Dahi Papdi Chaat

by Sarah Farheen

I needed spice.

Yes, spice. Not the spice you’re thinking of. Not America’s dispiriting replacement for cannabis, but the garam masala and the red chillies and the green chillies and the black pepper and the ginger. I needed the chatakdaar and the mazedaar.

Instead I ended up gulping down unsalted boiled rice with a tangy eggplant curry and under-fried potato chips. Not being ungrateful. But chilli chicken is chilli chicken. And though Great Britain has adopted kebabs, chicken tikka and korma from us, it has not quite grasped how they’re supposed to taste.

I stood in front of the full-length mirror, lining my eyes with raven black kohl for the second time in the day. The routine eight hour rotation at the hospital had smudged out the first application. I fluffed my locks and smoothed my dress. I smiled at my reflection. A long figure-hugging dress and its summer-y turquoise shade was all I needed to turn a bad day around. And I liked to end my gruelling days on a good note, a ritual I had come to practice these days. My eyes scanned the cluttered room. The hunt for the dress was the reason the room had reached the state.

‘I’ll clean it up later,’ I said to myself and stepped out, eagerly shutting the door behind me.

Brook Street was where the biryani was. I’d buy biryani, ask them to make it extra spicy and perhaps order some seekh kabab and rogan josh and buttered naan. I’d also probably get a Diet Coke to go along with it. I promised myself that this time, I’d relish every moment of the masaledar biryani in my mouth. Only God knew when I’d get to eat it again.

The silence on the street was deafening. I could hear the clicking of my pumps echo as I trod on the tiled sidewalk. All of a sudden, the stillness was shattered by a car with a wrecked exhaust system thundering towards me. It slowed down next to me, causing me to speed up subconsciously.

‘Meri jaan!’ the driver of the car yelled in my direction. He sounded like Captain Andrew Russell from Lagaan. There was an uproar of laughter from the car.

‘Main tumse pyaar karta hun!’ Captain Andrew Russell showed off his Hindi-speaking skills. I continued walking, ignoring his advances until he sped away, his car silencer rumbling. I found myself laughing when he was out of sight. Catcaller he might have been, but a Gora talking in Hindi? That was hilarious.

By the time I reached Brook Street, the shoe bites on my Achilles’ tendons had freshened. As I limped in the direction of the biryani place my eyes fell on a board that read Chai Something. As I moved closer I realised it was Chai Spot. I imagined a cup of simmering and sweet smelling kadak chai with a warm and soft samosa kept beside it along and two tiny katoris of coriander and tamarind chutney. The mouth-watering imagery was all I needed to take my mind off my original biryani plans.

At the very entrance, hanging on the top left corner of the door frame was a red-tinted lemon with a bunch of chillies shabbily strung along with it. I smiled. It had been a long time since I’d seen one of those. I was welcomed by the fragrance of agarbattis and the sweet voice of Mohammed Rafi. At the far end I saw our tricolour hanging over a wall, looking majestic.

‘Yes, love?’ A middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair and a moustache looked at me through his glasses, with welcoming eyes.

‘Hi! Um, are you open?’

‘Not yet, darling, I’m sorry. We open at six.’

‘Oh, okay.’ I nodded ‘It’s okay, I’ll come tomorrow. But do you have chaats?’

‘Yes, yes we do! We have golgappas also.’

‘Oh, that’s nice!’ I grinned back. ‘I’ll come tomorrow. By the way, I love that song. Pukarta Chala Hun Main.’

‘My favourite song too.’ He replied with his right hand over his chest. ‘So nice to see young people like you listening to old songs.’

‘Oh, I’ve only heard these through my childhood. My mother loves them.’

‘Me too! Why don’t you come inside and sit for a while?’

‘No, it’s okay, uncle. You must’ve been busy. I’ll leave. I’ll eat somewhere else.’

‘No no! You know what?’ The man stood thinking for a moment and then said, ‘What would you like to eat?’

‘Oh no, uncle, it’s okay. You’re not open, right.’

‘Beta, it’s okay. What do you want to eat? Come inside first. Come!’

I gave in to the insistence. He asked me to sit wherever I liked. I chose the seat nearest to the door. The tufted seats were made of a greyish velvet. I tucked my small, petite self into the corner, as per my usual preference when at a restaurant.

The sweet man brought a menu card over. He introduced himself as Rocky. After barely any thought, I asked for the samosa chaat and masala chai. But Rocky had a suggestion.

‘You should go for the dahi papdi chaat. I’m telling you, it’s very nice.’

‘Okay!’ I agreed instantly. ‘I’ll go with your suggestion.’

‘Five minutes, love.’

I decided to study the ambience of the restaurant until my meal arrived. The grey walls were lined with framed pictures of scenes from the streets of India. One showed a queue of cycle rickshaws and their owners. All black and white except for the pinks. Another showed a bustling street food stall. Another showed a Kolkata tram. Between the street food stall and Kolkata tram hung a wooden rotary phone. It brought back memories of my Nani’s black rotary phone and it’s shrill tring-tring.

The music changed from Rafi sahib to Lata ji. Yeh samaa, samaa hai yeh pyaar ka. I closed my eyes and remembered my days of Vividh Bharti – Hawa Mahal, Jai Mala Karyakram, Sakhi Saheli. I felt a sharp sting at the back of my eyes.

Why the hell am I not in India right now? 

I impulsively picked up my phone, craving the sound of my mother’s voice. I wondered what she’d be doing at this time. It must’ve been just after dinner. She would be sitting with my father, cutting fruits as he switched between news channels and Bhabhiji Ghar Par Hain.  

She picked up the phone after a couple of rings. No hello.

‘Did you see the news?’ she asked impatiently.

‘No, what happened?’

‘The BJP guys are trying to buy MLAs now. That’s why the Congress guys have taken the MLAs to a resort somewhere outside Bangalore and are giving them some sort of special treatment.’

‘What?!’

‘Yes! They tapped Yeddyurappa’s phone trying to bribe an MLA. Some say it’s real. Some are saying it’s fake.

‘Can we talk about something else?’

‘Watch this programme called Naataka in Karnataka. I’m sure they put it on YouTube. They showed the tapped phone call on it.’

‘Ammi!’

‘What?’

In the background, I could hear Arnab Goswami braying. The other panellists were barking, howling, mooing and screeching.

‘Hello? Noor?’

‘I’ll talk to you later.’

‘Sab barabar hai?’

‘Sab theek hai.’

‘Okay… but why you shouted?’

‘No, nothing. I’ll talk later, I’m hungry.’

‘Arrey! Go eat first then. Allah hafiz.’

‘Allah hafiz.’

I put down the phone wishing I hadn’t called her. The politics, the screwed-up education system, the feudalism, the intolerance, the bribery, the nepotism, the Netflix-obsessed millennial generation, the WhatsApp-obsessed generation of elders, all came back to me in a rush. I winced as if I’d been slapped hard.

I looked outside onto Brook Street, trying to get my mind off the negativity. My eyes found the flag of Great Britain dancing to the tunes of a pleasant breeze. It hung from a window sill right in front of the restaurant. It was the flag of our colonisers just a few decades back.

But had the freedom struggle gone in vain? Had the civil disobedience, the non-violent protests, the prison sentences, the executions, the massacres, the lathi charges, the marches all been done for an ungrateful generation? Despite being under-read, the average Indian had become his most outspoken self. To the extent that he had started to brand one freedom fighter’s blood less valuable than another’s. He had started to praise Gandhi’s assassin. He had begun justifying lynching and rape in the name of religion. And then, there were people like me. The sort that just watch from a distance, complain, lament, and abscond to the west at the very first opportunity. The flag of Great Britain began to blur out, almost going out of sight as my eyes flooded with tears. With tears? Did I just cry for India?

Rocky came over all of a sudden, with a bowl of dahi papdi chaat. He watched my face in surprise.

‘Beta, you’re crying?’

I giggled and wiped away my tears in embarrassment.

‘What happened?’

I waited until he repeated the question a second time and then replied.

‘Suddenly remembered India.’

‘Oh-ho!’

‘I’m okay, uncle. Don’t worry. It’s the first time I’m staying away from home. So…’

‘Here,’ he laid down the chaat in front of me. ‘Taste my dahi papdi chaat. You’ll feel like you’re in India. Chalo, shabaash, cheer up.’

I laughed and thanked Rocky.

‘India,’ Rocky mused. ‘Nothing can replace the air of that country.’

I nodded.

‘Where are you from in India?’ he enquired.

‘Karnataka. What about you, uncle?’

‘Gujarat,’ he replied. ‘By the way, I heard full naatak is happening in Karnatak. Is it true?’

Picture from archanaskitchen.com

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