Britannia used to be one Parsi Cafè (not that Bombay has many more of them left now, barring my other favourite - Jimmy Boy) I used to frequent in my college and journalism days. I have vivid memories of heated and impassioned discussions with my Editor on the copy and the features that needed to be filed for the week ahead, over my raspberry soda, chicken dhansak and paatrani maach (exactly in that order too!). Infact my very first feature on ‘Being Parsi from Cusrow Baug’ also got finalised and to a large extent drafted over detailed discussions at the dining tables there!
Meherwan uncle - the affable and endearingly likeable owner - as I’d fondly call him, would watch patiently from the sidelines and offer us his perspective as he’d discern the goings-on of “city happenings” in his quintessential sagacious bawa style, whenever it was that we went there - which was quite often!
At Britannia, we never had to formally order our food; food just the way we liked it - extra kebab and a few additional dashes of ginger-garlic in the Beri pulao, an additional generous spoonful of burnt caramel over the custard - just landed on our table and in the course-order we liked it (dessert first!) under the hawk-eyed supervision of Meherwan uncle.
It came as a shock to recieve a whatsapp update from a friend late last night that he had passed away. May his soul RIP. His passing away, to my mind, is also a symbolic passing away of all things “Bombay” to me. Nostalgia is never quite going to be what it used to be anymore!
Khoda hafiz Meherwan uncle. To good times wherever you be...
Updating a YouTube video of him and the Cafè he ‘lived’ and loved, that went on to become a veritable landmark of food connoisseurs in Bombay.
No comments:
Post a Comment