Khau galli and the stain on my shirt.

My friend R and I go out for lunchtime at a place called 'Khau galli'. Now, khau galli is not a very unique name and every 'galli' in India, where there are quite a few 'khaana stalls' with little seating arrangements is called a khau galli. The best part about such 'Khau gallis' is that you get a variety of foods.....and our 'KG' is no different. With the variety of foods, there seem to be a variety of germs. Hygiene is minimum and flies are maximum. Crows may fly and perch themselves on the table next to you and dogs might touch their noses to your feet, when you are sitting, enjoying the food. To counter all these 'anti-social elements' for customers, stall owners put a 'dhoop' or an essence stick on your table, which they think will drive the flies, crows and bees (did I mention bees? no I didnt, well, now I did) away. It definitely DOES NOT drive anything away. In fact, you spend half your time shooing the flies and the other half making the same shooing motion with your hands, only this time to drive away the oncoming vapours from the 'dhoop'. The flies, crows and bees have developed immunity towards 'dhoop' , same way as we have developed immunity against germs, eating the unhygienic food of KG.

My mom makes me a food tiffin and I take this along with me to KG. Here, outside food is allowed, if you place a small order. So, we go there in the afternoons to escape the air conditioned confines of our office and order something like buttermilk or something.

After lunch we have paan, at times. The other day, R and I ordered our custom paan........calcutta sadha paan, with chilkaa supaari and a dash of gulkand. The paanwalla folded the paan into a neat triangle and handed one to me. As I put it into my mouth, the gulkand dribbled out of the corner of the paan, right on to my favourite bright coloured white shirt with blue and yellow stripes. I was aghast !!! It was a huge blot of red guaranteed to leave a permanent stain (gulkand can leave permanent stains) . I applied some water to it and it was worse......it spread!!!. I had to go back to office wondering what to do. Everyone in the office kept staring at my shirt. I told anyone who would listen (no one did), that the boss had 'fired' me and so the blood. But only I managed to laugh valiantly at my own stupid joke. Later, I went to the washroom and put water on it again. When it dried off, I pinned my identity card on my collar end, so that it dangled on my right pocket and somewhat covered the major part of the stain. I hoped that there were no meetings that day and so lucky that there werent any.

Again, luckily, my mom managed to 'vanish' the stain. My favourite shirt is ready for use again.