Black Dog and New Mohan

This is not Led Zeppelin's Black Dog or about the old actor Mohan.

It's about the "Black Dog" we consumed in a place called "New Mohan". An interesting name for a place so old. It all started when Yoga, Sujju, Ezhil and I decided to go for "a tipple" on a quiet Saturday night, just when all bars close for the day.

Sujju at the driver's seat was "hell-bent" on getting to an "ambi-place". A term we'd coined on the fly to describe places that are plush, where the waiters greet you to your seat and serve food with garnish. It was past 11 and I said "Sujju, forget it, just go where Yoga is asking us to"; and Sujju obliged.


New Mohan was not bad from outside, the inside was a different story. We were guided through a small space open to the sky and then to a stairway (to heaven ?), the entire place was kind of slippery because of rain (or someone's puke ?), though I still hope it was the former.

I carefully climbed up the stairs, taking special care not to touch anything around. We were on top and were greeted by a cat munching some chicken bones left over by other "tipplers". The place had some kind of a courtyard and we could feel the mild drizzle. Surrounding the courtyard were wet tables and chairs with a lot more chicken bones and left overs from other "guests". To top things up there was a clothsline running on top of most tables with underwears and baniyans fluttering in the breeze. I was searching for Sujju to tell him how wrong I was to urge him to dump the "ambi-place" hunt, and how right he was in being obstinate about finding one. But Sujju was not following us, he had apparently got a call from office and was attending it below.

Yoga tried to make things better by pushing the bones off the table and wiping the chairs dry. And so we sat down - just teasing Yoga about the kind of place he's got us to. But deep inside I knew that this feeling of unease would not last long.

Finally we were settled and decided to go for the costliest they had there, just to avoid any kind of discomfort the next day. The "child laboured" kids who served us for that night got us something called as Black Dog. We "downed" a few glasses and in the state of euphoria induced by the Dog we discussed world politics, Richard Dawkins, etc. The euphoria made me completely oblivious to the surrounding ambience. In fact, I was so "comfortable" with the place that I started to contribute to the mess by throwing a few chicken bones and stuff over my head and behind. What happened next is a little hazy, but I know we reached home at about 3:30 AM(thanks to Sujju's skillful driving). Only to wake up with a splitting headache the next day. Black Dog was Bad Dog.