So Payal, Sarika and I (names changed) decide to do a dinner-and-movie at Govindas in Darlinghurst. It never ceases to surprise me that a place like Govindas is situated in a place like Darlinghurst. Maybe they had this idealistic dream of converting the whole of the drug and alcohol ridden place into soy burger-eating, almond milk-drinking Lord Krsna devotees. If so, then last I saw, it has not quite gone according to plan. They have a fair way to go.
Anyway, so the three of us go to the place on a Saturday evening. Upstairs is the dining room. We fill up our plates with food and settle down at our table. Ah, nice. The room looks congenial with large portraits of our dear Lord Krsna. There is one of him with Radha. There is one of him with his beloved cow. Sarika just loves cow-related subjects. I think she finds this Hindu devotion to cows fascinating. If you find the conversation lagging a bit, just mutter “cow” under your breath. It will perk up her ears and bring out the best in her. It was just then that Payal looked slightly mortified. And she said with horror, “Oh no! I’m wearing a leather jacket, leather boots and carrying a leather purse! And I’m here, at Govindas.” Were they going to kick us out of the place? Were we in danger of being permanently barred from the premises? From the whole of Kings Cross? Moods were tense for a few moments. But no one seemed to be giving us hateful looks. We had an uneventful dinner.
After dinner there was about an hour and a half to kill before the movie, so we decided to go to have a drink or two. No dearth of bars in Kings Cross. We entered one that turned out to have a strange disco/grunge/urban chic kind of setting. The music was loud and the speaker was turned in our precise direction, but the waitress was charming. There was a very interesting looking cocktail list with the strangest of names like Mary Bleeds Again, and Mother’s Milk, and I don’t remember what else. I settled for a martini, Sarika got herself an exotic cocktail whose name I don’t recall, and Payal ordered a gin and tonic. The waiter came with two of our orders after a while.
“Martini?”
“Yes, that’ll be me, thanks.”
“Here you go. And the Beefeater?”
“Sorry?”
“Beefeater.”
Confused looks. Then Sarika realised what it was. “Yes, the gin and tonic, Beefeater, that’s Payal there.”
And we burst out laughing. The cows were haunting her that evening.
At the end of the movie, Payal and I had to take the rail bus back to Central and take our respective buses from there. Kings Cross was unbelievably crowded and noisy. Each person there trying to stand out in a crowd of a million others who were trying to stand out in the crowd. A bunch of kids beside us in the bus were so irritating, it started giving Payal a headache and we decided to get down at Town Hall. She got her bus straightaway, and I was waiting for mine. I happened to look up and gasp! the Town Hall clock had stopped. It was weird. I’ve never seen it stopped before. On a whim, I SMSed it to Sarika, who wrote back, “clock stopped in gods angry response to payal wearing dead cow”
I think Payal will think of cows whenever she sees leather for a fair while now.
