dosa: I have never tasted Dosas better than Bangalore or Korba’s Indian Coffee House. Both of them stand out. Bangalore’s Vidhyarthi Bhavan being my favorite, enjoyed with Atishay Bhaiyas khilkhilati hasi and Ananda’s coffee gulping on the day when India beat Aussies at Perth post the monkeygate match. Or the World beater Benne Dosa or Paddu served at that small shop on the way to Basvangudi, or staple on treats (just 11 rs back then) of which I had 11 in Davangare once.

    Aloo Parathas: I fell in love with them in Shimla, they were like Sharmila Tagore of Aradhna, young, hot, shiny with all the makkhan on them, I was like Kaka eager to fall in Love and make the haseen galti of munching those daily morning before I started my day. For one and half month everything in Shimla bored us, Aloo Parathas were our only hope. I tasted the ones at Moolchand once, and for me the taste is still there on some part of my tounge.

    Naturals: More than ice cream Natural’s was a remedial place, I used to take hopeless friends there, enjoy the first cup listening to them (grunts which I mostly ignored) and the second talking crap to them (which I enjoyed). There was seldom the third one (with just one exception with whom chances of fourth came up) but I loved the place. 28 Rs. bought them a malai or a tender coconut and more than that peace of their mind. Lokhandwaala one with its shoftu couch was better.

    These were a few positive thoughts, I need more, help me. Maybe I think its just the overdose of spinach and lauki speaking here…

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    If down, how do you get back to thinking positively?

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  • Remembering Her

    As everyday I reached the school gates on a cold winter morning in Korba. The rush of students, tens of buses (the one which stood out was always the Coal India township buses, white covered with layers of Coal dust), kids with their hair well-oiled, the sight of green blazers all over (a few scholar ones-red and blue), and the pink lady-birds and the black MTBs which had become so popular on those days welcomed me. As always Dutta bhaiya was on top of his voice, screaming on the gates and always giving that awesome smile when I entered the gates. That day I had not entered, I was standing at the front-gate with few of my friends, a green FIAT halted near the gates. Her green fiat is something which I distinctly remember, just like her red-shawl (which wa snever to be missed during winters), her commanding voice, and her accent which was very unique and just stays on with us. She got off the car and said, “Deshpande, clean your blazer properly before you come”, and she walked away.

    I was a four year old when I appeared for an admissions interview to DPS Korba, I vaguely remember a young handsome Thapar Sir (very little imagery, but I think its mostly constructed from the conversations I had with her) accompanied by her. She was the in-charge of junior sections and the interview was held at the Pragati Nagar campus. I was asked about my favorite cartoon character and I had danced all over the place like HE-MAN, and the panel had a nice laugh. I was given chocolates and an entry to DPS Korba- 8810 it was.

    I met her last in 2004, she had lost a lot of weight, well that was the only thing which had changed, she looked the same, her eyes were still as expressive as always. She had made coffee and as she was talking about her new home at SADA and the change from the Yamuna Vihar home she suddenly mentioned, “Nowadays you don’t watch He-Man, they don’t show it anymore I believe?”.

    She was like that, she would recall the tiniest bits which would have happened, and bring them back to conversations. It was strange that despite being for my entire life in school I never got a chance to be her student. But I was fortunate it happened during my last year in school, Class 12th, it was just a coincidence that it was her last year too at the school. And as expected she was awesome, it was fun attending her classes, her voice modulations as she went through the English Literature stuff was brilliant, I vaguely remember the details, but it was a great feeling.

    And in that year came a forgettable day, where for the first time she became so angry at us (I don’t remember what had happened), she made the entire section stand and then she went and started punching back, this was not like her, she had become very angry with the behavior of few students in my section. Then as she finished the first column of benches, she came to one student and then she stopped (I believe it was Shameek or Swapnil) and then she cried. She then apologized for her actions, but conveyed how bad she had felt about the entire thing. Our entire class was not able to face her directly for a few days to come after that.

    She was strict, but she was much more loving than that. Her touch was extremely special, she knew everyone’s family in and out. Once in a while she would catch hold of me and ask me about home, about how my sis is finding the place, and am I enjoying my studies. She kept a tab on my studies as well that of 1000s others. I remember in Junior school Shameek used to be her favorite (or at-least that is what we presumed) and everyone wanted to be good in front of her. But she was never biased, she loved every student and really cared for us through all those years.

    Also few things which I have memories of are that of her speech during Annual Function (she used to present an update of Junior school), she leading the assembly in case B Singh sir was absent (or later our other Principals), her screaming out for Kalpana Didi and Dashrath Bhaiya (that was actually funny, both of them were always scared when they reached her), her annual trip to U.S. and stories from her trip during assembly (I remember her talking about Yellow Stone national park, and Disneyland).

    The last I had a really long conversation with her was in Dec, 2001. I was along with my family on a trip to South India and met her on Raipur airport. She was on the same flight with us to Mumbai (from where she was supposed to catch an international flight to Qatar maybe) and I took a seat next to her. This was my first flight ever, the first time I ever sat in a plane and I was lucky enough to experience my first flight with her. She talked about her trips, the years passed by in Korba, about her family in U.S. and a lot of other things. Even that was winter and she was wrapped in a red shawl.

    I sometimes feel that over the years I should have tried to connect back with her, I think I called her once in 2006, to tell her my engineering was done and I would be joining job at Bangalore. Be it the meetups with school friends, or teacher’s day or sometimes just like that, I would remember her and think that I should contact her. But I didn’t do it for a few years, something which I would always regret.

    We would all remember her, always…

  • The SemiPali Adventure

    Mondays were always like this, f**king boring, although I am not allowed use the F word as I am still in class VIth, it brings out the haaawww from you. So we have a Maths test tomorrow, I don’t know what happened to my school and they kept this routine of a weekly test, Kendriya Vidyalaya is so good they have a unit test, need to study once a month, we need to do it four times a month, although thanks to Gregorian, we sometimes have it five times a month.

    Mr Sharma, we secretly call him DK and laugh behind his back, is different from the rest, just this year they started telling us that other than numbers you can also play with a,b,c in Maths, hey but this guy is new, maybe he doesn’t know Maths at all, otherwise confusing English with Maths is a mistake, atleast something which I would never do. He calls this new thing Algebra, sounds like a Arabic Zebra, but my friends say that if you do this you get very good marks later in boards, and anyway everyone says you have to be good in Maths, they are the only test copies my father is interested in seeing, luckily for me I end up scoring good marks in this.

    So I have a Maths test tomorrow, and I can’t get the hang of it, these f**king (a,b,c)’s, so let me roam around a bit. Maybe Kartik would be studying too, let me bug him, he studies a lot anyway all the time. Kartik lives on the last home of my row, in township we have rows of houses, we even have gali rivalry, people from our row cross into other rows mostly to play cricket, pitthul and kabbadi and racetrip as we don’t have enough boys of our age group here, all are people from Tiny Cottage, those red dress wearing, nose wiping, small looking kids.

    I shouted Kartik’s name standing at his house gate, it may not sound civilized but this is the way we do our things, and he comes out in his trademark wide-assed shorts and a baniyan. By the way Kartik quite wide-assed, literally i.e., people had that observation when he rides his cycle, both the cheeks spread out like a vada-pav. Infact most of our brain works during that time only, we think better when we are on our cycles, we talk about girls in different way nowadays too while riding the cycle, things are changing.

    “So, how is the preparation, bore laga raha hai”
    “Yes Pattu, but I still have lots of course pending”
    “Hmm…, lets roam around a bit, get fresh and come back, you and Sunny always talk about that place right, with a small river and a bridge nearby”
    “SemiPali?”
    “Oh haan, yes that one, lets go there ”
    “Now? You must be out of your mind its around 10kms, no point today, we can go tomorrow”
    “Na na, today chal yaar, this algebra anyway doesn’t make any sense”
    “Ok, let me get ready then”. So Kartik puts on his trousers, wears a rough looking checked shirt, I am wearing a trouser too with some T-shirt. Trousers are in nowadays, my cousins from cities talk about something called a jeans but we don’t like that much, trousers make you look older than your age, and also its much better than half pants, we are in sixth now, so we are anyway allowed to wear trousers, it feels great, also with so many hirsute male legs around, it is a welcome move.

    So we pick up Sunny from his home and progress on our cycles to SemiPali, Sunny by the way is another of my classmate, I don’t interact with him much but Kartik so transitive ways I too, he is a good footballer and is creating a buzz on the township cricket scene too nowadays. SemiPali is a small village next to JamniPali, our township is located in village Jamnipali although it can be noway called a village with beautiful gardens, club, great homes, shopping centres and clubs around.

    Sunny talks about Semipali on the way, about how Kartik and he has been to the area before, how they found out that place, how one of his chachaji sat on a grave and had a cigarette.

    “Grave!!!”

    Yes he said, he told the river had a graveyard nearby, which was rumoured to be extremely old, and its closed now that means no more new burials there, but for me it came as surprise, recently they started Zee Horror show on television which I find very scary and anyway I am very afraid of ghosts and spirits and similar stories. The first episode was killer with the head of Archana Puran Singh served on a plate by a butler, although Butler reminds me of the sweet Butler from Ducktales, wonder what his name is though?

    We ride on this kaccha road outside our township, all Chattisgarh roads are kaccha mostly, and you just have to get out of the township to ride on any of them. As we continue on the road, we find a theatre on the way.

    “Hey, have been here saw Jurrasic Park here, what is it playing now”

    Some dirty stuff, people say its known as Porn or something, its not good for kids and newspapers and posters advertise it as above 18 stuff, I don’t know how being 18 qualifies you to see a movie, although the poster here doesn’t have any good hero-heroine also, who will watch it anyway. Also it seems Jurrasic Park is the only under 18 movie ever played in this theatre, because that’s the only one I saw here with Meenal (chronologically my oldest friend, about her sometime later).

    As we start moving ahead the small shops and business owners give way to lush wide paddy fields (quite a common thing in Chattisgarh) and half chopped teak woods in the way. This area is mostly red-soiled, you can conclude that in two ways- the ghadas made here are Red in Color and during Autumns when the leaves dry and shed off, they all get a reddish tinge on them from dust. They look simply amazing, even the Trees turn Red. Certainly not RedWood though, read in Britannica that they are found in USA. Right now though my Hercules MTB is getting a Red Tinge, lucky Kartik and Sunny, they have a Red Bike.

    As we moved ahead all three of us were pretty excited, both of them talked about the beauty of the place, while I was wondering how I could have missed this place. The road was sparsely populated, just a few cycles once in a while and even a tractor once. The slightly tiring long legs on the BiCycle keep moving though, crawling towards the destination.

    On the way you see small children playing, women moving around with Water in Brass Pots and men sitting and chatting, its almost 5:00 PM and everyone is back from fields. One thing about Chattisgarhi Women though, their skin is has this amazing shine, it shines as though tonnes of Coconut Oil has been poured on it, and when they carry the Brass Pots on their heads, the sheen and the contrast makes the whole imagery brilliant. That Dark Shining Skin reflects confidence and their hardworking character, which I find missing in people from township. I was seeing this movie Shaukeen the other day where even Utpal Dutt was appreciative of Chattisgarhi women, but in a not so goody way. Generally he is good but that time he wasn’t, he was a bit dirty.

    “Aha, so here we are”

    “Pahuch gaye” shouted Kartik while getting off from his Bike in a superb fashion which was possible for only Kartik to do. Jumping off and continue running, it was funny but took a lot of practice. He also had many other tricks up his sleeves on a bicycle of which I had tried at least half, and almost all of them had resulted in a fall, and Dettol being pured over me.

    It was beautiful. It was like well, lets see, a bridge, a leftward turn down a dusty lane, a small river, making the nice kal-kal sound. Smell of wet mud, aha, now thats something.

    “And, there is the kabristan” shouted Sunny. How the hell does one see that in between the scenic beauty. Anyway we rolled our cycle down the lane next to the bridge, took it to the river and gave it wash. It was shining, the sun was about to set and there was a beautiful orange light all around us, the cycles were shining too, although the shine was nothing compared to the skin of those beautiful Chattisgarhi women.

    And it was all so nice, we sat there, and it was all so nice, before…

    He was a silhouette, a sort of a shadow, a lean figure, short in height, he just kept walking, he came from the side of the kabristan. I don’t know what the others were thinking, I thought he was a ghost, a spirit, or something on those lines. He limped slightly, and then he came near Sunny’s cycle, a mid-heighted reddish bike, picked it up and kept walking. He didn’t utter a word, we shouted chased him, but we were so scared, we couldn’t do a thing, it was so weird.

    And he went away, and I sat there, scared and stunned, and suddenly I realised that Kartik and Sunny were running behind him and they were gone.How the hell did they have the guts to chase him. I felt slightly ashamed, or maybe weird that I didn’t support them. All I could manage to do, is cry.

    Yes, I cried!

    And I picked up my bicycle and started going back towards the township, the roads were empty and dark, there was hardly any street lighting on the way back. I felt ashamed that maybe I just left my friends on their own, or I felt that I cheated them, or I was just lost.

    Yes, I was lost!

    I was just going back, I found a drunk fellow on the way back, and there were no Chattisgarhi women with that awesome shining skin. I was crying and cycling back, running away from my first slightly super-natural adventure.

    It was an hour and then I saw light, ya, Mohan talkies was here and I had reached the edge of the township and once I entered I cycled back to my home.

    I had reached, somehow!

    I just ran to my room and sat on my greenish teak wood study table. I couldn’t concentrate, nor did I have the courage to goto Kartik’s home and ask about him.I was scared, and I wanted to read.

    I somehow tried to sleep later at night and just saw the same figure before me. I ran to the bathroom and saw him standing there again. It was so so bad.

    Morning finally came.I possibly had my first night out and somehow cycle to the college. I crossed Kartik, we didn’t say anything and rushed away to the test hall. I couldn’t see Sunny around, but later realised he sits in another exam hall. I couldn’t concentrate, nor could Kartik, I just wanted it to end.

    And it ended, and we met, and I asked?

    “How was the test?”

    Kartik told “ It was Ok!”.We met Sunny sometime later, he said “Hi” and moved on.

    What about the kabristan guy? What about the cycle? What about Semipali again? What about Maths test? How did you come back and how?

    The day ended and I just wanted to go back and sleep, I stepped out into the cycle stand and saw Sunny riding his red cycle. I wondered what had happened. Maybe I shouldn’t discuss this, maybe I was too sleepy!

  • Scooter ki Sawari

    Scene 1: I was behind him, on 4th gear but always afraid to go a bit faster, my foot always flirting with the foot brake, and then something strange happened. Bhippu was sitting behind him, and he the fearless Jubhash riding his bottle green some plain looking bajaj turned back, and said namaste. All this while the scooter kept speeding ahead of me.

    Scene 2: We were standing at our regular adda, doing bakbak, and the girl passed. The girl on the pink ladybird (well there were so many of them during those days), and Jubhash again went mad, he picked up Seepak’s awesome hulky looking cream LML and went behind her, I don’t know why but he went behind her. His best buddy Taanu accompanied him.

    He came back after 10 minutes, and then something strange happened, he stopped the scooter, and raised his hand, the clutch came out and he gave it to Seepak. He drove it for half a km without a clutch in place!!!

    Scene 3: He told me to release the clutch dheere dheere, and move the accelerator up at the same pace. Unlike making him run while learning the bicycle this was much much relaxing, and I learnt it in one day. He told me about his first scooter, a Vijay Super (made by UP government factory to capitalized on the growing demand and limited supply by Bajaj) which was bought by my dadaji.

    Putting it on stand and locking the scooter took maximum time to learn.

    Scene 4: Me and him and his Jijaji’s scooter. It was a very pale looking Bajaj, well past its prime, but we roamed around the empty roads of Gandhinagar on that, eating paratha shaak, sipping Trupti lassi and Gh-0 soda on the way back. All my bank work, taking people to Civil hospital, going to R-World, everything was done on that. It just went on and on, and I think finally it died a silent death, although much used it was, and it had a painful life. I wish we had treated it in a better way.

    Scene 5: I entered from the Kaveri Vihar end, parked the scooter there, and my friend used to enter from the Yamuna Vihar end, parking the scooter there, I always used to take aloo-pyaaz in the end, he used to buy it first. Subzi market in the township was the place where one realized the true power of a scooter. It was so easy to carry tonnes of it near your feet, and you can always show a thenga to bike guy on the Tuesday and Friday, days when weekly subzi market was there.

    Scene 6: It was my birthday, and it was bhoko’s birthday. Guys from NTPC were brilliant, they drove scooters, guys from MPEB had one thing in common, everyone drove Sunny, that plastic bag covering a m-80 which used to be present back in 90s. Tiddu thought he would drive bhoko’s Sunny and thrashed it to an electric pole.

    And then some one took a condom (one gifted to us on our 16th birthday!!!), blew it, and put it behind someone’s scooter, and they drove it away, wonder what happened next!!!

    Scene 7: Both of us went for back to back movies to R-World, it was strange and very rainy day and we were walking back. When we reached the highway, there was no auto, no tempo, no truck giving lift. We walked to the corner of the road to take a leak, I still remember the scene, lightening, empty roads, and everything very very wet. So both of us started emptying our tankers near a set of empty drums. He finished and started walking, I was about to and then something strange happened, someone screamed from within that pile of drums,

    “Kaun hai be, bhaag jaao”

    And he started running, and I followed holding my loose jeans, and we kept running and running (it was my first interaction with the supernatural and it literally took my pants off). We stopped after some 10-15 minutes and it was still raining loads. And then came a guy on scooter and offered both of us a lift. Was he a god, trying to save us from the evil?

    10 minutes later the scooter stopped, he asked us to push it, it didn’t work. We checked the tank and the petrol was over. No point now. Then he laughed and laughed. And then he and his Scooter started and whoosh he went. Both of us were scared, but we walked the next 8-9 KM and somehow managed to reach the beautiful DAIICT.

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    The post title is inspired from the Sudarshan’s classic Cycle ki Sawari. They were just my experiences with scooter, the best vehicle I have driven till date, adventures, racing, supernatural etc. Do you have any interesting scooter stories to share?

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    Featured image from my instagram feed

  • Desi Ud

    Its been a long time since I wrote about a movie. But Udaan is something which certainly deserves a “writing”.

    Udaan reminded me of a zillion things, although I am always nostalgic about one thing or another, Udaan certainly brought a lot of those memories in picture. Few striking memories were of Banu and Jubhash’s adventures at Mohan talkies with Bhishra sir (names changed to hide identities); me and my friends visiting chattan (we could view chimneys from there, sitting in peace, and that was a place few friends actually tried out chimney smoking too :)); just roaming around the township with its beautiful gardens, well manicured lawns, nice big houses with garden and jhoola; doing stupid kaands in school; a self-destructed diary with good amount of writings and many more. Lot of things which stay in my conscious but I generally don’t talk about also came up. But every thing in a good sense.

    Like Rohan even I am confused, and so are most of us, but the age is different. At Rohan’s age one had the chance to take a decision, we are past that, its mostly too late for anything radical now.

    About the movie, I just loved it from scene to scene, Rohan’s performance, his kid bro and that of chacha Ram Kapoor. But what I really liked was Ronit Roy’s anger puffed stern looks, I always thought of him as a successful businessman with a hit romantic (Jaan Tere Naam, awesome songs) and then a big TV star (Mihir 2, I am cutoff with TV post Mihir 1, so didn’t really know about his acting that much), but never knew he could come up with such a brilliant one.
    The setting of the movie is pretty authentic, take apart my nostalgia, it really is real, and then there is the end which was good again. My favorite song from the movie is Azaadiyan, but I really love all the songs and they just keep playing on my playlist all day long.

    Another development with the movie is that few of my friends came to know about me watching this movie alone. Alone and You they said. Few inquired about my tabiyat, few about my mental state, few asked that am I happy with work or not, I just said maybe I have grown older :). Well I should say that it isn’t that boring to watch a movie alone, just that you cant finish the PopCorn alone (I certainly can’t). Too much of a shock for my new shauk of watching movies alone!

    Its late at night now, and I am working, felt sleepy so thought would write this down in the break. That day when I ran off for this movie I was stuck, mind wasn’t working the right way, the movie helped me be fresh, feel positive and super happy sorts after a long time. I felt a connect with Rohan and the settings, quite simply I felt there was just too much of me in the movie.

    About writing, have lost a few, have thrown away a few, now considering should I be more serious about them? Lets see, quite a simple trigger I received during the movie.

    And I think its time to get back to work again, too much of sitting and working nowadays and too much eating too, I think I will become MotuMaster soon :).

    But I should be lighter, otherwise people won’t raise their fingers when someone says “Desi Ud” in the cult-game “Chidiya-Ud”, surely time for me to fly.

    Right now, it would be back to work and then some sleep.

  • The Times of Holi – Edition 1

    Sometime in 1996, somewhere in Chhattisgarh

    “Bhaiya kuch fugge (balloon) dena, arre yeh nahi, who paani waale”

    “Lo Beta, 5rs ke 100, rang wagera chahiye”

    “nahi bhaiya, who le liya, Thank you”

    Tomorrow is Holi time, this time it has fallen in between the exam, but we will play. Holi requires hell lot of preparations and we are all ready for that. I have my entire arsenal ready,

    • 2 packets of Gulaal– my favourite- Yellow and Violet, the weirdest of combos
    • 2 packs of water waala colour, 1 Solid (choti bottle), one regular in both red & green
    • This year I have given away with pichkari, no use, small streams of water are of no use, metal pichkaris as shown in Sholay are not good too. Me and my friends have come up with a set of plastic bottles, cut & twisted to form nice pichku devices with maximum impact
    • Fuggas which need to be made into chotu hand grenades filled with water color
    • A set of old clothes, the only festival in the world where o0ne wears that. Although on television nowadays they show people wearing Super White clothes on Holi I think it’s a stupid idea. Every year this was the day when we dispatched our worst clothes (mostly torn by EOD). Although one of my friends use to wear the same trouser every year for holi (something which I tried on later)

    I woke up early, and we did a small pooja at home. Post that I applied Parachute Nariyal Tel on my body & face and hair. A yucky feeling but its ok, as everyone says it will help in removing the colour later on. And then I move out of C-655 Kaveri Vihar.

    Apart from Patricks, there is no one else, so we put some gulaal on each other and moved to the row behind. This row has been amazing for my childhood, where I have played everything from Racetrip when electricity goes, to pitthul, kabbadi and obviously cricket. So we played holi here with everyone with our entire arsenal. All my grenades were transferred to a terrace and fired from there.

    Although as always there are two types of people everywhere, Good and Bad. We were obviously the good lot, and the bad ones use on Holi day are the ones who use Silver Paint, Grease, and play with even Gobar at times. Also they whistle and say bad stuff when didi log from our township go around on holi. All dirty people…

    After the first round we reload our arsenal and move towards Nucleus club where the whole of township assembles. Everything is arranged, from drums full of colour, pipes throwing up chilled water and water tankers supplying hell lot of it, holi style dhinchak music, jalebis and bhaijyas, my friends from all over the township, thandai (2 types, one for us, one for uncles with something called bhang in it which is like alcohol I heard). It ends with food packets.
    After playing for a long time, its back home and then the efforts to wash off the colours, and its bad if someone has put some paint or grease on you, bad people. Next day in school everyone would turn with pink cheeks and multicoloured hands. Holi also brings a lot of tiredness and a nice sleep on that day.

    Also the sad part is like Navratri it always either falls on sideline or in between an exam. Horrible timing for such an awesome festival, but I will always enjoy celebrating it.

    Never better than at Korba…

    This year I didn’t celebrate it after quite sometime, hoping this never happens again and keep on enjoying my favorite festival.

    Hope you have read the Navratri collection,

  • कहानी २५ पैसे के बोरकुट की

    On all those cycle journeys back from school me, my namesake and few more friends spent most of our time chit-chatting, drinking water from my Milton bottle and taking numerous stops. Strangely each stop and its activity was the same for years.

    The school was some 15 mins from our home Krishna Vihar in morning (or even at 10 mins at times), but in afternoon it took us half hour or more. We had 3 stops, first in Yamuna Vihar (water drinking and discussion on girls and on latest Kaands in school stop), Kaveri Vihar Market (detour from our route, chedu’s pravachan, his our fascinations of kimberly drummond (different strokes) & ms. winslet of titanic and experiments with sanskrit :)), and finally the borkut stop :D…

    Borkut stop was our final frontier of freedom, 1Re coin helping us buy 4 of them, we were usually 3, so one for each and then carefully splitting the final pack in 3 parts. Or mixing borkut with aamkut and imlikut just at 25p :). Borkut is btw a pachak product made from Jungli Ber’s power along with chatpata masala (like hajmola). Aamkut is amde form raw mango and imlikut from dried tamarind.

    Those were the days were a rupee bought me that much pleasure. Jalebi in those days was Rs. 40 a kg and we were full in 5Rs.

    And yesterday whn I stpped out with another of my namesakes we spent 98 Rs for 2 pieces of Jalebi and 2 Pieces of Gulaabjaamun. Oh I forgot 5ml of Rabdi which accompanied it. Felt bad, but world has changed.

    And so have we…