A Saturday Spent Among Legends--Meeting Madhav Apte and Ivan Arthur

Saturday, October 20, 2018
Bombay

A Saturday Spent Among Legends--Meeting Madhav Apte and Ivan Arthur
   
      Namaste from Bombay! I had absolutely the best sort of day! Really really excited to share my doings of the day with you--at the risk of sounding starry eyed...but I hope you will forgive my enthusiasm.
     First of all, despite the fact that it was Saturday, I woke up at the usual time--which for me, is now about 5.00am  I blogged, downloaded The Times of London (weekend edition) on my iPad (I love the Weekend, Culture and Magazine sections which keep me reading happily throughout the week) and then I washed and dressed and downed a cup of coffee. Fortified with my java, I left for the Bandra Gym at 8.00 am for my workout which lasted for an hour. I met a friend there (Steven D'Mello) and discussed with him the full tear in my rotator cuff which makes it impossible for me to do any overhead weightlifting although I do enjoy using the rowing machine--this gives me a full body workout without aggravating my rotator cuff. The cortisone shot that my orthopedist gave me in June is, thankfully, still keeping pain at bay...but its effects are supposed to be wearing off anytime now. I am holding my breath...
     Got back from the gym to have my breakfast of birschersmuesli while watching Fat, Salt, Acid, Heat, a cooking-cum-travel program on Netflix that features the narrator Samin Nosrat, an American of Irani origin, who travels to varied parts of the world looking to see how these key elements in a recipe are incorporated--so far she has gone to Italy (Fat) and Japan (Salt). She is in Mexico right now (Acid) and I have little doubt that she will be in India for the last installment (Heat). I like everything about the show except her manic laugh which is frequent and unnecessary.  She seems to throw her head back in hearty laughter at times that do not seem even remotely funny or amusing to me--just so that we can see a perpetually plastered happy expression on her face. It looks odd, to say the least.
     I then left for Dad's as he needed me to complete the last bit of work associated with sending off all paperwork for Russel's medical reimbursement. This time we went though all entries on his Annexure that contained his receipts. It was worth it because we did find one error and then spent a while correcting it on all our correspondence pertaining to this matter. I also met the physiotherapist Lenita who comes in daily to exercise with Russel. She is the sweetest person and it was nice to find out from her how Russel is doing. She is optimistic that once his cast is removed, he will have more confidence about standing and putting weight on his left leg as, right now, the foot keeps slipping and makes him nervous.
     When my work with Dad was done and the papers were actually finally put into a large envelope ready to be sent off by courier, I insisted on setting up a Vicks inhalation station for him as he had caught a terrible cold and his nose was simply streaming.  Dad did not enjoy it but I feel sure that it will loosen his sinus passages and make him feel better. I also insisted he take Crocin Cold and Fever before having a nice hot beverage. That done, I returned to my studio.
     I showered quickly, dressed and called for an Uber. And then I was off for lunch.

Colonial Grandeur at the Willingdon Sports Club:
    I had a lunch invitation for 1.00 pm from a college classmate of mine, Vaman Apte. I would be seeing him after forty years! I was really excited. We have hooked up because Vaman is on the Organizing Committee for the 40th year Reunion of Elphinstonians that will be held on January 4, 2019. He had also invited Milind Wagle, a well-recognized cricket commentator and another member of the Organizing Committee, who was four years' senior to us in college.
     The Uber driver--a really nice guy--took me to the appointed spot and place. I am not familiar with the area around the Mahalaxmi Race Course in Bombay, but there are a number of private clubs here--the Riders' Club, for instance, which is attached to the Race Course and this one--the Willingdon Sports Club which, I was told later, is one of the oldest in Bombay, was founded by Bombay's colonial Governors and numbered them among its earliest members.
    Accordingly, the building reflects this gracious colonial style and ambience. It is painted a sparkling white and has a red tiled roof--like a giant bungalow. Inside, it has all the trappings of colonial splendour--dark wood furniture, gleaming marble floors, lots of portraits of the British Royal family on the walls (all from another era: I spied the late Queen Mother, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyons, and her husband, George VI!) No new royals for this lot--no Wills or Harry, no Kate or Meghan! Certainly no little George or Charlotte or Louis! You enter through a very spacious Reception area where Vaman was waiting to give me a hug and introduce me to Milind. While he was signing me in, I could see the vast emerald lawns and golf links--all perfectly manicured and sunning themselves warmly in the October haze. It was very clear to me that you need not just deep pockets, but also the right connections, to become a member at this club today.  Vaman is the CEO and owner of a brand of foods called Dr. Writers in India--they market chocolates and chocolate products. So, he (as Milind put it) belongs to the corporate elite. We were very honored to be invited...
     
Lunch with my Elphinstonian Classmates:
     Better than the food we ate was the wonderful catch-up we had. But even better than that was meeting a cricketing legend. I had always known, even in my college days, that Vaman (who was a very accomplished sportsman in his own right--he played cricket and squash for our college) was the son of one of the all-time Indian cricketing greats--Madhav Apte. His father is my Dad's contemporary--they are both in their late 80s. When I had told Dad, forty years ago, that the son of Madhav Apte was in my class in college, Dad's eyes had lighted up. So, imagine how delighted I was when Vaman took me to a table where his Dad, the legendary Madhav Apte, his lovely and very elegant wife and his daughter Janavi, were seated. I was quite thrilled to shake hands with the Legend who was extremely sweet--very accommodating and he really did have the proverbial twinkle in his eye.
     Back at our table, we kept chatting. There was so much to talk about--former classmates (where are they? What are they doing? Will they will joining us at the reunion?), classmates who had passed away (among them was a rock legend, Nandu Bhende, on whom I used to have a bit of a crush actually), professors who had passed away (Principal Banker, Profs. Homai Shroff and Mehroo Jussawala), the illustrious alumni of our college (a veritable Who's Who of the Indian Independence Movement--Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Dadabhai Naoroji, Pherozeshah Mehta, various justices of the Indian Supreme Court, etc. were all students in my college--if only I had known this while I was a student there, I might have held my head a few inches higher!), plans for the reunion, etc. It was fun, fun fun. These guys, who have stayed on in India, unlike so many of us who went overseas, have done so well for themselves.  Milind travels all over the country giving cricket commentary in English on TV--as well as for the Blind Cricketers Eleven with which I became fascinated.
     Meanwhile, the food kept coming.  I had a gin and tonic but my mates had Bloody Marys. The space was called The Pub and it was suitably decorated with high wooden ceilings with exposed beams. a long and very impressive bar and liveried waiters--really old-world. Vaman ordered chili cheese toast and Chinese Potatoes (that were awesome) to nibble with our drinks.  Lunch was Vegetable Lasagne, Crab filled pasta pockets and Mutton Biryani with raita and onion salad--a rather odd selection of dishes...but this is what happens when you have folks at the same table with varying tastes and desires.  Dessert was chocolate ice-cream with chocolate sauce--had I known that there was praline ice-cream, I'd have had that as it was studded with candied nuts (I had a taste from Milind's coupe). A very delicious meal in such fun company--really made my morning.
     When we spied the senior Aptes leaving, I asked Vaman if I could have a picture with his father. He said he was sure his father would be delighted. And because pictures are not allowed in the dining room, we adjourned outside and the lovely gracious Madhav Apte patiently posed for pictures with us. It really made my afternoon even better to be in the presence of someone who had batted and bowled with the likes of Vijay Merchant, Nari Contractor, the Nawab of Pataudi, etc--figures from my Dad's era. Dad will be so jealous when I tell him whom I met and with whom I shook hands.
     I used the rest room before I left--and believe me, that was another awesome experience.  They were the largest compendium of rest rooms I have ever seen--so spacious and generously laid out that there were actually couches on which a few women were resting horizontally! Then Vaman took me into the Billiards Room to poke my head in--I saw antlers on the wall (yes, I swear I could have been in an inn somewhere in the wilds of the Scottish Highlands).
    I called for an Uber to go home and gave Milind a ride back--he hopped off at Shivaji Park which was en route to Bandra. My Uber experience, on both stretches, turned out to be very pleasant indeed--nothing like that horrid stinky first ride, two months ago, when I'd had the BO of the driver literally gagging me.

Off to the Bandra Gym for a Book Reading:
  Back home, having eaten too much, I could not wait to get a short nap and as soon as I changed, I went flat out horizontal myself! Napping for about 45 minutes, I woke up just in time for my next appointment: attending a Book Launch and Book Reading at the Bandra Gymkhana. The author was Ivan Arthur. The book is called, A Village Dies: Your Invitation to a Memorable Funeral. I was meeting Shahnaz and Marisa at the entrance of the gym and had make plans to go together for the reading,
     When we entered the small conference room space on the second floor of the gym, there were about 25 people there. At the front sat the author Ivan Arthur with two stalwart members of the Club--Darryl D'Monte (veteran journalist) and Roger Pereira (veteran ad man and once owner of Shilpi Advertising Agency as well as a veteran theater man). In the next five minutes, the entire space filled up. I was as astounded as the author was--to see so many people flooding the space for a book reading! It was so heartening to see that so many members of the Bandra Gym were interested in something like this.
     Now I had never heard of Ivan Arthur--or so I thought. His name and his previous publications meant nothing to me...but that is not surprising as I have had little opportunity to keep abreast with Indian publications...I can barely stay afloat with American ones! It was only when Roger Pereira introduced him that the penny dropped. Many years ago, when I was very close to someone in advertising, he had told me that the best copywriter in India at the time (about forty years ago) was a man named Ivan Arthur who worked with HTA (Hindustan Thomson Advertising). For some reason, I had visualized an Englishman--with a name like that, who could blame me?--or at the very least, an Anglo-Indian. Imagine my surprise when I saw an Indian and, as I discovered, during his chat with us, a Manglorean at that!
     The book is a work of fiction but it is based entirely on the people that populate a village called Amboli in present-day Andheri--a typical East Indian 'gaotan' or village that dates back from the time of the Portuguese and then the East India Company. The Irish playwright J.M. Synge had talked about writing plays in which the language spoken by the characters--poor, uneducated Irish fisherman on the Aran Islands--was "as fully flavored as a nut or an apple". It appears that Arthur has attempted to capture a similar idiom in the language of the East Indians that populate this village. His reading from bits of the book that focussed on the limited vocabulary of the villagers brought several laughs from the audience as did his reading of bits that reflected their limited mindset. Some more sensitive people might take objection to the parodying of villagers who are not Westernized and have not had the opportunities for higher education or better financial freedom that more elite members of the community (among whom were members of the audience) have been blessed enough to have. But, if you give the author a wide berth and respect his freedom of expression, this promises to be a very amusing book indeed.
     Shahnaz bought a copy and got it signed by Arthur. I refrained as I do not want to accumulate anything that I will only have to cart back to the States. While she was getting it signed, I had a chat with the author and told him about the fact that someone had proclaimed him to be India's best copywriter to me, forty years ago, and that I had imagined I would find an Englishman sporting such a name.  He laughed and told me that Arthur was his Protestant father's middle name. His surname was Kermode. He took Arthur as his surname after meeting his mother and deciding to marry her as he did not want her to have a Protestant last name.
     So for the second time, I had the opportunity to meet and chat with a legend--this time an advertising genius whose career had been top notch and who paved the way for so many Indian Catholics in Bombay who looked for similar success in Advertising.

Dinner with Shahnaz in the Bandra Gym:  
     Marisa had left soon after the reading as she had an errand to run. Shahnaz and I then adjourned to the Dining Hall-Restaurant at the Club where we split a big bottle of Kingfisher beer and ordered dinner. She had set her heart on the Caldine--which she described as "a yellow curry that is outstanding". We went for the Prawn Caldine (and I have to say that it was superb) and the Subzi Tadka which was a mixture of various vegetables in a delicious thick spiced gravy. For dessert, we had ice-cream with chocolate sauce--yes, again!
      Shahnaz and I consider ourselves so lucky that we are members of these private clubs (Bandra Gymkhana in my case, The Otters Club in her's) where we can partake of these outstanding meals for a fraction of the price we would pay in Bombay's eateries.  Of course, that said, it means that we will never really get to taste the kind of cuisine that is sweeping the city with impressive world-class chefs. But then, we are content with being able to sit with a beer and gab for two hours and not being told to leave. And the food is not half bad either.
     Shahnaz got into a rick while I walked the one block home to my studio. And there, on the street, I bumped into a friend Michelle--who had also attended the reading. She happened to be with two ladies--both of whom happen to live on my lane--Betsy and Blossom! Michelle told them that I was visiting for a year from the US and Blossom immediately took me under her wing--exactly as my good friend Cynthia Colclough had done when I bumped into her, for the first time, when I was living in London for a year--that was ten years ago! Blossom gave me her number, insisted that I come home for a drink (I declined as I told her I was too full), walked me right up to her building and told me that I should feel free to come "any time I felt like a meal or even just a chat". How kind and thoughtful and generous is that?? I am truly blessed. I simply seem to find these angels whenever I am living away from home who offer me friendship and protection and comfort and become close friends. I feel, in so many ways, as if my experience of living in London is being replicated in Bombay. Its like deja-vu, as Yogi Beara would say, all over again.
     And so my wonderful day came to an end.  Seriously, it doesn't get any better than this. Bombay is treating me wonderfully and I have all the intellectual and cultural stimulation I had in New York and much more! Plus, I have close and very loving family members, great friends and a clutch of colleagues who are adding enormously to my sense of settlement.
     Until tomorrow...