“I’m too scared to eat South Indian food”
Im home, well not really actually. VT is definitely home, and I’m in NYC, which is DEFNITELY NOT home, actually I might feel more at home in some parts of India, but you get the idea (but that is the subject of the next entry). Im listening to ( i know, this is pathetic, itunes Radio “bombay beats” which is basically what would be considered by not even that snobby music snobs to be terrible Hindi pop songs, which are quite fun to listen to. Really, im happy to be back and not regretting it but still, i caught myself reading my cousin’s “NY Cheap eats” article and the “Tiffin Wallah” S. indian Veg food caught my attention, and i was half planning to find it, until i realized that I was just in India, where i could, and only sometimes did, eat South indian food and, even “cheap” in NY cannot compart to all u can eat, for about 15 cents!!.
Well, why, then, since it’s cheap and delicious didnt i always eat S. Indian food? Well, the obvious answer, for the first half of the trip was that i was in the North, and for the most part we ate at “expensive” (thinking them clean) restaurants with really heavy food, that was of course so over cooked you didn’t really know what you were eating, which is perhaps why some veggie dishes are just “subji” (vegetable) rather than a specific one. So by the time I reached Andhra Pradesh, the fresh, crisp, peeled cucumbers and vitamin-rich carrots, available at the ashram’s “western canteen” drew me in at once, whereas the South food, while much lighter and very delicious compared to our food in Uttaranchal, was still, well very cooked. Then there was the chance to go to the North Indian canteen, where the food was, naturally much better, and cheaper, and fresher, than we ate in the North, and available with crispy red cabbage salad, crunchy carrots and chilly, balanced by sweet, syrpy tamarind sauce to accompany clear dhals, spicy okra, eggplant, etc. Still, South Indian did have it’s allure. First, it felt more authentic, obviously because I was there, and, conjured some small nostalgia– it’s the “original” canteen, and since a toddler it’s where I ate before the palates of finicky foreigners, and Northerners needed appeasing with their more expensive, more elaborate eating establishments. The S Indian food is very cheap, and simple, but the process proves complicated. (Basically you buy these food coupons ahead of time, which theoretically cuts down on the time it takes to eat, which can be true but while standing in the token line usually about 5 people are hovering just in front of the line, waiting to push their way in, but the whole idea of cutting, and lines, and a discussion as to its obnoxiousness and then the PC counter points about a culture with many people and few resources, etc etc, should, if at all be written about separately). So anyway, you either buy 6 rupee (about 15 cents) ‘Meal” coupons, of two rupee “tiffin/chapati/chai” coupons. For the meals you sit down and are searved Rice, sambar (sort of like dhal but more watery), a small amount of “curried” (again this made up and now used word should be written about later) vegetable, some spicy “pickle” a tomato soupy thing called rasam. When you start to finish your plate it is again heaped with rice and sambaar in the truly Indian-housewife hospitality style. The other option is to give a “tiffin” coupon for your choice of dishes — chapati and cococonuty vegetable, sometimes beans, yogurt rice (yes, it’s yogurt covered rice, this is not like our sweet obssessed country’s “yogurt pretzels” and most of the yogurt, or curd in India is plain, or fried rice with peanuts and chillies. Shockingly sweet 6 oz cups of chai (milk, sugar and some tea and spices), coffee (milk, sugar and a little coffee or just hot milk (milk and sugar) (good thing i brought lactaid, oh more lactose intolerant me in the land of the holy cow, but as my cousin and i discussed, just because milk products are associated with India, the small portions and specility of the items mean that in the US likely much more per capita dairy is consumed). ANYWAY . . .
When Yamini arrived and we discussed where to eat and she didn’t mention South, I said, “You’re probably sick of it cause you eat it at home, huh?”
“Uh, well, not really, the people just scare me” — this was the response my other Indian-origin friends had also given. I too had been intimiated, but figured if I could handle it, me who was much more likely to get stared at (although, maybe from her opinion, less likely to be pushed or cut in line, though those happened very often to me).
“The people are so pushy, and you have to first get tokens, and it’s so complicated” she explained”. I’d been eating chapatis/veggies there and had no problem, I thought i was tough, and when the lines out of the other two were too long, I first got my tokens. This was the day i was leaving, and in a great rush. I’d returned my room keys, Yamini was meeting me at the room to eat and say goodbye after meeting, i still had to pack. I gave the woman with the chapattis two coupons and held out my bag to bring them back to my room,
“take-out nahi!” She barked, about 3 times, because I didn’t realize she was talking to me, and somehow hadnt processed this simple Hindi-english combination, perhaps because she seemed just to be shouting to the world, as if everyone should no that no take out was permitted. Miffed, I grabbed a plate, continued down the line as paltry portions of spicy carrots, beans and cauliflower were put on, then, because there is no soap there, poured these water mixtures from the stainless steal plate into my small Tubbeware containers, leaving a yellow ring on the table. Realizing that Yamini had missed breakfast (we’d been up since five and it was 11:30), I went back to get more, and seeing them, withough question give another woman food in a container, decided to forgo the plate. To make a long story short, this did not go over well. The server looked like she wanted to oblige (it sounds like im disccusing something serious here, like a bank loan or adopting an abandoned puppy) but kept looking over to her “boss” who claimed the take-out woman worked at the hospital. I said i had a bus to catch, the head woman refused, the server, fearing my escalating anger, pleaded “im just a seva dal (volunteer)” as the reason she refused to put 5 cents worth of cauliflower in my container. So, i took another plate, and repoured it, as the woman shouted at me “dont do this again!”
and I, none the less firmly “explained” again, that “I AM LEAVING!!! TODAY!”
Anyway, such a trivial matter, and i was near tears, pathetic really, but somehow it’s often these small, completely insignificant “wrongs” that trigger such anxiety. I could have major crisis in my life and seem calm and tranquil (key being seem) and here i am arguing about getting equal treatment re my tupperwear. Anyway, I told Yamini she was right, it was scary, but the food certainly was tasty.
Tags: Travel
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