Brunch, bye bye Ben and Bandra: another weekend in the big city

Saturday morning I was up bright and early ready for brunch at Cafe Mondegar’s with Karen. I got a cab down Marine Drive which looked lovely on a lazy Saturday morning (lazy by Mumbai standards anyway). We drove past a field of cricketers all dressed in white and running around laughing and joking. A little further down the road a wedding was beginning. It was somewhere between wonderful, tacky and a meringue explosion, I’ve never seen so much ribbon in my life. We carried on except my next observation was not quite so attractive. A fat, homeless, wrinkly guy was stark naked pulling on his pants ready for the day on the side of the road. I didn’t turn quickly enough. Lovely.

Thankfully I was not put off my breakfast, and we continued on our way to Colaba. As we stopped at a traffic light a man came over trying to sell his wares through the cab window. This is completely normal in Mumbai, it was not this that bothered me. What bothered me was the man trying to sell me one of a stack of Grazia magazines. ‘I work there,’ I explained to him, ‘I don’t need a copy.’ ‘Yes, yes, you buy!’ he insisted, ‘brand new issue’. I looked at the familiar front cover, having worked at the office for over two weeks now. The ‘new issue’ was two months old. ‘That’s old!’ I exclaimed, ‘I work there!’ Despite my obvious refusal he kept trying to sell me the old magazine until the lights changed. The driver, who spoke more English than the salesman, found the whole situation hilarious and laughed all the way to Mondegar’s about how stupid the guy was.

I met Karen outside Café Mondegar and we went straight in to get a window seat. The first thing that greeted me was an awesome old American style jukebox. A café where I got to choose my own soundtrack and eat breakfast foods? I was so in love. After ordering we laughed and chatted with Wham’s ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go Go’ on in the background. The Café was really cool, with an awesome mural on the wall done by a famous artist, who I can’t remember the name of.

Cool wall mural in Cafe Mondegar

Jukebox at Cafe Mondegar

Karen and I got our food, me a Cappuccino (complete with frothy face stencilled on top) and scrambled eggs on toast with cheese. Karen went for a ham and bacon omelette and some toast. This time I chose our song, Red Hot Chili Pepper’s ‘Scar Tissue’, it made my brunch even better than it was already. After Karen, the amazing historian (I know you’re reading this Karen!) told me all about the significance of the symbol on Indian coins and about local heritage, Pasham joined us for a pot of tea. We sat there drinking tea listening to Marley for a while and then the girls had to go to the office.

Pasham, Karen and me in Cafe Mondegar

I went back to the guest house to get Ben for a day of adventuring, except on arrival I found that he was pale as anything. With a twinge of green. Food poisoning was not my friend for the rest of the day. Ben had his head in the toilet bowl, while I had my head in my hands, bored of the four walls of the guest house. Thankfully I had Skandita, my roomie to keep me company, and Varoon, Ben’s roomie to talk about superheroes with. Varoon introduced me to the best cookies in the world and downloaded Kick-Ass for us to watch. We had a mini picnic and film fest in Ben’s room while trying to make him better, and less vomit prone. He had to get a flight a few hours later. Luckily Ben recovered and went on his way. He’s back safe and sound in the U.K now, no more curry for him. Or uncooked seafood.

I went back to my room to sit with Skandita, eat Domino’s and watch bad movies. The girls didn’t get out of the office in time for us to do something, but I actually needed to relax a little after the busy week.

This morning me and Skandita drank tea, ate biscuits and leftover pizza and watched more bad TV while I waited to sort out my day with Indrakshi. Indrakshi was spending the morning with her niece, so we arranged to meet up at four.

I got to Bandra just after four, though it was still baking hot. Indrakshi and I decided to stay at hers for an hour before venturing out to shop til we dropped. We had a complete orange fest, having orange juice and orange cake while sitting in her room worshipping the air conditioning system. After an hour we took an auto rickshaw to Hill Road in Bandra, a shopping hotspot. I have never been nearer death than I was in that machine, I thought the cabs were bad. I’m lucky to be alive.

Me and Indrakshi in an Auto-Rickshaw of Death

We arrived unscathed, luckily and headed for all the street stalls where I bought my first Indian style tunic. I’m not going to lie, it’s lush and I actually look good in it. I thought I’d look ridiculous. We continued through the hustle and bustle and headed for the stall where the Accessorize supplier works. Indrakshi and I were just browsing and sweating away when we heard someone say, ‘hey guys!’

We turned around to find our friend Ashika, the model from Thursday’s shoot who greeted us with a hug. It was so random and me and Indrakshi walked away and to our surprise, on the window of Globus, was a huge photo of who else but our very model friend again. ‘Oh my God we were just hanging out with her!’ we laughed and it was completely surreal.

Me, Indrakshi and Asihka, the model from Thursday's awesome shoot

Our friend Ashika on a building!

We carried on shopping and I got a few lovely dresses thanks to Indrakshi’s knowledge of the Hindi language and incessant bartering! We dropped off one of my dresses at the tailor’s before going for tea, as one panel of a beautiful dress was too big, but I really wanted it! We went to Gloria Jean’s for dinner and I had a butter chicken wrap and quiche, it was delicious. Indrakshi had a weird grey drink that smelt like biscuits and made my stomach churn.

We picked up my dress and went back to Indrakshi’s for a fashion show of all our clothes for her maid. It was so funny! I then got a cab all the way back to Babulnath, which is where I am now, on my favourite sofa, watching the guys watch cricket. My legs are so tired and I can’t believe I have to get up and go to Grazia tomorrow looking like a normal able, fashionable person. Who am I kidding, I’ll love it in the morning.

Me in one of my new awesome dresses!