In that dirty, dingy gulli called Andheri subway, an autowalla seemed to have been trying some stunts. Okay, not auto but what do you call those auto-looking things that carry goods instead of passengers? Going by the way the autowallas drive, I don’t think they know the difference but anyway…

This vehicle was stuck in the most extraordinary position of all - nose up in the air and forehead (!) caught in the roof of the subway. A couple of workers were perched up there hammering away in a bid to get it unstuck. Wheels up in the air, my first thought was,

Was that an auto-wheelie gone wrong??

Perhaps he skid. After all Andheri subway is a messy puddle even in the height of summer and we’ve been facing lagataar baarish for a week now. It wasn’t till evening when someone suggested the most probable reason. The back was probably overloaded and it just unbalanced, right under the subway. Kya timing, boss.

As far as I can see, there were no casualties. Except for oh, about two hours of everyone’s time in the peripheral areas. Yeh Mumbai ka traffic, na…

So I find myself sauntering down a road that was probably desiged to be a nice, quiet side-street with colony gates opening into it but has metamorphosed instead. The road has grown up and now sees hourly traffic snarls, cars and cabs zooming and vrooming up and down and a bright neon multiplex thrusting itself in between the faded painted hoardings that came up about fifteen years ago (when the road was oh, about in its teens).

It’s scorching hot after a week of grey skies and incessant rain. Great, I left my sunglasses behind and carried my extra-heavy-duty rain protection gear instead, that’s making my otherwise ubercool bag bulge like a pillow. No matter I tell myself, in Matunga, nobody will mind.

No taxiwalla is willing to ferry me to the station and my stomach is starting to make itself (or its emptiness) felt so I pause, mid-traffic to think. If I were in Dadar, I’d pop in to sample some no-frills delicious Mahrashtrian cuisine. I spend a peaceful few seconds thinking about kokum sharbat, patra, shrikhand-puri and masale bath. The honking behind me jolts me out of my reverie so I rush on. Bandra and I would have stepped into any of the cafes, restaurants and hangouts I know so well. Town has its own delights. Even if Tea Center has ceased to function, there’s always Samrat where I’ve enjoyed many a solo lunch with the waiters dancing attendance. Yes, I know, I know that Gujjus don’t consider Samrat fare as ‘good food’ but like I said, one makes do with what one has.

My gastronomical soliloquy has carried me comfortably down the entire stretch and I’m almost near the station. I sense an Udipi close by and I walk in. Did I say ’sense’ it? Yes, when one is hungry, one’s senses are much heightened and besides can any Mumbaiker miss the Shetty-style maroon/navy blue uniform-clad water boys, cleaners and waiters? I’m in Udipi land alright. Except…I’m most surprised to find the place almost deserted. An Udipi at lunchtime deserted? Besides I’m fairly certain I’ve been to this one before and it has reasonably nice food. Nonplussed I drift to one of the empty seats, taking in the darkness in the nether sections and waiters in huddles. One of them directs me to the inevitable ‘A.C.Room’ upstairs. I trudge upstairs only to find one single waiter and one sole customer both looking at me very curiously. So I back out, my customary confidence vaporizing and other senses taking over (”Yikes!”) and decide to sit downstairs.

The man at the cash register a few feet away whispers loudly to one of the water-boys to…

Remove ash-tray!

Funny, I’ve never seen an ash-tray in an Udipi before. But the water-boy shows up and I forget all, savouring the cool water in a way only someone who has walked down a road on a hot day can. I run my gaze down the menu. Chicken items, Mutton items, Egg curries, Fish dishes, Snacks (yes, they spell it right!) and beverages. Uh….in an Udipi? Of course I know that the Shetty clan are as carnivorous as the next guy and enjoy their fish and meat. But you’ll never find even the smell of one of them in an Udipi. And ummm, has anyone in Matunga heard of meat?

Tentatively I ask,

This used to be a vegetarian restaurant?

The waiter shakes his head and then comprehension dawning late says,

No, this is a bar. Our veg restaurant is across the road.

YIIIIIIIIIIIIKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKES!!!!!!!!!!

So, of course, I beat a hasty retreat. If you need to ask….well forget it, don’t even ask.

Across the road I wonder if the glass of water I had, tasted any different from a restaurant. What if they had spiked it? Someone spiked my Breezer with beer once! I shudder off all those annoying senses that are surrounding me and tell myself firmly that

I would know if someone spiked my drink. And what’s a little beer going to do to a rum drinker?

In the vegetarian restaurant (which, I note is bustling with activity, much to my relief) I sink into a chair right near the entrance. Two minutes later the menu still hasn’t been arrived and I haven’t even been given a glass of water (not that I’d need another one after that beer-spiked glass I downed not five minutes back). So I scowl in impatience and move to a better location. Right near the mirrored walls, on the sofa side where I have a view of cashier, water boys, waiters, wash-basin and the door to the kitchen.

What I need is a good thali. Nothing like simple pseudo-home fare to calm the (beer-spiked) nerves. The shiny steel platter arrives in exactly the time it takes me to walk to the wash-basin and come back. Three soft and thin chappatis (I hate those doughy, chewy parathas or ‘parotas’ as the southie restaurants call them) surrounded by round katoris all along the rim. The curd is set in the katori and I break the smooth surface to test it. I note that the cream is just thick enough to bend a little before breaking but light enough to not crumple. Next, the crucial taste test. Hmm….lovely! The proof of the Udipi is in the curd-eating.

One after the other, I sample each katori, deciding which ones I like and which I don’t and can be evacuated from the plate. So out goes palak gravy (*sob* but gastroentitis was enough to throw me off my favorite green veggie in the monsoons…even if today is an uncharacteristically sunny day!). The beetroot-bhaji follows suit. I never got used to that evil thing. Lovely colour, horrendous taste. No wonder they say it’s good for the blood, it tastes like blood too! The sambar-ey thing joins them (who ever heard of sambar with chappati?). So I’m left with aloo-bhaji, brinjals in a coconut-ey orange gravy, payasam (kheer), a watery brown thing that I always decide I will try but never do and the curd. I line up all the remaining katoris to the frontlines, place the mini-papad in the conclave they form and open and re-fold the three chappatis seperately. Ready to begin!

The first morsel is dunked into payasam and disappointingly yields nothing more than two dripping fingers. So I beckon to a passing waiter and ask him,

Did you just dump the liquid in? There’s no payasam here!!!

He looks ready to argue but is pulled off by his colleague who tells him to replace it. In a blink I have another fresh katori, hot this time and filled half with soft rice. Damn and I was hoping it would be semiya-payasam. Don’t tell my mum since I feign a dislike for payasam but I love the feel of a not-too-watery, not-too-sugary semiya-payasam within a chappati. Rice will do just as well so I attack tuck in. My fresh lime soda arrives in the ubiquitous beer-mug (beer again!) with a straw in it which falls off the minute it is set on the table.

Mid-way, I’m interrupted by people standing next to my seat. Ah, the next occupants standing so as to ‘grab the seat’. But they sit down instead. And I’m mighty surprised. This is two men, the sort that I’d walk past quickly on the road anticipating their stares following me down the road. But they don’t of course. This is Mumbai at lunch-hour and the rules are different. A person eating alone and sitting in a table meant for 4 (tightly squeezed) has effectively stated that they are fine with company. Company does not speak or look. The rules of the shared table are much the same as in a closed elevator. No eye-contact and hold your breath till its over. One of them steals a glance at my almost empty katoris and I retract my uncharitable thoughts on staring. Hunger speaks across languages.

Meal done, I speed up the finishing bits and ask for the bill (yes, not ‘the cheque’). On my way out, I pause to buy a beeda. A bright green betel leaf wrapped around a mysterious something, topped with colourful dried coconut and finished with a clove through it. What Udipi meal is complete without one?

Look closer.

The funniest part is that this is the second one that I spotted within 20 minutes. I thought the earlier one was a mistake but two? Am I missing something?

The skies heralded the season of water.

And then I watched the drops paint the sidewalk a shiny, sheeny gloss of life.

The traffic revved, feet sped up and umbrellas burst open to the infinitely grey sky.

Did the colour grey ever stop you in your tracks? It did, me.

..proclaims a hoarding on Andheri Link Road a few feet before Infiniti Mall which houses the Landmark store. The lower two floors look fairly sane, I think to myself as far as weekdays go. Even the second floor which looms into sight as the escalator rides up looks remarkably normal. Then I notice the mountain of bags lying at the entrance. And I’m stopped by the polite but firm female guard who shakes her head almost sorrowfully and tells me that I cannot carry my battered copy of As the Crow Flies in.

I push my way past the jewelery counter, the New Releases rack and past the music section. Voila!! What’s a celebrity without the crowd? Archer has succeeded in drawing the mob to the store on a weekday. It’s so crowded that people are stepping on each other’s toes even among the magazines racks that signal the start of that heaven that is Landmark’s book section.

I slither through the crowd in a manner perfected by years of Mumbai train travel and end up right at the back, smushed up against Movies while Jeffrey Archer regales a crowd from a stage in what is otherwise the aisle between Maps and Language.

All around people are standing, waving cameras, cellphones, microphones and books in the air. Thank goodness for my genes, thank goodness I’m wearing heels I murmur, doing my yoga stretch of toes, torso, neck and forehead. Small wonder then that the guy next to me jerks his head around in curiosity. And from the corner of my eye, I follow his gaze zip down to my feet. I want to yell,

Yes! Heels are the only way I’ll ever be on eye-level with you…on tiptoe! Now how about tearing your eyes away from my fabulous legs and towards the guest? We are in the presence of peerage after all.

But I refrain and try changing position instead. After a repeat (thrice!) I give up on the priorities of mankind and focus on the man on stage.

Archer speaks as well as he writes. White hair notwithstanding, he leaps nimbly from IPL to Bollywood to writing and politics. The last actually comes in only as an almost unconscious reference in conversation and is not touched upon again. When someone in the audience tries to steer him back to politics, he darts away so quickly he has the audience laughing with him.

The audience is hanging on to every word and even the seasoned TV anchors are laughing along with him. I pause in my live-tweeting to listen to an anecdote of his previous day’s meeting with kids and when he ends with,

I must say the girls are so much smarter than the boys!

…I join in the loud applause and laughter. As I sink back to terra firma I wonder how I’ll describe him in my post. Politician? Jailbird? Novelist? Firang-in-India? I settle for Charmer. And true to that description he winds off by saying that an author is someone who has access to so many minds…and is very privileged indeed. Indeed. Well-said.

Now he’s telling us that he has a dinner in 40 minutes at a place 2 hours away but that he’s not leaving the store until the books are all signed so we can all go have a cup of coffee and a chat if we like and he’ll still be there. Only, could we relax and not trample each other?

Hah! I smirk, you’ve never been to India, Lord Archer…wait and watch! Sure enough, there is pandemonium in exactly 24 seconds with the Landmark staff trying frantically to get the chairs out of the way, TV crew shifting angles, journos vying for soundbites and the junta being junta. I am too far from the stage to see his reaction but what to do, we are like wonly.

The ruckus is silenced by a loud, very loud, shrill female voice airing her disapproval and screeching,

Please, I say!! There’s no need to crowd around, I say!!! Let’s just be civilised and queue up, I say. What is this crowding and rushing and pushing, I say?!!!

The whole floor stands stock-still. Effective, I say and the staff look almost relieved.

I hang back and walk around, watching people mill about. Chattering teenagers, young couples, older couples, people in their 40s are all walking around. Everyone is toting A Prisoner of Birth.

I run through all the Archers I’ve read, in my head and wonder how good this one will be. I think wistfully of my own As the Crow Flies lying on the security guard’s shelf and debate on buying a new copy. I settle instead for guzzling juice and biscuits.

An hour later I’m still there, watching from the stage at the back, now free of TV cameras. The crowd has thinned out as well so I think it’s time to get in line for the signature. As I near the stage, the girl in front of the table practically yanks me by the collar (except I don’t have one) with a withering look. My books are then snatched out of my hand and thrust into Jeffrey Archer’s face and then thrown back at me before I have a chance to react. She certainly isn’t one of the Landmark staff. What is it darling, I smirk in my mind? The pretty-bimbette-swooning-over-you act? Or the in-thrall-of-goras syndrome? Or the I HAVE TO BE IN THE LIMELIGHT Page 3 habit? Well, whatever, my books are signed and that’s all I care.

And as I prepare to jump off the stage, Jeffrey Archer calls out to me,

Miss? Did I sign your book?

I smile back and him and nod a yes.

Back home, I open my bag. I have bought A Prison Diary as a keepsake to be able to tell myself (since I’m probably not going to have grandkids) that I saw the author in person. In my other hand is Twelve Red Herrings and I pause, smiling.

It’s the 14th July 1994. The sun is streaming in through the windows of a high-ceilinged classrooms, fans whirring loudly and drowning out the nervous chatter of a 100-odd teenagers. It’s the first day of junior college. And I don’t know a soul there.

She walks in cool and poised in black jeans and a tee-shirt so smoothly that all of us in the third row, mid-introduction gape. She glides into the empty seat in front of me and puts her bag down. Then she turns around and smiles and in a hesitant voice asks me my name. We are interrupted a minute later by the entry of the professor but I’ve just had enough to time to answer her question about my hobbies, with a monosyllable,

BOOKS.

The conversation resumes in the breaks and between lectures. Everyone is excited and nervous and wanting to know each other and ally themselves with whoever looks strongest, prettiest, smartest and coolest. I wonder why she’s paying any attention to me when there are so many others vying for her attention. After class, we walk out together and stop at her bus-stop. The others disperse. Abruptly she turns around and says,

I just know we are going to be friends. I knew it the minute you said that you loved books. I do too! There’s my bus, see you tomorrow!

14 years later, her voice travels echoes in my mind, whispering in math class, telling me about the book she finished last night and ending with,

My favorite is Never Stop on the Motorway. It’s sooo scary!

I’ve learnt by then of her weird fascination with spooky thrills. I smile and pencil in on the page after Archer’s signature,

For my best friend,

You were right. It was a good story. 14 years later, here’s the book again just so I can prove that I do listen to you. And you can prove that I agreed you were right. :-)

And long after it’s fashionable to say that I like Jeffrey Archer, I’ve finally met the man whose words have had such deep meaning on the most important friendship in my life. Thank you, Lord Archer, it has been a pleasure, a real pleasure.

Here’s what I spotted on a late evening in the local train. Orange transparent plastic sandals fastened on with a fat ribbon in a matching hue. How could I not stop and stare?!

Anjani, the owner of those tangy toes (I love aliterations!) works in merchandising a fashion retail business. She was also gracious enough to let me take a photograph for this blog. She isn’t a Mumbaiker (still bothered by the weather and the crowd) but she isn’t new to the city either. But in my mind she represents the colourful panorama of this city, shifting smoothly between outsider, newcomer and seasoned local.

Ooh, the sheer audacity of the design, the spunkiness of the colour..it totally made my otherwise dreary day! Notice the contrast between the shoe and the surroundings - a typical dark-and-dingy platform on a Mumbai railway station.

In fact, now I think I’ll start a section where I report interesting fashion ’spottings’ in the city. (See an earlier sighting here!)Thank you, Anjani, for inspiration and for the colour!

There’s one at every corner, if you know where to look and I’ve given away a few of my secrets before. This is (or used to be) one of my favorite haunts before convenience and credit cards took over.

From the evergreen Sidney Sheldons, John Grishams and Jeffrey Archers to the ubiquitous management books, this place still holds its charm. It’s hard to supress that innate sense of superiority in pulling out a book and placing it in the ‘right’ stack along with others in the genre. So pop fiction to the sides, classics in the middle, bestsellers on top. Then realisation strikes that the dynamics of cataloguing work differently in a street-stall.

There’s a certain order in the chaos, one that creates itself. You’ll always find Diary of Anne Frank, Roget’s Pocket Thesaurus (I don’t know anyone with pockets large enough to fit this volume!!) and Chicken Soup for the Soul atop one of the heaps. These are books that most browsers instinctively pull out and several dump aside as well. The largest stash in any raddiwalla’s store will be the Mills n’ Boons and its twins - who says the city is devoid of romantics? :-)

Popularity determines the order, not genre or author. It has its own appeal. After all, if you’re like me, you’ll know the best way to read is not to go slam-dunk into any particular author’s works or even to stick to one genre. The most satisfying way is to vary them, never repeating any aspect in consecutive books. That way, the contrasts bring out the speciality of each book and make the experience so much richer!

Ever so often I’ve found that all I have to do is grab an armful of books from anywhere in the stack and I’ll have my next three books in the exact order that I would like to read them. The random shuffling has already been done!

I finally picked up There’s no such place as far away. Long are the days that I was an avid Richard Bach enthusiast. While those days are past and this isn’t even one of his best, I still remain a collector and so the slim pastel-covered book will occupy a place of pride with my other black-and-blue-and-silver volumes.

I always like to open the first page of a book. A new book has a sense of anticipation and…emptiness; like a new house waiting for you to furnish and populate it with your thoughts and being. A second-hand book on the other hand, is like being welcomed into someone else’s house.

On the inner cover were scribbled in a vivid flourish,

Dear Chandru,

I’m sending you my copy. I don’t know how much sense it might make to you but it’ll be good reading anyway (wot!!) It’s something I feel..and believe in. Enjoy maadi!

Maya

Was I sneaking a peek into a private conversation*? Yes I was…but I had bought it after all. My guilt assuaged, the voyeur in me smiled. It sounded exactly like something I would have written and just the same book I would have gifted a friend.

There is nothing quite like the feel and smell of an old book. Even if it is second-hand. Perhaps, especially so.

* If either Maya or Chandru are reading this post, I feel like I should apologize for not asking your permission first before sharing this note. But it touched a chord somewhere, really.

I could be wrong, however. Does anybody know what these things are used for? I didn’t have the nerve to walk up to the shopkeeper and ask him. He didn’t seem perturbed by my taking photographs though.

Mera Road Bheyender

Escelworld

I always wondered what the names stuck on the back of taxis meant. Would he be offended if I asked him to go elsewhere? Now we see our autorickshaws have abandoned social awareness (Mulgi shikli, pragati zhali) in favour of more practical (if not indecipherable) engravings.

Speaking of which, the Mumbai autorickshawallas and taxiwallas must be the most amourous of all Indian men. I’m thrown to one side while he negotiates a pothole but I land on a poster of a pouty Urmila Matondker. From the other corner Amisha Patel stares balefully at me, as if asking me why I favour her colleague. From the side-mirror dangles a beaded heart with tassles. And Himmesss implores me to show a glimpse of my face. Anybody remember Altaf Raja of Tum to thehere pardesi fame? Alas, a decade later, he has finally been dethroned as the king of rickshawalla gaana!!!

And finally, my piece de resistance:

I rest my case. No one understands my dil ka haal better than this man!!

And speaking of dabbas, how about the other dabbas? The ones carrying piping hot nourishment, lovingly made by mothers and wives and cooks across the city and delivered Just In Time for lunch to their hungry patrons? To the uninitiated, the dabbawallas are a network of deliverymen who carry lunchboxes from homes to offices and back using a never-fail above-world-class system of colour coding. An Ivy League US b-school used them as a case study and the concept has picked up much visibility since then.

I was at the station at a later hour than my usual and had a chance to catch one little thread in this vast nervous system that feeds the city. Truly, the dabbawallas do Mumbai proud. It makes one choke up just seeing the neatly lined up lunch boxes.

The train pulled in and I got into the compartment. And there I met yet another Mumbai railway relic - the train sellers of trinkets. Of course their wares vary from hour to hour. So the early morning hears a nasal twang hawking railway timetables and ginger sweets (Adrak ki goli, rupaye ka teeeeeeen…). Move into rush hour and a topi-clad teenager waves a newspaper in your face (Mid-Day…Mid-Day..Midddd-Dayyyyy..). Stagger out of rush hour and we’re into trinket territory.

Presumably there’s more space to display these wares in the late morning/early afternoon hours when the commuters are dispersed across seats instead of crammed into them. The target audience a.k.a. college kids also make their journey upto campuses around this hour.

Fifteen rupees buys you a spider-clamp clip or a pair of fake pearl-drop chandeliers. Put in twenty more and you can have your pick of a retro headband (Cosmo-inspired) or a matching bracelet. Haggle a bit and you just might get a free scrunchie thrown in for good measure. Or a super-long string of beads that can be used as an anklet, doubled or tripled into a neckpiece, wrapped around a bag-strap, woven into a hairdo, wrapped around the waist or just slung over the neck.

And finally, let’s never forget that we’re home to the biggest entertainment industry in the world and talent is found in unexpected places. I see this girl often on the trains, always accompanied by a little boy with a harmonium. She hops on to the train with the same off-to-work expression that is mirrored by the other commuters in the compartment. They wait till the train picks up speed and everyone is settled in, bags put away in the upper rack, seating negotiated. Then he starts picking the chords and the girl starts, wherever she is standing - usually right in the center aisle. Her compact size and nimble feet make it possible for her to prance in the little spaces between commuters as well, deftly avoiding people’s feet. Then they stop mid-song to scope out the crowd and if it doesn’t look very interested or moneyed they move on to another dabba.

Maybe in a few years she’ll make it to Jhalak Dikhla Ja or perhaps he’ll be the next Indian Idol. Or maybe they’ll just be street kids on a Mumbai train.