05.25.07
Meeting Some Old Friends
Tonight we ate “outside” at an (indoor) cafeteria-like eatery. When we entered, I was struck by how many people were inside. I was the only white person in the building. We spotted a table whose occupants had stood. We approached them and asked if they were leaving (I think that’s what was asked). They must have said yes. I was instructed to sit down at the table, which had not yet been cleared. There were four chairs and five of us (The grandma, the uncle, Prinall, Pratik, and me), so Prinall captured an extra. The table was cleaned, and the uncle ordered for everyone. The first course, idli with sambhar and coconut chatni was new to me (though I had had sambhar before). The second course, however was an old friend–masala dosa–which my dad and I had sampled at a South Indian restaurant called Dosa in San Francisco when we went there to procure my visa. We finished the meal with special South Indian coffee.
Just when I was about to offer to pay for my portion of the meal, the uncle asked whether I knew how much the meal had cost for all five of us. “How much,” I asked. “Four dollars.” He asked how much it would cost in the US, and I told him about forty.