Marketing

My friend Uday is in marketing. He handles MNC's and strategic marketing plans and POP [ Point of purchase ] displays etc. etc.
Aunty Mazie is also into marketing. Every other day she gets her Goa bag out and heads of to the bazaar. And you ask her where she's going and she says ' Marketing".
For her everyday needs its Pali Market that she heads to. Where you can get your sweet potatoes and cauliflower on the road without even getting into the market. She just has to dodge past the cars that roll down Pali Hill whose Memsahibs think Pali Market is a Drive -In. And Nandu [ who has cherry tomatoes, baby corn and other exotic vegetables that she as a child had in wax replicas in her showcase ] who is old enough to be her Uncle calls her 'Mummy".
And then there's the BIG market. Come Saturday, she heads for the big market. The market which gives raison d'etre to Bazaar Road. You wind thru Chinchpokli Road, or dodge between the multiple garages behind the Bata shop on Hill Rd., or head past Hindu Hotel [ OK Balajis for all you kids ] past the Bandra Pork Market to Jeffs and then hang left.
The market starts right there. Shops selling copper chatties, [ yes chatties not hundies ], and baskets of fruit on the nonexistent pavement, with the odd handcart pushing its way through, giving a new meaning to the word mobile sales. And the cart owner will stop for whoever is interested in pushing his sales figures up while traffic waits patiently for the transaction to be concluded. And finally you reach that holiest of holies, the Mecca that all good Aunties visit at least once a week other wise they are only Mazie not AUNTY Maizie, The Fish Market. Where the Kohli fisherwomen all have their favourite Aunties or is it the Aunties who have their favourite fisherwoman ? So they'll prod at the bhangra [ mac kerel ] for freshness. Pompfrets will be prised open at the gills to check fo redness which of course you know tells you the exact time of death. Crabs will be bought on new moon days , [ nights ?]because thats when they're full of meat. And Shravan is bonus time because all the Non Katlicks dont eat fish then, so prices are better. So one more week is taken care of with Bomlos [Bombils ] parcelled of into the deep freeze and bhangras sliced and packed away. The mandlis don't keep well so this eveing they'll be chatna. And Chotu is given two rupees to carry the bag to a rickshaw for the ten rupee ride home.
And then once a year there's the BIGGEST market. Come December, Aunty Mazie, Auntie Marie and Auntie Juliana get together to plan this expedition, to Crawford !
Where they get into a rickshaw to Bandra station, where they catch a train to Marine Lines, [ debating every year on the way wheter it' s better to get onto the harbour line and go to VT ]
and share-a-cab to Crawford. Royal Dryfruits for all the cahsews and almonds and dates that give up their ghosts to be born again as marzipan and milk creams date rolls . And tissues and Christmas lights [ because these Chinese ones are so cheap ] and fish molds for the mousse and new clothes hangers because the hooks of the old ones are all rusty and plastic flowers that look reall'er than the real thing. Look they've even got fake water on the petals. Lovely.
And when the whole of Crawford has been crammed into multiple Goa bags and a coolie with a basket [ that the apostles used at the Sermon on the mount ] has been summoned and commisioned, Badshah's beckons. Where a rose ice cream falooda is the order of the day. While Mr. Coolie waits patiently squatted on the pavement for the Memshab's to finish. And then its share a cab time again but this time all the way to Bandra.
Uday ! This is marketing !!!