by Issac M John
Debbie: I am not opposed to meeting. But pray tell how if you are moving to another city. And I am not even from Mumbai. I don’t even know if I am going to move here.
Riz: Why do you ‘pray tell’ so much?
Debbie: Blame it on the English drama dialogue I read in college.
Riz: Where are you from?
Debbie: New Delhi.
Riz: Well, Mussoorie is not far from New Delhi. It’s closer than Mumbai, if you know what I mean.
Debbie: I don’t know what you mean. Is that what we are gonna count on now? Miles?
Riz: As an aside, normally I would get unmatched within seconds of telling people that I am married. Why haven’t you unmatched me yet?
Debbie: Why do you keep telling people that you are married?
Riz: All I want to do is have a distracting conversation and nothing else. I would rather be honest about it.
Debbie: Are you sure about the nothing else?
Riz: Honestly? Not so much.
Debbie: There you go. I knew it.
Riz: So, I shouldn’t be doing this?
Debbie: Not my place to suggest. Wait, give me a minute.
Riz: Why? What happened? Remember I am on a clock here. I could be gone by the time you come back to this futile conversation.
Debbie: It’s worth the futility. The receptionist wants to talk. I don’t want to let go of you yet. Will take two minutes and be back. Don’t fly yet.
Riz: It’s not like I am the one flying this plane. Though I do know how to fly one.
Debbie: Just when I thought you couldn’t be more perfect.
Riz: Just when I thought I really should get off the plane and come and fetch you.
The receptionist informed Debbie that the creative director might not be able to make it today at all and that she was trying to get an interview arranged with the CEO.
‘How long before you can confirm this?’ Debbie asked.
‘In half an hour. Our CEO is just getting done from a meeting. I can ask her in person.’
Debbie returned to her chat.
Debbie: Here I am.
Riz: What interview are you giving?
Debbie: This company called Yours Virally. The CEO is in a meeting. The receptionist will tell me in half an hour if she can meet with me. Heard of the company?
Riz: Hell yeah!
Debbie: Relax, why the extra energy all of a sudden?
Riz: My wife is the CEO. You are in the Andheri office?
Debbie read that twice.
Debbie: Please tell me you are kidding. That would make this ridiculous. And I can sense a panic attack coming. I can’t take this.
Riz: Panic attack?
Debbie: I have my moments. I don’t want to screw up this interview knowing that I just chatted, wait, ‘plotted’ to have a scene with her husband.
Riz: Were you?
Debbie: Were you what?
Riz: Thinking of having a scene with me? What does a ‘scene’ mean anyway for people of your generation?
Debbie: It could mean a lot of things. But first, is this woman your wife? I don’t even know her name. I wasn’t even supposed to meet her. Wait, I need some water.
Debbie emptied half a bottle of water kept nearby and started panting as she typed. The receptionist raised her eyebrows again.
Debbie: I need to lie down. I can’t believe I decided to go to Tinder while waiting for an interview. Worst. Decision. Ever. I can’t do this.
Riz: I am serious. But what work will you have with her anyway? I don’t think she will meet you for an interview. She only interviews business guys.
Debbie’s heart pounded. She needed this job so badly. She looked for the Xanax pills her doctor had prescribed in her purse. It was the worst day to leave them behind.
Debbie: I think I am fainting. At least give me some tips. Something, anything.
Riz: She will ask you for a personal example of grit and determination. Not in your professional life but in your personal life. It’s important to her.
Debbie: I don’t trust you. What’s her name?
Riz: And then there’s this one question that she asks everyone and that is the clinching question for her.
Debbie: What is it?
Riz: My flight’s taking off.
Debbie: Don’t do this. Stop the damn thing. I forgot my pills too. I can’t believe it. WHAT’S THE QUESTION?
Riz: She will ask you . . . if . . .
Debbie: If WHAT
Riz: If you ever chatted with Riz on Tinder . . .
Debbie felt like smashing his head.
Debbie: I can’t believe you are taking this so lightly. Please tell me you were kidding.
Riz: I am used to freaking people out with the information they give me. Like I only knew that Yours Virally is based out of Andheri and . . .
Debbie: Go away. Just go! I am not talking to you.
Riz: You are wrecked right now, aren’t you?
Debbie: Of course, I am. I have had anxiety attacks where I faint. This was way too close and I hate you for it. That’s also why I chose to become a writer and not an actor.
Riz: Did you know Emma Stone overcame panic attacks and made it this big?
Debbie: You like Emma Stone?
Riz: She’s celestial.
Debbie: You are killing me. She’s my favourite actress. Why do we both like the exact same things! Anyway, I think I am gonna faint and lose this job.
Riz: It’s exactly that, just a job. There’ll be another one waiting if you don’t get this. But . . .
Debbie: But what?
Riz: But if we don’t agree to meet during the course of this conversation, will we ever find someone with this level of connection again?
Debbie: Easy for you to say. I need this job. I don’t have a rich father who will allow me to grow mushrooms. In fact, I don’t even have a father. But I do feel the need to meet you too.
Riz: I get it. You don’t worry about it too much. You will do fine. Time for me to leave.
Debbie: But let me put it out there blunt and clear.
Riz: What?
Debbie: I WANT to meet you whenever you are back in Mumbai next. Call me.
Riz: I will. And good luck for the interview.
Half an hour later, the receptionist informed Debbie that the interview had been scheduled. The CEO, Abha Kapoor, turned out to be a genial lady in her forties, who skimmed through her resume and read one of the writing samples Debbie had placed in front of her.
‘You write well, but this is not the sort of writing that we have on our website. If you know what I mean,’ Abha said.
‘I know, but given a brief I can put together any number of lists, especially around topics of films and theatre, which are my forte,’ Debbie said calmly.
‘Subhashish, our creative director, couldn’t be here because he had to attend to a medical emergency in the morning. He would be best placed to take a call on your candidature. But before you go, could you give me a couple of personal examples of grit and determination?’
Right then, Debbie fainted out of exertion and the genial Abha Kapoor, out of sheer pity for the poor girl, rolled out an appointment letter later that evening. Debbie got to know that Abha had never married, but Riz’s sense of humour didn’t go down well with her and she promptly unmatched him.
That evening Maya, Riz’s wife, asked him, ‘Did you manage to find someone today?’
‘No, I was close to meeting a gullible young girl but something ticked her off. Can’t put a finger on what it was. She unmatched me in the evening,’ he said.
Maya calmly said, ‘I’ll tell you. You need to put a lid on your sense of humour. My turn tomorrow. We better find a partner soon to spice things up between us.’
They turned their backs to each other and went to sleep.
Table for One
‘Sir, I need you to step aside for a moment,’ the skinny, grey-haired John, manager of Khwaaish, the hot new restaurant on Waterfield Road, said to Akshay.
Akshay Karmakar was not the kind of guy you would ask to step aside while he was waiting for his meal. The man was big. At the same time, he was radically polite. ‘Oh sure, would you like to join me?’
‘No,’ said John.
‘Can we do this after I dig into my Khwaaish-e-Nalli?’
‘No, sorry. You have to come with me now.’
‘But why?’
‘Because this is the second time this month that you have called in with a reservation for a table of four. May I ask where the rest of your party is?’
‘They are on their way. They should be here in fifteen at best,’ Akshay pushed his chair to get up. It was going to take more than a moment.
‘I know all about you, Akshay Karmakar. You either come with me now or I am going to have to call security.’
There was not much to know about Akshay Karmakar. Except that ever since he separated from his wife, Rashi, four years ago, he went from a svelte 62 kg to a hefty 94 kg.
There was not much on offer for reclusive, obese and separated men on the dating front in Mumbai. Besides, being brought up in an orphanage meant that he never had any friends to fall back on. He also never got to know about the fate of his parents. He stayed alone, studied alone and ate alone these past few years after his separation.
Eating out served as an easy delusional escape for Akshay who had also, just before his separation, lost his job at Lester Brothers as they had gone bankrupt. In urban cities around the world, a rising trend that was seen among separated couples was a phenomenon called the Revenge Body—a term that described a person’s ambition for a physically fit body after a break-up. It wouldn’t be unfair to say that Akshay single-handedly demolished the sheer notion of that phenomenon with his revenge eating.
He loved his food so much that every year he would look at the Best Restaurants that Time Out Mumbai listed. Then he would compare it to TripAdvisor’s top-rated restaurants and cross-reference it with India’s Michelin Guide.
After this, he would spend a couple of days with his whiteboard and blue marker to studiously curate a list of restaurants he would like to visit over the course of the year. This had been Akshay Karmakar’s Christmas holiday plan for the last three years. The first time he embarked on this journey was with his wife back in 2011. Back then, you didn’t even have to make a call to visit a restaurant and book a table, but 2016 turned out to be a beast in this regard.
People were reading these informed reviews more than ever. They were hijacking the same phone numbers off the likes of Zomato and accessing the same websites to make these bookings. Where Akshay realized he was missing out was that he only needed a table for one. Most of the time, these fancy restaurants gave preference to reservations for two or more for better business and consigned tables for one to a doomed waiting list. That list might as well have been called Waiting for Godot, for the ones waiting for a Table for One were never allocated a seat.
Post New Year’s, a downturn of dining out invariably hit Mumbai. That’s when Akshay would scour the web and make those painful calls or click on those grids of dates on online websites of restaurants to reserve his table. It worked every year since he started this practice in 2012. Being a nerd with an opinion about the latest on Mumbai’s dining circuit gave Akshay the only shred of social legitimacy in his pedantic life.
That’s when he came up with a simple hack to veer away from those waiting lists.
Akshay tried his luck first with Chutney Mary by booking a table for four. He then followed it up with a booking for two at The Sushi Tetsu. It worked. He would get seated and when asked about the rest of the party, he would simply say, ‘They are on their way.’
‘Would you like to wait or order now?’ the staff would ask him.
‘I think I’ll go ahead,’ Akshay would answer with a twinkle in his eyes. And there the matter would rest.
This was in February. Over the next couple of months, he was able to follow the same procedure and get his tables a tad easily than before. It was still tough, but his strike rate improved marginally.
Akshay wasn’t rich enough to dine out every week. He would save up to have two world-class meals a month. That was his singular goal. And the new restaurants came galloping every month. After every meal, he would studiously write a review for TripAdvisor, which was nothing less than a meticulously constructed opera in honour of the food.
Maybe he stretched his luck at Khwaaish. But he was too tempted. The tasting menu was out of this world. That Nalli Sunahri he had at the beginning of the month was still fresh in his mind. He wanted to come here again so badly.
But he made one mistake. He booked a table for four for the second time in less than a month at Khwaaish. Thrice, on each occasion, the waiting staff inquired about the rest of his party. Each time Akshay shrugged his shoulders and told them that the others were going to be late.
The first time this month at Khwaaish, a placid, fulfilled Akshay looked at John and said, ‘I’ll take the cheque. Too bad the others missed the meal. Mumbai traffic and its horrors.’
But John was only too mindful about the faces walking into the restaurant. It struck him then that Akshay’s party of four never arrived. He let it pass. Akshay had also left a generous tip for the staff. It was a fine modus operandi that worked across the spring of 2016 till John came by his table today.
Akshay stood up in the only way he could. Slowly.
‘I know it looks like a coincidence because it’s the second time,’ Akshay spluttered. ‘But what can you say about my friends. So errant,’ he rued.
‘Why don’t you save yourself the time and the trouble Mr Karmakar?’
‘You know what, I will step aside and call them again. It’s no trouble.’
For fancy restaurants like Khwaaish, saving time amounted to earning money and John was only being the ever-so-diligent guardsman for his restaurant.
‘Can someone please call the security?’ a cold John blurted emphatically, standing in the middle of Khwaaish, protecting his turf from this unscrupulous soul.
All the distinguished gentlemen and elegant ladies, with their shining cutlery mid-air, froze in their seats. The rhythm of the knives and forks on the other tables thawed.
By now, Akshay knew there was no point continuing the gag any further. Two security guards came in and stood next to him.
‘There’s no need. Save it,’ Akshay said, dropping his napkin on the floor.
His succulent Khwaaish-e-Nalli had just arrived and the delicious aroma of the visibly soft lamb had assailed his senses already. But it was time to let dignity win one round over gluttony for the moment.
At the exit, an elderly couple looked at Akshay with disgust. ‘Do you think he stole something from here?’ the lady asked dipping into her orange blossom cake with strained yoghurt that Akshay recognized from his last visit here.
‘Look at him, the chav! I bet he couldn’t pay for his meal.’
More than John acting like a complete jackass, it was this comment that stung Akshay Karmakar. He went home wanting to never have another meal again outside of his basement apartment in Mulund.
Akshay earned an honest buck and was spending it well within his means for a decent meal. Did any of the others in the restaurant ever win the title of Gold Reviewer bestowed by TripAdvisor to a hand-picked few every year? Could they ever verbalize the intricacies of spice and flavour? Did the rich really know their food or did they come to these restaurants because it gave them a reason to click a picture for their social media profiles?
Akshay opened his laptop and did what he did best: spend time with the latest version of Grand Theft Auto. But these questions hovered over the noise of his on-screen Porsche. He was many things—a smart liar, or even a crook with a hungry soul, but not a chav. Please! That comment from the old couple still rankled in his ears.
He wanted to hit back at Khwaaish. Once he channelized his energies towards that end, he spent the next half an hour putting together a note.
/> ‘Despicable, disgusting food. Think before you barf here, let alone eat.’
This place is surviving on a short-lived legacy of a few good reviews garnered in its initial days. Let me paint you the real story. Because right now the food is so bad, I suppose an unborn infant could cook better than what I was served. The Amritsari Basa was so chewy, you might be better off chewing gum instead. Oh, and the pulled duck breast, so raw that the poor animal was perhaps still breathing when he was served on my plate. I would shudder before I go anywhere near Khwaaish in the near future.
I am convinced all these five reviews posted before mine were from people who were paid by Khwaaish to post good reviews. You know the drill.
I would give this deplorable shanty a negative hundred on a scale of one to five. It’s a pity you can’t do that here on TripAdvisor.
Akshay felt his spirit renew as he wrote this short note and posted it on TripAdvisor. The average rating for the place was 4.4. But since it was a new restaurant, he knew that with his damning review he would have a big impact in pulling down the rating for Khwaaish.
By the time he woke up, two people had already marked his review helpful.
‘That’s interesting,’ he muttered to himself.
And then he came up with a thought far viler than the act of posting a false review.
‘What if I created ten fake profiles and posted terrible reviews through them on TripAdvisor. That would take Khwaaish down entirely,’ he ruminated.
That would require a lot of work. But Akshay was no stranger to organizing his thoughts on a whiteboard and following it through. At best, it would take a weekend away from him. But a string of negative reviews could irreparably dent Khwaaish, he mused.
His plan made, Akshay went off to sleep soundly.
The next morning, he had another ping on the TripAdvisor rating. Never before had his phone pinged so early on a weekend. On weekdays of course, troubles from all over JP Morgan’s global offices would land in his inbox.
He opened his TripAdvisor profile eagerly. It was a reply to his review. It read: