Wednesday, July 10, 2019
Bombay
A Soaker of a Day, Afternoon Tea at Marianel's and Small Island with Nafisa
Namaste from Bombay!
I guess the novelty of the rains has subsided and the monsoon is reaching the point at which it starts to feel inconvenient. That was how I felt all day today as it poured non-stop.
So, up at 4.30, I read till 5.30 (Machines Like Me by Ian McEwan) and then took a look at Twitter and The Times. I also drafted a blog post before my thoughts turned to brekkie--and it was still only 7.30 am: in an attempt to finish all the food in my fridge, I ate two chapatis with lemon curd and peanut butter and washed it down with coffee. While munching, I watched Joolz Guides: this time, he was knocking around Clapham.
Back to the Salt Mines:
There were two important pieces of work I needed to finish before I could goof off for the day: A review and revision of a lecture I have been invited to give on Friday, July 12 at Mithibai College in Juhu; and a transcription of the interview I had done with my friend Beulah at her place after lunch on Sunday.
I have decided to vary my lecture a bit and instead of focussing on the invisibility of Britain's Anglo-Indians (a public lecture I have delivered several times), I am going to talk about aspects of Race, Caste and Gender with regards to Britain's Anglo-Indians. It is amazing how little contemporary Indians know about this ethnic minority and after the rock-star reception I got following this talk at the University of Nagpur, a few months ago, I hope it will go down well here too. Editing the talk, looking over the accompanying Powerpoint slides that I shall be projecting and synchronizing their insertion into my talk took a while--but it was time very fruitfully spent.
Next, I got down to transcribing the interview I did with Beulah. It took me about two hours by which time I was starving--my early breakfast did not help. I ate a small bowl of cereal with yogurt and then asked myself why I simply did not get lunch! It was about 12. 15 then and I finished up the last of Valerie's meal of last week while watching Julian McDonald of Joolz Guides tell me about 'Taking Afternoon Tea in London'--he was at the Langham Hotel (whose lobby I have visited to take a bit of a sit-down on one of my walking tours). This hotel was once the grandest in all of London. Its location--sandwiched between the BBC Building and the wonderful round All Souls Church right off Regent's Street--is also cool.
By then, my thoughts turned to a nap as my back (and back side) felt sore after sitting on my laptop for so long in the morning. But I barely closed by eyes for ten minutes when my upstairs neighbor called to find out if the realtor could come to see the place. I told her that I would be going in for a shower and then leaving to go out for the day. They could come after 2. 30 (I said), I presumed this would give me time to finish my shower and let them take a look at my place.
But, of course, my bell rang just as I got into the shower! I had to turn it off and get out again to open the door. Needless to say, like Queen Victoria, I was not amused! I told Anam it would not work for me to have to deal with these last-minute drop-ins and that I would need to have them scheduled well in advance. As usual, she apologized. The actually walk-through took only minutes, but I felt annoyed.
Shower done, I dressed and as it continued to pour outside, I had serious worries about how I would reach the city. Had I not booked tickets for Small Island online yesterday, I would have scrapped a visit to the city altogether. But I knew that I would lose the money--and so I decided to brave the elements. The only concession I would make to myself was that I would take an Uber (instead of the local train).
After I had dressed, I called for one and guess what? A journey that would normally have cost me Rs. 250 cost me Rs. 504! Clearly there were not many Uber drivers around in the deluge either! But come my driver did and we crawled all the way into the city. At the best of times traffic is a nightmare in Central Bombay---but when the rain hits the way it does, the problem is compounded. To make matters worse, the driver took me to a place that did not look even vaguely familiar and dropped me there. I told him that this was not where I wanted to go. A call to Marianel then gave the driver directions on how to get there--we were so far away from where we ought to have been! The end result was that I had to walk in the rain for quite a bit before I reached Marianel's place and when I did, well...she made it so worthwhile. She had called to ask if I was still coming and when I told her that I was just about to enter the Uber, she had said, "My God! You are really brave!" Brave?Foolhardy, more like.
Afternoon Tea at Marianel's:
Since Marianel is a professional chef, nothing gives her more pleasure than putting out a whole spread for people. And since she has been known to cater Afternoon Teas for cruise passengers whose vessels touch Bombay, after a heritage walk around her village (Khotachiwadi in Girgaum where she lives in a sprawling ancestral heritage two-storied bungalow), she had a whole spread out there for me that would rival anything served at London's Ritz: Tri-colored Ribbon Sandwiches (made with chutney, meat paste and cheese); sausage rolls, vol au vents filled with corn, mushroom and spinach, spring rolls, little tarts filled with her own homemade mango jam. You can just imagine what a spread she provided! I tried one of each item and then she insisted on packing up a few of the goodies in foil for me to take for Nafisa and myself to eat during the film's intermission.
What's more, Marianel had kept ready a whole bunch of things for me to look at--costume jewelry that had been gifted to her and which she never uses and a lot of blouses and kurtis, still in their original packing that she has never opened because they were not her size. I told her that I would not take them unless I tried them on and found that they worked for me. And boy oh boy, how lucky was I??? The garments looked as if they had been made for me. They were also so pretty that I was absolutely delighted. I wish she had given them to me at the beginning of my stay in Bombay as I have been managing with the same three shirts and three pants and three blouses as part of my minimalist wardrobe as I have tried to find ways and means to mix and match to make them look different. There were a lot of other clothes and costume jewelry that were not my style and those I passed up. Anyway, the new wardrobe I took away from her place is stunning. I also took two lovely pairs of ear-rings and a nice necklace--and with that I made out like a bandit!
About an hour later (how I wished we could have spent more time together as we never tire of nattering), I took a cab and drove towards South Bombay to the southern tip of the island. Nafisa had called to find out if we were still on for the evening and I assured her, we were. In the cab, I called Dad who was suffering a devastating viewing of India's dismal show in the semi-finals against New Zealand at the cricket World Cup match. He told me, heartbroken, that there was no chance India would make it to the Finals. I told Dad that I was seeing a movie in the city and would not be visiting with him or Russel this evening,
That done, I arrived at the Godrej Theater of the NCPA and found my tickets online on my phone. Nafisa followed a swift minute later and we made contact. The theater was very sparsely filled as many people stayed home.
Watching Small Island at the NCPA:
So, I have to say, that I did not have very high expectations of this production. A few years ago, the BBC had done a wonderful cinematic version. It featured people who subsequently became stars of the silver screen and were either winners or were nominated for Oscars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Ruth Wilson, Naomi Harris and David Oyelowo. That version is so good that I have TIVO-ed it at home and have never wiped it away. How anything could come up to the standard of that production was beyond me. However, I have great affection for the novel and for its writer, the late Andrea Levy (whom I had the privilege of meeting in London, ten years ago). Sadly, she passed away just a few months ago and did not live to see her incredible Orange-Award winning novel on the London stage. It was she who had given me her blessings when I had told her that I was in London to research Britain's Anglo-Indians. Being of mixed race herself (her father came to England from Jamaica on the Empire Windrush in 1948 and her mother is a white Scots), she told me that it was so important to tell the stories of people of mixed racial descent.
For all these reasons, I wanted to see the staged version even though I had low expectations. Gosh! Could I have been more amazed! It was simply incredible! Superbly acted by everyone of the cast, the honors, however, go directly to Aisling Loftus who, in the role of Queenie, did such an astonishing job that she had the entire theater in thrall. I knew I had seen her somewhere before but I simply could not place her. After googling her, I discovered that she played Agnes Towler, a wonderfully sympathetic characters in Mr. Selfridge--which I had loved. I had given Nafisa a brief synopsis of the story and she was very grateful for it while being completely bowled over by the production. In the final analysis, I was patting myself on the back for braving the vagaries of the weather and getting into that theater seat--because it was worth all the anxiety.
Having feasted on Marianel's goodies during the intermission, neither Nafisa nor I needed dinner. She dropped me off in her car to Churchgate station from where I took a train home. Churchgate station was empty, the trains were empty and I reached Bandra, 25 minutes later, jumped into a waiting rickshaw and was home by 10.30 pm at which stage, I merely washed and changed and went straight to bed.
Until tomorrow...
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