No avocados or almond milk in this Bandra cafe. Good Luck Restaurant
Full disclosure, I like avocados
I am chilling in a cafe in Bandra. The world marches past. Autos, BMW Bikes, Uber Luxes, S Classes & Range Rovers race past each other leaving behind the proverbial rats.
It’s 1030. The place is empty, barring the smiling owner.
He doesn’t know when the cafe was opened. ‘My dad opened it before I was born,’ says Mohammed . ‘18 years back?,’ I quip. He guffaws.
‘My dad, Ramzan Ali. came to India from Yazd. He was 10. There was no India Pakistan. There was only one border to cross. He built this building.’ You do the math.
Mohammad grew up at a time where going up the hill (Mt Mary Steps) was considered unsafe. ‘What would you do if faced with a man with a knife?’ He remembers the stretch by the sea being so empty that the end was called ‘suicide point’ after the troubled souls who would jump into the sea. Now there’s a promenade instead. The Irani Cafe Seaside, where couples were once charged by the hour for sea view windows, lies empty.
Mohammed’s frazzled by the crowds & doesn’t go there anymore.
The first hipster walks in in shorts. His hair & stubble are white. Natural, not peroxide. Unshaven, not sporting a designer beard. He orders bun maska chai. Makes the waiter pour it out with a flourish. He’s come from Pune. He says that his aunt was a heroine from yesteryears. He rattles out the name of films he has been in. I don’t remember him.
But it’s Bollywood… you come here to suspend reality. Not to fact check it.
The first couple comes in. Collegians. They share kheema pav & anda half fry. And sweet nothings.
The next are in their 40s. Regulars. They don’t need to be anonymous.
They don’t serve fresh brews, kombuchas, flat whites with macadamia milk at Good Luck. Nor avocado on gluten free joyless toast. I go for the kheema fry with extra mirchi & pav. I’d come for a kheema pav shoot across the town for a delivery app. This was the best. In Bandra, my backyard. I felt so proud. I decide to write. I call for a lemon tea. No sugar. There are no ‘no laptop’ signs here. I am the only one writing. Not that I had planned to, but then can writing ever planned?
Ps: ‘Only cash, no digital payments’ says a sign in this Irani cafe. The kheema is buff.
Address:
Building No 106, Zulphedari Manzil, Hill Road, Bandra West, Mumbai – 400050 (Opposite Mehboob Studios, Mount Mary, Mehboob Khan Chowk)
