Bombay Dreams

It was my friend’s birthday; we went to a restaurant called ‘Bombay Dreams’. The name itself, consumed my mind with images of a colourful landscape, full of beautiful women dressed in Saree’s, and men in tight waistcoat-esque suits. Later on in this fantasy I hear one of the waiters explain: ‘No, Sir, sorry we don’t do that… Thankyou’ in a proper ‘freshie’ (fresh of the boat) accent as he tilts his head very slowly to the right and then left, with a big grin, presenting an almost vacant expression. Then I remembered ‘Goodness Gracious Me’ was not a documentary and maybe I was enacting in some naive racial stereotyping. Maybe this restaurant was full of Indian people, acting very British, extremely prim and proper, because believe me, this is a dream of the Indian people (stereotypically). It seems as Indians float to the higher end of the Social class hierarchy, the more British they act, the more often you will hear them break up their native tongue with English. True Story!

I get to this restaurant, and there was a polish waitresses, and then I remembered it has always been the Indian way to revere and look up to the ‘Whites’. What better way to indicate the stature and awesomely delivered ‘Bombay dream’ than to have fair skinned people serving you. Wow, I was impressed with the thought that had gone into this cultural understanding of the ‘Bombay Dream’ which had been done subversively, before a mouthful of food had even been devoured.

When it comes to food, within the South Asian continent there has always been a strong cultural leaning to that of sharing food, something I think is an amazing trait. This was perfectly translated into the ‘culture’ of said restaurant. As the food was brought out, it became clear that the dishes were not given to individual members who ordered the food, but were provided as communal dishes to share for the table, a method me and my friends of Indian/Asian descent used to do as standard when we went out to eat. Another nice authentic touch I thought, but this totally confused and made many of the people on our table experience an uncomfortable moment that could and should not have been expressed in words. I, did my part to make this as funny as possible for myself and pointed out some of my eating buddies uncomfortable-ness to everyone. LOLS were experienced, and the food was good – Winning! To end a fun dinner, as I was leaving I did notice a girl who looked like what I can only explain as the Indian version of the Suffragette movement poster girl. I was really buying into the unbelievable levels of authenticity of this restaurant, but it was interesting to learn this was her freedom of expression being played out for my amusement (in my head), and she was not in fact an employee of Bombay Dreams but a really nice girl actually.