Bombay Row

Mar 23, 2010

"Bombay Row?" Brian said as we made plans to meet for dinner. He was referring to Sixth Street between First and Second Avenue, dubbed "Bombay Row" by our friend Joe -- in fact, Brian did an impression of Joe as he asked the question. The last time I met Brian and Joe for Indian food on Sixth Street, I pointed out that since the real Bombay isn't called Bombay anymore, perhaps we should update the nickname to match. "Mumbai Mews," I suggested, but it didn't stick. No matter, most of the Indian restaurants on "Bombay Row" are actually Pakistani owned and operated anyway, and since Islamabad Avenue is too much of a mouthful, Bombay Row it is.

Brian and I have been meeting at various Indian restaurants on Sixth Street for at least ten years, so the question was merely protocol. "Sure, sounds good," I said. "What time? Six?"

There are at least a half-dozen Indian restaurants on the block -- there used to be even more, and the joke was that there a single kitchen running the length of the entire block. I used to wonder how they all stayed in business, but from the look of things, they haven't. The plan was to meet on the corner of Sixth Street and Second Avenue and choose a specific restaurant when we got there, but as I headed out the door, Brian called with a change of plans. "Second Avenue and Second Street," he said. "Curry Mahal."

"Curry Mahal, got it." It didn't matter to me.

I got there a little early and cruised up and down the block, but I couldn't find anywhere called Curry Mahal. There was what appeared to be an upscale Indian restaurant one block further, but from what I could tell, it had gone out of business. I walked up the north side of the street, and down the south side, no Curry Mahal. I thought I might have the address wrong and called Brian to double-check. "I'm right down the street," he said. "I'll be there in 30 seconds."

I hadn't seen him since he left for his extended sojourn in the southern Monastery and was surprised at how thin he was. "Dude, I was down to 130 pounds when I was away."

"Holy shit, that's too much. Or too little, rather."

"I know, I've gained about 15 pounds since I've been back. I'm trying to put on a little more." We walked to the middle of the block and stopped in front of a plywood wall with construction permit stickers all over it. "Shit, it used to be right here. Oh well, back to our original plan."

In front of every Indian restaurant on Sixth Street stands a man, usually in a black suit, beckoning any and everyone who passes by to come in and eat. "Please, sir, you come for dinner," they say, and try to convince you that their prices are the best, or their food is the best, or both.

"Don't make eye contact," said Brian as we strolled by the barkers, trying to decide where to go. "It sucks that you can't look at the menus of any of these places without getting the hard sell."

"It's all the same to me. As long as we don't go to the place with the sitar player in the window, it doesn't matter."

"This is the place we went to last time, isn't it?" he said, peering through the front glass while ignoring the man giving the hard sell out front.

"Yeah, I recognize the red pepper lights."

Hanging from the restaurant's ceiling are strings and strings of red Christmas lights shaped like peppers, hundreds of them. And the walls and lined with mirrors, turning hundreds of red lights into infinite red lights. Everything in the place glows red.

The waiter brought out warm dishes and wiped them down with a dirty rag before placing them in front of us.

"Did you see that?" said Brian. "The dirty rag routine. Classic."

When the food came, it tasted odd. We sampled each others entrees and agreed they both had way too much lemon. There were lemon slices in both dishes, but the taste was less lemon and more lemon-flavored dish detergent, however, as the meal progressed, it grew on us.

"Now what?" I said, when we finished.

"I have to drag you to this thing," said Brian.

"What thing?"

"Mickey is meeting bunch of people at a restaurant in the West Village and this chick he wants to set me up with is going to be there. I told him I'd stop by, but I need you to come, in case I need an excuse to bail.

Mickey is Brian's roommate -- or rather his host -- whenever Brian comes to New York and needs a place to stay, he stays with Mickey. Mickey is a retired Fire Lieutenant who was inside the north tower of the World Trade Center when it collapsed and he miraculously survived. It's a truly amazing story, but since I've only ever heard it in pieces, second-hand, I don't feel I can do it justice. Fortunately, thanks to this clip on YouTube, I can let him tell his own story.

The group of people Mickey was meeting at the restaurant included an eclectic group of women who volunteered in various ways during the 9-11 recovery efforts. I didn't get the whole story so I don't know if the women were all friends to begin with, or if they met during their volunteer work, but regardless, they have a special bond and they meet up regularly to socialize. The women, about a dozen of them, plus a couple of husbands, were seated around a huge banquet table and Mickey introduced us to them all one by one. When he got to the woman he was hoping to set Brian up with, he said, "You remember my friend Brian, don't you?" She nodded, then turned to face the opposite direction.

"Is that her?" I whispered.

"Who? Miss Personality over here? Yeah, that's her."

We sat down, with Brian seated next to Miss Personality, and he tried to make small talk, but she wasn't interested.

"Did I hear an accent? Where is she from?"

"New Yawk," he said.

"Oh, ha. I thought she was Russian or something. My ears are so bad."

Actually, everyone at the party was a tried-and-true New Yawkuh with dyed-in-the-wool accents to prove it. Mickey's girlfriend, for example, had to step out to "pawk da caw."

Brian and I took a seat at the table across from a guy whose suit, tie, and slicked white hair made him look like a Goodfella, but who turned out to be a retired police detective. He sat next to his wife, a wild-eyed woman with a dyed black Bettie Page hairdo who looked like she might own a thrift store called "Crazy Betty's." Brian knew her, and he told me that once upon a time in the not-so-distant past, she had been an out-of-control party girl. She's a singer now, and Brian asked her how things were going. She told us she's been busy recording some demos. Her husband, the detective, raved to us about her singing and assured us that, as soon as he bumped off Lady Ga Ga, she'd be on top of the charts.

"What is it with you and Lady Ga Ga," the singer said. "You keep mentioning her. I think you have a thing for her or something."

The detective just smiled and remained generally non-committal, knowing all too well that anything he said could be used against him.

When the singer excused herself to the ladies’ room, the detective let us in on the fact that his wife had just celebrated her 50th birthday.

"How's she taking it?" said Brian.

"Are you friggin' kidding me? It was hell for weeks. Waa waa waa," he said, wiping imaginary tears from his cheeks. "But I jus' bought her a lil' bling and she snapped out of it." He pantomimed his wife looking at a ring on her finger through teary eyes. "A lil' bling and boom, 'oh it's beauuuutifuul.' Now everything is fine."

"Are you guys staying for dinner?" Mickey asked.

"Nah, we just ate," said Brian. He thumbed over his shoulder at the woman Mickey was hoping to set him up with.

Mickey shrugged. Brian shrugged.

After a half an hour or so, Brian turned to me and said, "What do you say, dude, we done here?"

"I am if you are," I said.

"Let's go."