New whine in an old bottle

Sad, sad, sad. Ever since Mumbai's cultural police decided to put the screws on late night revelry, a sense of gloom has reportedly hit t...

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Sad, sad, sad. Ever since Mumbai’s cultural police decided to put the screws on late night revelry, a sense of gloom has reportedly hit the city’s young groovers. No place to boogey, no place to drink. It’s a plight fit to melt anyone’s heart. And mine would be all squished out except – except that I remember a time, not so long ago, when things were a lot worse.

As recently as ten years ago, forget partying late, you would have been hard put to find a decent joint for a drink. The only places that served alcohol in the city had tinted glass windows and waitresses slamming plates of papad on your table and maybe a dancing girl or two tinkling in a corner. Needless to say, you didn’t, particularly if you were of the female sex, want to go there. The only splashy bars were in five-star hotels. The Lancers’, Harbour Bar – for the most part, dark, gloomy places overrun by fat cats with expense accounts. The one I liked was the Library Bar at The President with its big plush chairs, a piano clinking awayand books that I never saw anybody read. It had a general air of ease and comfort and was nice to go to when someone else was paying. But if you were a young professional with a yen for something more exciting or more within your reach at any rate, where did you go?

One thing was sure – you didn’t just walk into a cool smart bar, because they didn’t exist. You started with the premise that any place you went to would be seedy. That to get to the loo you would be prepared to ascend or descend floors, go through kitchens and pray that the door would shut. That the glasses would bear the waiter’s fingerprints and that the ice would come in huge shaggy blocks, the origins of which you did not want to investigate.

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That you might, as a friend once did, develop strange rashes where skin touched table and have the doctor ask you suspiciously where you were the night before. If you were okay with the above, then and only then could you proceed to a good time.

The best drinking joints were in Colaba, the mostpopular of them all of course being Gokul. It consisted of a couple of large open rooms with dreary walls that came to be known as a gay hangout. But in those days everyone went there, ad executives, journalists, lawyers, marketing types, gay or straight (the rumour being you carried a red rose to send out the right vibe). The air of disrepute wafted right in with the delicious smell of Bade Miya’s baida rotis and dope selling on the street.

In the neighbourhood, opposite Regal was Cafe Royale. Not the new spiffy avatar but a large slapdash place overlooking the street. Upstairs would be a band belting out loud Hindi songs, downstairs you would buy quarter bottles of your preferred liquor and order soft drinks to go with it. Then down Causeway were the two other cafes – Leopold and Modegar. Lovely cheerful places with backpacking foreigners and jukeboxes but hot, sweaty and if I remember right, they only served beer.

In fact, most places worth going to served only beer. Like the Naaz cafe out atHanging Gardens. Great view, nice breeze, but like so many other cafes, it was grimy, the service was slow and it shut, I think, at a time you could put a baby to sleep. I could go on. But the point I am trying to make is that the whole idea of alcohol and young people letting their hair down is a relatively new thing. I have great memories of my old drinking haunts and wouldn’t have exchanged the experience for anything. But still, every once in a while, one did wish that unwinding after a day of work didn’t have to be such an arduous and sleazy affair.

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So you guys with your neon-lit theme bars, pool tables, candy-coloured cocktails and pick of deejays. Quit complaining.

(The writer is a former editor of Elle)