Without thinking too much into his situation, he listened to the shehnai-walas playing. The music stirred something in him. He felt hungry. A glance towards the feeding end of the hall showed that dinner had not yet been served. Having ruined his stomach over the previous weekend gorging on street delicacies, he didn't want to risk having the snacks offered. Then he noticed a queue forming at the feeding end. He wasted no time, and raced to join the queue, a proud 5th position finish.
As the queue got longer, the buzz in the room increased. Everybody was trying to rush through conversations, with an eye on when the dinner would be served. The queue, meanwhile, swelled in size. He looked back, an felt prouder of his decision to give up a comfortable seat; in his head he patted himself for making good decisions with long-term goals in mind. The 4 others ahead of him accommodated 14 more people - as is the norm with families strategizing their food assault on dinner parties, - which slightly put him off, but not by much as behind him now queued hundreds. He would be the 19th person on the dishes, which meant the best bits in all gravy dishes would still be for the grabs.
Just then, the first tinker of cutlery... somebody lifted a plate off the deck. Then another tinker... a spoon being removed from the stack. Then another one... the lid on first of the dishes being removed. Then the tinkers picked tempo as more lids were removed off the dishes and more people nudged forward and picked up cutlery. The first smells of gravy dishes wafted through the air and grew thicker, a phenomenon that everybody appreciated, as it helped build an appetite for multiple servings, especially after the past coupla hours with snacks.
After the 18th person, came his turn. He was swift in arming himself; age had made him better at least at this, he realized. The first table consisted of salad - several kinds of raw fruits and vegetables and sprouts cut and arranged in tempting shapes, and some covered in attractive colouring, begging to be picked and eaten. But he was no kid to buy into such ruse.. He was here for the big food. He knew that the salads were only meant to distract people from the mains and help with savings for the food contractor. He ignored the salad trays and headed straight for the main dishes. He wouldn't do with any but the juiciest "chaap" pieces in the mutton stew, which he already knew would be on offer.
Curse the kid who did not realize the things that he did. The kid with the family ahead of him, who hesitated, but then did stop for the salad - the star-shaped watermelons and glacially-arranged sprouts had succeeded. As with kids, this one turned awkwardly, and hunched awkwardly to reach for the fruit. His one leg pulled back to keep his balance. This leg was what came to be our man's undoing.
Cutting across straight for the non-veg counter, he tripped over the kids' leg. His body picked up an unexpected sideways momentum, which his brain had no prior knowledge of, and hence could do nothing to control. The hunger suspended and was replaced by panic, as he felt his body hurtle down towards the dishes. He could see himself heading for either Paneer Pakhtuni or Paneer Lababdaar. Nothing could drive his hate of cottage cheese more, than seeing his head dipped in a vesselful of it. A new realization dawned in that split second... that his life won't be the same in another second.
Then, as if commissioned by God himself, came the hand that gripped him by the shoulder and stopped his fall.
[... to be continued]
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