My Curry Tales

 

‘We use to own an Indian restaurant. Dad sold it to pay off is debts for bringing us to the UK and building the house in the Bangladesh,’ said one of my four sisters. 

‘When we were building a house in Sylhet, we would rarely see him. We needed the money to pay for it. That was the nail in the coffin.’

Our dad would usually came home every weekend after working for five days (and nights) at the time when he was working in an Indian restaurant in Ipswich. We initially lived in Stepney Green. Later we then moved to Wapping.  We would rarely see him in the week days. It was like this for years. When he did come home to rest, his clothes would smell of all the unimaginable spices of India. I could easily have imagined him putting his hands on  all the Indian herbs and spices to make his rich dishes. In fact, I remember when he cooked at home for us, he would made dishes that were SO rich in flavour!

'Why the dishes you cook are so rich, dad?’ I would ask him. He would reply:

‘Being a chef if not easy job, son. You have to develop your technic after doing it for many years.  You have to know your spices. Most of all - you have to work under pressure to combine alls these worldly spices and you must do it quickly because you are to serve dozens of hungry people within an hour. People are relying on your cooking. Taste matters!’

His taste and method of  cooking was nothing like how my mother would cook at home.  Her cooking was gentle, soft, although it has some of the spices, they were often mellowness to it. Her cooking involved a lot of patience and care.

His cooking also involved a lot of 'to-ing and fro-ing' of the dishes as he cooked them in very high heat. He would move the fry pan about as though he was in a circus. The fire would even cover the frying pan.  There was nothing like it.

My mum would comment:

' Oh my god. Does he now any shame? Cooking at home is a woman’s job; not for a man. Shame on him! He would laugh out loud when he heard it. She can she do, she had competiton in the kithen. 

BROTHER GETTING READY AS WAITER

I was 12 years old.  My brother was trying on a new black waistcoat over a white clean shirt. 

‘Why the new outfit, brother?’ I asked. He smiled; looked me in the eye and said:

‘I am a grown up now. I am going to work in Birmingham to our uncle’s restaurant.’ And he said nothing at all. He went upstairs, packed his luggage and just came downstairs.  My whole family gathered around him. I remembered tears were pouring out of my mother eyes. 

‘Do look after yourself, my son,’ she whispered.

My older sister also weeped along with my mother. He opened the main door and off he went. All my siblings either looked through the windows or watched from outside, as he disappeared into the horizon. Once he left, the whole house was completely silence.

He would come and visit us every other week as was the case with my dad. When he did come home he would often sleep all day and sometimes even late at night.   I remembered seeing him a few times getting a bunch of rolled-up notes out of his jacket and he would give them to mother. Her face would enlighten when he saw money.  She would grab the notes and tuck them under her saree.

SISTERS AND THEIR HUSBANDS IN RESTAURANTS

Two of my sister’s husbands were deeply involved in the restaurant sector too. Khela’s husband’s restaurants were thriving at the time. Both of their restaurants were in Gravesend, Kent.  I remember twinkly sareers she would wear when she and her husband visited us. They would drive around in a 1980s black Mercedes in Ocean Estate.  I could smell Chanel from my room when she sits in the room next door. We were always impressed by her husband’s wealth and style; They were successful restaurateur. 

With Ritha’s husband,  their luck was not as fortunate as Khela’s unfortunately. When I asked Ritha about the state of the take away a few years ago, she replied:

‘Don’t ask. I had to put my salary into the business. Do you believe this! I am subsidising  by paying for the lease, salary of  the waiters and chefs. We can’t carry on living like this. This take-way was going to make us or me bankrupt!’

Not before long the business was abandoned.  Her husband then became an Uber driver.

MY STORY 

I was nearly 17 years old. Me and father were in the house. Everyone else was in Bangladesh. I would go out at night in Soho to excite myself. It all happened gradually. In the end,  I would come home  at 4/5 AM in the morning. 

‘Why do you go out so late at night at your age?!’, he would shout. 

‘Why do you smell of cigarettes?!,’ he would shout at me again… 

‘Who is this or that person constantly phoning you this time of  the night?!’ 

These were some of the issues I use to come across when I was a fully fledged rampaging and hot headed teenager. 

‘Right, I have spoken to your brother. You are leaving tomorrow and he will teach you how to work as a waiter. I can’t seem to be able to get anything in your head. You are going!'

I had no interest in becoming a restaurant worker.  I wanted to discover something different. I left home to discover London on my own terms.

Until now (yes, during lockdown in December 2020), I decided to go back to  explore my roots and community from the lenses of the Bengali or Indian restaurant sector. Why you may wonder?...I don't know. I guess the sector is in my blood.