Shimla's Indian Coffee House

For those who live in the Tricity (Chandigarh, Panchkula and Mohali), Shimla is a weekend destination. For the daring ones, who have the stamina for the four hour uphill ride and back, it is also a day destination. It has gone downhill since its glory days as the summer capital of the British Raj but retains enough charm to tempt tourists to its doors.

You can look up lists that tell you which are the best spots to visit; without them, most tourists spend their time walking on the Mall Road, hanging out on The Ridge, the Lakkar Bazar, going down to the Kali Mata temple. Then there is the increasingly naughty monkey infested Jakhu Temple.  

There are two famous food landmarks in Shimla. One is a corner booth on the Mall Road which serves soups and snacks. I loved their coffee in a paper cup. Maybe it was the invigorating air of Shimla that made the coffee so tasty. Another must try item of this booth was the Slush. One sip could give you a brain freeze. At any time, you can see people crowded outside the booth, picking up their food and enjoying it lounging around near by. There is a booth on the ridge too but I haven't tried it. I hope these places are still functional. 

 

 

The other iconic landmark of Shimla was the Indian Coffee House on the Mall Road. The first time I went to Shimla, as a young fifteen year old girl, I remembered eating at the Indian Coffee House. I have seen these cosy cafes in many places. They boast a vast clientele. They are renowned for nourishing many impoverished artists who could not afford fancy dining. To enter an Indian Coffee House is to admit your pockets are not lined. It is unabashedly middle class. The furniture is a collection of Sunmica top tables and chairs that make a terrible squeak when you drag them. The dosas are invariably soggy, the idlis hard, the sambar and chutney are a sham. Their cutlets get more minuscule by the day, there is no kick in the coffee, shakes look fake and their cutlery is terrible. Yet you will see people make a beeline to these cafes during lunch hour or any other time.

When you are wondering which to pick between two equally evil looking cafes, it is safer to pick Indian Coffee House because it is predictable. Which was why my parents chose Indian Coffee House for eating often when we were in Shimla. Years later, when I visited Shimla again I was thrilled to find the cafe safe on its spot on the Mall Road.  It brought back memories of my first visit to the place.

Today I hear that the cafe is set to close down.  I feel as if a trusted friend is going away forever. Corona has hit us hard in so many ways that it is difficult to fathom. So many things that we took for granted are snatched away from us. We are no longer free to travel when the mood takes us, we cannot eat out when we wish, we look at people with suspicion, wondering if they are carrying the dreadful disease, our children are holed in at home, we are living like rats, poking our noses out of home only to ferret for food. 

In such times, closing of a familiar cafe in a beloved spot may not mean much to us personally but it is the death of one more memory, one more icon that bites the dust.

An encounter with a would-be thief

I had gone to the GPO in Sector 17, Chandigarh on Saturday to mail a letter by registered post.

By the way, this involves a long process if your mail is overseas.  The person at the counter will view the envelope/parcel suspiciously, knock it from all angles to make sure it is properly sealed. Then, they make you sign a form where you have to list its contents, value, name and address of the sender and receiver. Whew!

It makes sense if you are sending a large parcel, but you have to do this even for a simple letter and a photograph.

Anyway, I was in Sector 17 GPO and queued up dutifully behind a couple of people.  There was a young girl right before me.  She was a lawyer by the looks of her, white salwar kameez with a black coat.  She was carrying a stack of letters that she had to send by registered post and was chattering amiably with the person before her. A friendly sort,  I thought.

After she was done, she took a seat to sort out the papers she had in hand.  I took my place at the head of the counter and was promptly directed to get the declaration form from another counter.  I collected the form and sat down beside the lawyer girl and started riffling through my bag, looking for a pen.  As usual, when you really need these things, they are seldom there.  The lawyer girl got up to go. I decided to go out of the GPO and buy a pen.

There are a lot of helpful people who sell wrapping paper, gum, pens and sticking tapes right outside the door of GPO.  I stopped by the first one and asked for a pen.  As I looked in my bag for the wallet, I realized with a thudding heart that I had left my wallet on the bench when I was riffling through my bag.

I ran back inside the GPO and found the lawyer girl practically sitting on my wallet and talking to someone. I picked up my wallet from under her and went back to get the pen.  The lawyer girl stood up immediately and left.

I returned with my pen and started filling up the form.  A young man who was sitting on an adjoining bench came up to me and said that the lawyer girl had returned as soon as I left and sat on the wallet.  He said if I had returned a moment later, the wallet would have been in her bag. He had been watching her avidly.

The girl was probably not a habitual thief, I do not like to think so.  But an honest person would surely have tried to return the wallet to me, tried to run after me.  Now that I think back upon the incident, it was rather strange the way she was chattering away with all and sundry.  She had chattered and smiled at me when I sat down beside her as well.

The girl's face keeps swimming before my eyes.  And I shake my head every time I think about this incident.

Sector 17 Chandigarh

I was about to close my eyes for a blissful nap this afternoon when the phone rang.  It was the guy from the city office to report a problem.  The problem was serious enough to make me drag myself out of bed and drive over to bail him out.  It took me an hour or two to fix his problem.

Our city office is in Sector 22 which is a stone's throw away from my favorite spot in Chandigarh, Sector 17.  I could not resist the temptation to hang out there for a while.  I have lived in Chandigarh (or its vicinity) for nearly 30 years now.  I love visiting the Sukhna Lake and Nek Chand's Rock Garden a lot.  I like driving around its tree lined roads.  I like shopping in Sector 22.  I have favorite spots for most things.

Nothing beats Sector 17 for just walking about, looking in to shop windows, walking into English Book Shop or Capital Book Shop for looking at books and magazines.  One can eat at many of the small snack shops that abound, or walk into fast food restaurants or even fine dining ones.

This is a fish shaped fountain in the center of Sector 17 plaza.  You can see a number of people just hanging around.

This is another row of fountains in the center of the plaza.  Just behind this fountain is the space where platform is usually set up for cultural performances from time to time.

You can see the famous Softy Corner which has been supplying softies and snacks to Chandigarhians as far as I can remember.  This tiny shop doles out softies, popcorn, cold drinks and several such stuff.

Just like the shop in this picture, Sector 17 is studded with little nooks loaded with bags, dupattas, socks, belts, caps, jewellery, cosmetics, umbrellas and stuff like that.  These are lovely to browse in.  Often a bag that looks funky and cute from afar looks tacky upon a closer look.  There are times though, when you could pick something trendy and pretty at rock bottom rates.

This is all what make Sector 17 such a fun place to hang out in.  Large expensive showrooms sit cheek-by-jowl with tiny shops selling budget stuff and pavement sellers who look bored when you pause beside their display.  They know you are just looking.

I took these pictures from my ancient beaten down mobile phone.  Predictably it croaked after these many pictures were taken.  Hope to be able to bring you an update on Sector 17 soon.

Pretty Panchkula

It was a short while ago that my office shifted to Panchkula.  Living on rent, it did not make too much sense for me to commute so much, hence I started looking for houses closer to my place of work.  Alas, Panchkula had already been beset by cash rich IT professionals who were willing to pay good bucks.  The houses that went for ridiculous rents were now beyond reach for me.  I moved into a less popular place, more populous nevertheless, thanks to the numerous housing societies that have sprung up here, turning a green periphery into a concrete jungle.

Now that I was closer to my place of work and took a route through Panchkula, I started noticing how pretty Panchkula is.  Indeed, it is prettier than its more famous cousin Chandigarh.  A tiny little dot on the map, it nestles close to the foothills of the Shivalik mountains that loom in the background no matter where you are.  From Chandigarh you can spot them in the distance, blue and hazy.  In Panchkula you can see the green bushes and the exposed earth and rocks that dot the Morni hills and the hills close to Nada village. The roads are broad here and kothis are more individualistic and opulent than in Chandigarh.  More on these later when I have pictures to back my claim.

This post is about the view of Nada Sahib from atop the  flyover that is built for the convenience of travellers from Ambala-Delhi route who want to rush towards Shimla without being caught in the bottleneck of city traffic.  More on this too, later.  At the moment, enjoy the pictures.

Nada Sahib shines amongst shrubs and rocks of the hills that  are just starting out.

People flock to the Nada Sahib Gurdwara on Puranmashi  days.

Devotees ask for boons here.

Cities grow and overtake everything. Chandigarh airport was once in wilderness, Now it is in the centre of Pabhat (or Bhabat) village.  Visiting Nada Sahib used to be a long drive through a quiet town, now it is a busy road and a thriving Nada Village that dots your road.

New Home

The thing about renting a place is that your landlord gets antsy if you hang on too long in one house.  So you know that within 3-4 years you will be getting marching orders.  The thought that my landlord might soon give me marching orders, gets me all antsy after 3 years in one place.  I start preparing myself mentally for the move.  During my three years in Baltana, I was constantly looking for another place.  When we first moved there, electricity was a huge problem.  If the power went off, we were never sure when it would return, it could be within two hours or two days.  The water supply was good to start with, then all the people around installed motors to fill their tanks overhead, it pulled the water supply away from non-motor people like me.  So faced with the bad approach roads, narrow lanes where I could barely navigate my scooter, the water problem, I decided the time was ripe to move.  Before I leave the topic of Baltana, let me mention that the market was awesome.  I could get everything there from handkerchief to quilts,  all sorts of services were available, from fixing a loose wire to .... anything.  From 9 in the morning to 9 in the evening. I love these kind of thriving shops a lot.  Baltana is not too far away from where I live now, and I can visit it anytime in case I need to visit my old addas.

Ok, so a friend recommended this flat to me.  It is about a mile away from the previous location, not the one I was looking for.  I was looking for someplace more within the city, but the rents... they are forbidding... and my salary... it refuses to move northwards.  Hence I snapped up this flat when I found it.  It was in a decent area, things of immediate need are available within a 200 meter perimeter.  My drive to my office is non-bumpy which is essential when you riding a scooter.  This place is on one of the edges of the city, which still has the view of mama nature in its semi-pristine splendour.  There are farms adjoining the flat where I see a tractor plying, things growing.  There is a cluster of greens and trees through which a train screams past now and then.  For some reason its 'Mere Sapno ki Rani' that plays in my head more than the forlorn screams of the train in Pakeezah.  Maybe it denotes that my heart is in a happy place, which is good.  I can see the Shivaliks in the distance, green fields; so it is like living in the lap of nature.  Ideally, I would like to own a house in Kansal, with the Sukhna Lake and the Rock Garden close by.  But I am not Richie Rich, I have to do with what I have.

Look at the few pictures that I have taken with my cell phone camera.

Lights glittering in the night...

A train passes by this way.

The fields to my left, I wish I had a zoom lens

Again the view to my right, to be enjoyed for a few months more till  the  new flats block my view

Cars lined up tidily by the side of the road

Camera does not zoom, but my eyes see the hills in the distance

Look at the fields in the distance

My Balconey

My doorway

Good Hair Day and Indian Coffee House

I use the pink one

I missed my swimming class and hopped over to Tina's Blue Heaven for a haircut last evening.  Getting a haircut is such an upper.  I feel 20 degrees smarter instantly.  Tina has a magic touch that makes your hair look feminine and cute, even if it is just a layered bob.  It was late already and there was no time to hang out in Sector 17.  So I just rushed over to Empire Stores to pick up some soap and shampoo.  I like Herbal Essences, but I couldn't find it on the shelves.  Disappointed, I pick up a Pantene which my son uses.  I will have to go to some other shop now.

I couldn't resist hopping into Indian Coffee House, I was hungry and a dosa-coffee looked appetising.  There is really something about this place that brings out my creativity.  I must go there sometime with a laptop, when I finally own one, that is.  There were a couple of boys seated opposite me, tucking into hot dogs and a strawberry shake.  I know I am being horrid, but it seemed so girly somehow, sipping a pink drink through a straw.

There is a motley crowd around me as usual.  A group of men in their fifties, suitably bald and overweight, being as rambunctious as they can get over cups of coffee; some shoppers clutching bags, looking tired and sorely in need of sustenance; the heretofore mentioned sippers of strawberry shake; a couple of other youngsters not sipping strawberry shake.

My coffee drunk, dosa eaten, half hour spent in contemplating my surroundings, I leave.

New Roads - Inroads into a tiny city

Sector 17- Heart of Chandigarh

I have always believed Chandigarh to be a tiny city.  15 minutes and you could traverse it from ends to ends.  Landlocked from all sides, it had no scope to grow any further.  Its roads were tree lined and designed for leisurely bicycling.  Le Courbusier could not imagine a city that could require a road wider than 10 feet in future. His rectangular city with independent sectors and parks and shopping areas were charming, are charming still, but inadequate for future times.

Scenic Village Kansal where many big banglows have come up

To begin with, Chandigarh Panchkula and Mohali were stringed together, had a similar character and were called a Tricity.  Now it seems to me as if the Tricity has spread, like butter in the sun to include Kharar, Zirakpur, Naya Gaon and Rampur.  Tiny villages that were the 'outside' slums like Khajeri,  Colony No 1, Ram Darbar, Naya Gaon, Kansal, Hallo Majra, Mullanpur, Dadu Majra have blossomed into prime properties with a mix of old style shanties and grand kothies.  Village Kishangarh is drowned by magnificent edifices built thanks to the SEZ endowed IT Park.

DT Mall in IT Park

So the city grows, shanties shrink and there is suddenly a crying need for roads to get to places.  The side roads and small lanes that hardly ever saw a bicycle whizz by are now beset by all kinds of vehicles, all trying to get to point B from point A, in a tearing hurry and wanting to mow down anyone who comes in their way.

Necessity takes me down roads I never knew existed.  I think this every time I take a road  between Baltana and Mouli Jagran,  cross the railway fatak, turn right and take the narrow curving road that passes the railway station and take a left to reach the transport chowk.  From here it is a straight road to  Browser, my much frequented spot, in quest of new books to read.

Chandigarh sits like a Koh-i-noor amongst a more modern setting of sometimes crass, sometimes showy borders of noveau localities.  

Visiting Sector 17

Visiting sector 17 always gives me a an instant spirit lift. There is something about it, the familiar shops, the plaza, people all decked up and walking about.  Some licking cones, some chomping on popcorn, some clustered around various shops.  I made a round, browsed a couple of windows, peeked at a few wares, and made a beeline for my favorite Indian Coffee House.

It was crowded as usual.  I was lucky to find a newly vacated table.  The busy waiter put two glasses of water in front of me and got busy trying to cope with a rush of orders.  I looked around, there was a table full of lawyers right in my front.   Two guys with a gal on the right, Mom and daughter on my left.  I drew some curious glances, being a lonely lady.  I ignored them.  I was trying to decide between a masala dosa and a vada sambhar.  When the waiter came up I ordered Vada Sambhar and some coffee.  The taste of the food was exactly as it used to be.  The size of the vada has shrunk somewhat. The 'coconut' chutney was as faux as ever, and quite yucky.  The coffee was divine.  The group of lawyers threw a last curious look at me and departed while I ate.  The seat was quickly filled by a trio of husband-wife-grown son.

A lady came and asked if she could share my table.

'Please', I said, finished my coffee, picked up my bags, and left.

I noticed that a lot of people were wearing black.  Is it because the temperatures have plummed to 22C thanks to the maverick rainshower?   I looked down at myself and realised I was wearing black too for this very reason.