Samuel Benoit

The present has a tendency to move much faster than my capacity to report on the past, so I am going to try to pick up the pace some.  I have just returned from a second trip to Delhi that I am eager to tell you about, but haven’t yet reported on the first.  This visit I was having fun imagining all the tourists coming to North India at this time of year expecting a tropical destination setting foot out of the airport and getting blasted by cold air.  People climbing the hills to Panchgani probably go through a similar experience, creating demand for the large shop dedicated to sweaters, probably opened years ago by the enterprising young Nuri Yazdani. 

After checking into Prospect Hotel and washing up, the next order of business for Anis and I was foraging in town.  We went to Friend’s Treat, the only restaurant in Panchgani as far as my friends from my last visitwere concerned.  Anisordered some form of chicken and without Nuri’s foresight, I was drawn to the most expensive item on the menu; the Mix Veg Sizzler.  The first inspection shows saucynoodles in a sizzling raw cabbage leaf, the other ingredients that kept being uncovered after every visit to the dish prompted me to get out my pen to take note of the ingredients in the order they were found so that everyone at home can make Mix Veg Sizzler for themselves:

• Raw cabbage leaf
• Chinese fried noodles
• White rice
• Sweet Chinese sauce
• A  vegetarian cutlet
• Green peas
• Paneer cheese cubes 
• Some french fries
• Mysterious Chinese wheat balls
• 7 beans
• A Scrambled egg  
• Some persistent fruit flies

When the waiter who we had been hitting it off with earlier interrupted the best laugh either Anis and I had ever had at a food item to ask us how our dishes were going.  Anis’s was just fine, but the waiter started to get frowny when I told him that this was the most ridiculous dish I had ever seen.  He said :”This is the Indian style, Sir.”  But he couldn’t tell me which part of India when I asked.  The Mix Veg Sizzler has got to be a highlight of the whole trip for it’s ability to inspire laughter, anger and embarrassment for having eaten so much of it.  At 150 rupees, the most expensive heap of compost I would ever expect to see.

We saw all of the most important sights in this most important stop in the Samuel Benoit Sentimental Tour of India; Lucky’s Snacks, New Era Teacher Training Centre, New Era High School and the Baha’i Academy.  On the way to NETTC, I wanted to swing by my old house again to see if it was still empty.  There we encountered the new owner and was glad to let me in to the currently unoccupied half where our bedrooms were.  Those going for the genuine Benoit-James Experience should know that the owner is currently renting it out brief stays for that very purpose. 

Before we left the next day for Mahableshwar, we met briefly with the elusive Melody Mazloom of London, Ontario who is currently doing a year of service at NETTC and is doing very well.  In Mahableshwar we surprise visited Sureka and had a snack at her husband’s restaurant as I tried to explain to Anis’s amusement how I had told the story of my finding her on something called the Internet  and many people read enjoyed it. 

After an evening travelling to Pune, and then through Pune on a crammed city bus because we got out at the wrong station, we settled in for a night of more travelling.  An overnight bus to Arungabad, the city nearest our next stop of Ajanta Caves.  But for Nuri’s being able to join us we would have travelled in a series of leaps generated by his mighty thighs with him taking us by the scruffs our necks.  More on the rewarding experience of travelling without the use of superpowers in our next installment.