AN EVENING IN BOMBAY

“Sorry I can’t meet you tonight..got some urgent work”. I looked in disbelief at the text message. Exactly 12 days ago when I came to know that I would be in Bombay for the weekend I became as excited as a two year old kid in a toy shop. I was visiting the place after a long gap of nine years and there were so many people to meet and places to discover. Yet at 7 pm on a Saturday evening all my best laid plans were going to pieces before my eyes. “Why don’t you take a local train to Churchgate and explore the area”, the advice of my colleagues Lalita and Sidharth came to my mind. As it turned out it was one of the best pieces of free advice I have ever taken!

So with Led Zeppelin echoing in my ears I decided to head for the nearest railway station. Luckily for me Bandra was just a short walk away. I purchased a return first class ticket to Churchgate and caught a fast local train. As the train blitzed me to my destination and I could almost see the other stations and passing trains blurring into streaks of light, it struck me that that the local train was surely the truest representation of the spirit of Mumbai. Like the people it was absolutely no-nonsense, had not even a moment to waste and most importantly knew where it was headed.

After getting down at the station I decided to take a taxi for Leopold café. Of course it had become infamous after the terror attacks in 2008 (the bullet marks have still been preserved) but I had always wanted to pay it a visit after reading “Shantaram”. I requested a table for one and from among the crowded tables I received a response, “Isko Idhar hi fit kar de!”. Unexpectedly I found myself sitting in front of a tall European and ironically he ordered for tandoori chicken and roti while I ordered for pasta. We had a good laugh about it. The ice was broken. As the beer flowed we soon began to converse and I learnt that he was a travel writer from France who had to cover the city for a magazine. We talked about politics, philosophy, books, wine and even football tactics! I only realized the time when the bill came. So after wishing him luck in his future endeavors I once again found myself on the streets of the city.

I decided to head for Marine Drive and on my way gorged on Bhelpuri and Pav Bhaji near Bombay Stock Exchange. After taking the turn past LIC and Air India offices the promenade lay before me and it took my breath away. Everywhere I could see towers of lights reaching out to touch the sky. I took my place amongst the countless couples cosying up to each other (receiving a lot of dirty looks in the bargain!) and just heard the waves dashing onto the breakers which seemed as if they had been randomly scattered there by a giant hand.

To my complete surprise I heard a voice singing “Maalish! Tel Maalish! ”. In this age of Lazyboys and Thai masseurs he had surely become extinct. But then I spotted him. The man made famous by Johnnie Walker in the song “Sar Jo Tera Chakraye”. I beckoned him earnestly and asked for a head massage. He got out his motley array of oils and soon began to work his magic. Coupled with the cool sea breeze on my face it induced me into a state of near bliss. And I realized that like any great organization the greatest asset of the city were its people. It was a place of remarkable energy and zest for life. A city which had no consideration of caste or creed and only rewarded hard work and talent.

What if I had decided to stay back at the guest house and sleep early (the thought did cross my mind!)? Would I have had a meaningful conversation with my pillow? Would the chilled impersonal air from the AC be as refreshing as the sea breeze on Nariman Point? Were my experiences a matter of mere chance or a reward for being brave and venturing out into the unknown? The song had warned me that “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke Yeh Hai Bombay Meri Jaan”. Yet when I had tried to be a part of it for one night, the city welcomed me and rewarded me with unforgettable memories. Salaam Bombay!

THEM BLOND HAIRED ANGELS : A TRIBUTE TO LED ZEPPELIN

It was a hot summer night and as usual I had tossed and turned in my bed for a couple of hours. Searching for a way to kill time I went out and switched on the TV. As the dark black screen gave way to the plaintive voice of Robert Plant singing the first chords of ‘Black Dog’, I knew something had fundamentally changed in me. I had been transformed into a rebel. It was as if someone had knocked off the corks plugged into my ears due to years of listening to beach blond divas in tight plastic clothes just by the sheer magic of their music. And that someone was Led Zeppelin : Them Blond haired Angels.

I was the quintessential child of the 1990’s brought up in a country that was just beginning to throw its arms wide open to the world. I grew up listening to MTV Select and singing aloud with my elder sister to Backstreet Boys and Boyzone. That was my introduction to “English” music as it was called back then. As years rolled on I started listening to Bryan Adams, which made children “cool” in those days. But when that moment of epiphany happened on my couch I somehow knew that my perspective of looking at things had been altered.

As the program progressed I became more and more entangled in the wizardry of those four magicians and when it ended I was on the internet within seconds trawling through their biographies. Within a matter of days I had finished listening to all their songs and from then on I graduated to becoming even bigger fans of The Doors, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, AC-DC and many others. Yet it was Led Zeppelin who had been the stepping stone to that golden generation of the 1960’s and 1970’s and shall remain the closest to my heart.

Ravi Shankar once said that a lifetime was not enough to understand the work of Rabindranath Tagore. Such is the sheer diversity and brilliance of the work produced by Led Zeppelin that much the same can be said about them. The drum intro of “Rock And Roll” and “The Song Remains The Same” are moments of superlative invention. They almost invented the art of beginning songs with a slow beat and then changing gears abruptly in the midst of songs like “Bring It On Home” and “Whole Lotta Love” and mastered it with “Stairway To Heaven”. Whether you are sad, happy, haunted, jilted or even horny, one can find a song for almost any mood. And name a genre of music be it Country (Friends), Rock (Heartbreaker), Folk (Bron Y aur Stamp) or even Texas Rockabilly (Hot Dog), Led Zeppelin left their indelible mark of genius on each one of them.

When Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, Paul Jones and John Bonham a.k.a Led Zeppelin began their journey could they ever envisage that four decades later, a young boy living in India could derive such joy from them. A year ago, as I sat dangling my legs on the footboard of a train taking me to Calcutta, the rays of the rising run had just begun to kiss the waves of Chilka Lake almost as if someone had lit a million sparklers beneath its surface. It was at that exact moment that the first riffs of “Stairway to Heaven” began to pervade my senses and I knew that I had found my ticket to divinity. Go find yours.