Fifteen months after the Mumbai terrorist attacks, security remains very… well, Indian. Sort of ho-hum karma. Hotels check beneath cars with mirrors on rollerskates; some look in the glovebox, some glance at the luggage, few do both. It gets more perfunctory as the queue and hooting grows but with Mumbai traffic it’s hard to know what’s queue and what isn’t, what’s road rage and what’s habit.
At the Leopold Café you’re frisked by a man with a rifle over his shoulder that would take down a chorus line of rhino with one shot. It was early morning and just a few Europeans inside so when waved to any of the tables, I chose one a little too close to the serving counter but with the best overall view.
A waiter took our order and without prompting pointed out the bullet holes in the walls they’ve kept after renovation and then lifted the tablecloth a little in front of Alex and pointed to a saucer-shaped hole in the marble floor between her feet. “That’s where the bomb went off,” he said, clicking his ballpoint. ”You want snack too?”. Suddenly the ho-hum’s replaced with a little chill that I’ve chosen that table out of thirty and Alex has picked that particular chair out of four. We skipped the snacks, just had coffee. And didn’t linger.
Tags: india restaurant