Jhumritalaiyya is a Place
And not merely fiction. It is in Jharkhand (previously part of Bihar), next to Ranchi.
This I know because the pani puri walla whom I regularly visit is not a Mumbaiyya by birth. He is the first of his family, Ajay said, to come out and see the city quite a distance away.
He arranges his audience clockwise around him, and then serves puris to them, picking each one up with a flourish, filling it with moong/boondis, then tamarind water, and then pani puri water. One plate of pani puri costs Rs. 20 and is good for 6 puris.
At first bite, you crunch into the puri, then the water’s taste fills up your mouth, and the softness of boondis, and coriander finally hit in last, freshening the breath.
After serving the 6 puris, he offers you an extra helping of the water (paani) and an extra puri with boondi-moong, and masala. I get a customized serving of a little bit of tamarind in my final puri. Like me, he knows the tastes of many regular customers. I hear a man behind me introduce a new customer to Ajay, ‘This is actually my brother.’
Ajay regularly arrives at about 11 to the Lokhandwala Chat Center and takes a break around 2, then he starts again about 3 or 4 and goes on to 11 p.m.
I have asked him a bit about himself, and tried his servings, but I wonder how many faces he has seen, and stories he’s sampled sitting just on this one little corner in Lokhandwala.
in pajamas: green top, yellow bottom with flowers
till:2 p.m. roughly :)
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