Modern cafes ain’t be better than our "Shekhar"
First of all no offence to any specific coffee chain or
restaurant, because it's all about those days when there were no established
coffee chains, no cafes, no foreign chain restaurants.
Last Friday in a friendly meet with my old college pal at
Barista what I figured out that it was a more of a flashy kind of thing rather
than being a truly social place to hang out. Analyzing the young generation,
what we found that there was no kind of true recreation or excitement in their
chit chats. May be all of them were just allured by its modern foreign
architecture and enticing ambience. All the juveniles were trying their best to
communicate in English whether they like it or not. Some were occupied by their
laptops and many eyes and ears were trapped by the fancy mobile phones and their
owners brushing off the fact that their friends are sitting in front of them.
My eyes were scrutinizing for a posse who would be engaged
in real enjoyment forgetting the other entire world and from where I could re
live my old memories. But hardly had they got anything. The only thing I
noticed that could also be counted as an irony was that after such a lacklustre
meet, they had to pay heavy cheques. What is the use of spending so much of
money when you can’t get the full out of yourself? I think in that age with
friends, the level of your foolishness and craziness must be higher than
aristocratism.
Talking about our times, during late 80's when we used to go
our college, we were totally devoid and unheard of all of these expensive
restaurants or cafes, but that doesn't mean we hadn’t had our fun. I still
remember those days when after a tedious lecture of mathematics there was an
enthusiastic call from one of my friend for hot “samosas (a fried or baked pastry)” at "Shekhar's corner". As the
name signifies, it was just a basic kiosk at the corner of the road. All of our
friends used to gather over there and would start the endless tattles. There
were no formal sittings or expensive furniture, no gadgets but the immense
delight and excitement we used to get was totally fathomless. There was no
conversation without patting each other with joy and laughter. Humor, bullying
were the primary focused tasks. Sometimes our lecturers and professors would
also join us in our gossips and there were limitless fun mixed with a
proportionate amount of humor.
I don't know if we
can compare the taste and hygiene of those “samosas” with today's healthy viands
but the contentment we used to get in that 2 or 3 rupee samosa was totally
inimitable.
