Let me take you through a culinary tour of my life. We make three stops to admire the scenery and take pictures.
Gilly Billy was the nightmare of my initial years. He was the monster who appeared on trees, clinging from branches and sinisterly watching over me, every time I was fed by Amma. “Eat”, she would say, “Or Gilly Billy will get you! Look, he’s right over there, looking at you.” He was the last word to be uttered in a conversation involving food, my 5 year old self, my mother, and a general coughspluttering threatening to blow up into a bawling tantrum. After his mandatory cameo, I uncomplainingly gobbled down every handful of rice Amma stuffed into my mouth. Later, a relieved Amma used to make him go away using her superpowers.
During the extended howling nightmare that was Plus Two, I had tuitions at insane hours, like for example, 5 am. Most of the days I would breakfast in some hotel near school, but on other days my father would wake up along with me (he would wake me up, in fact) and wrap my breakfast: Bread and Jam wrapped in butter paper for the road, or Idlis inundated with mulagai podi. Sitting on the steps near the water cooler, I used to flinch every time I bit into those things, either sweet enough to make you go stark raving mad, or spicy to the point of causing instant combustion. But I still feel very thankful that he woke up every other day and went through the torture of wrapping all those idlis and stuff, they destroyed most of the shreds of sleep that remained at around 830 am.
Scrolling further down the timeline to the here and now of things. At college, my constant refrain at the Mess table is “Oh, no! Not this depraved half cooked Aloo crap again…” : A more tangible, very real and edible monster has taken Gilly Billy’s place. I miss the tall tumbler of dahi with sugar mixed in it that would be waiting for me to come from school, refridgerating. I miss Venkadesha Bhavan’s peerless Poori Masal.
