The uncool restaurant

The place I stay in the UK has a few Indian restaurants that are all owned by Bangladeshis. It is only longing for a bit of spice in one’s meal that propels one to one of these eat outs. The food in these restaurants bears varying degrees of resemblance to the actual stuff, and on a miraculous day, you can actually guess the name of the dish without checking with the waiter.

It is not exactly a great advertisement for Indian cuisine, and I can imagine Brits reasoning out why no Indian wants to claim it as his handiwork and leaves it to be taken over by Bangladeshis. However, as mentioned above, compared to bland boiled food, it is like manna from heaven.

I was showing an Indian the place one day and took him to one of these. A crucial thing to be kept in mind when you eat out is that since you’re shelling out considerable bucks, you should at least try to enjoy the ambience and the meal as much as possible.

It so happened that this restaurant had a cooler, because the mercury had risen to unexpected levels over the preceding few days. I had scarcely finished giving the order when the chap with me pointed this out with no small measure of contempt in his voice, “Look. They have a cooler. In India and all, cooler means petty restaurant.”

I told him that it had been pretty warm for the past few days. The cooler wasn’t that bad actually and unobtrusively blended itself into the surroundings.

There were a lot of people in the restaurant that night, what with it being a Sunday and all that. Two guys were discussing about Indians. I could not help listening, and they were loud enough anyway.

“They are very brainy, in general, but what I don’t like…”

It would have been great to know what they didn’t like about Indians, but I never got the chance.

“In UK and all, I never expected to see a cooler.”

The guy blurted this out, as if he’d been trying to refrain from so doing, but had found the outrage of being taken to a restaurant with a cooler too much to tolerate. He looked miserable.

The order arrived soon. I tried to pacify the guy, but from the frequent anxious glances he kept directing at the cooler whenever we ate, it had no effect whatsoever on him. The funny thing is that it gave me a guilty conscience, as if I were to blame for carrying so touchy a guy into the restaurant.

“Why can’t they have air conditioning?” He cribbed half way through the meal.

“Because it’s normally not necessary. Can’t you see that that’s why they’ve put in a cooler as a temporary measure?”

Everybody in the restaurant except the two of us was either having a relaxed dinner or a pleasant conversation in anticipation of one. And I was, stuck with a guy who had no cribs about the food or the place, but about a stupid cooler.

It was pretty uncomfortable to have dinner on such high alert. I felt that he could make a salvo anytime, and was prepared to defend the restaurant and my choosing it for dinner. I hardly dared to look at him, but unfortunately, after looking all round the restaurant, found to my shock that he was about to say something.

“Is this going to be about the cooler again?”, I asked angrily.

“Actually, I was just going to ask you the time, but since you mention the cooler…”

“I mention the cooler? Oh, it’s I who have been cribbing away about the cooler, is it? I didn't mention it even once.”

“You’re right, actually. The cooler is not even worth mentioning. In India and all, I have never seen a cooler in a good restaurant…”

I had heard enough. I got up and told him that I was leaving.

“That’s better. At least, you won’t have to bear the cooler…”

I fled. That’s the last time I visited that restaurant.

The worst aspect of the whole matter was that you could guess why he was cribbing. When imagining himself describing about his first day in the UK later on, he could see himself talking about the restaurant and how hot it was outside. Then, when somebody asked him whether it was air-conditioned, he’d have to say it had a cooler, to the disbelieving “Oh no.”s and “Not really?”s and “Don’t tell me, a cooler in the UK?” s of the audience. It would be demeaning in their eyes to have gone to such a restaurant.

That’s why he found it intolerable, not because it was jarring to the eye or because it wasn’t as comfortable as an AC.

That's why I found him intolerable too. However many hypocrites you meet, you can never become fully immune to them.