let bygones be bygones

so we’re past the glory days of living in karachi when parents told us stories of yore and tales of liberal partying and fun days when karachi had trams running through it’s arteries. now comes the time for me to tell the next generation about what we used to enjoy which they never will.

let’s try and cover food first, because, as i mentioned before, i love to eat, and i always have. now let’s get one thing clear, i grew up in clifton. most of the exposure to major landmarks and institutions have been in this region. feel free to add your own institutions from your locale in the comments below.

there were a bunch of eateries in clifton which aren’t around anymore, and eating in clifton has historically  been synonymous with boating basin. this was when people actually used to take their boats within the basin from the karachi boat club. this was when we used to take long walks along it’s shores and get scared of the big crabs coming out of the rockery and not the hooligans down at the other end of the park, and when pink flamingos could be seen flying in the horizon. nowadays all you get is a road named after a woman who may or may not have been the lady the city is named after, and a sorry excuse of mangroves which have been hacked away by land reclamation killing a thriving shrimp industry and loss of migration of swarms of migratory bird populations.

boat basin is very different today than it used to be about 20 years ago. first of all, as kids the only cool place really was Mr. Burger. they used to have a very fun orange theme which isn’t around anymore, but they’ve expanded and changed it to a pinky purply look. they used to hand out stickers and colouring penciles and have cool posters and pictures of characters famously stolen from mcdonaldland. now mr. burger is still around and hopefully remains so for a long time to come but the KFC right next to it, used to be a restaurant called Red Carpet. that’s gone. used to have atypical pakistani bbq and nothing much else, but used to be a staple landmark of boat basin.

if you kept walking along the footpath towards the other end of boat basin, coming next was Sagar video game arcade. all the goonda’s of the area would reside there. if your parents found out the kind of people you hung out with at Sagar, they wouldn’t really let you go back there. but arcade games were 5 Rs. for ten tokens so entertainment was cheap.  But what came right after was another restaurant, this one with VERY dark tinted windows was Seagull. i know absolutely NOBODY who ever went in there, though it remained there for the longest time.

a few stores over you come across mezban. it’s the proud standing store that’s been around ever since  i can remember, and always been the go to place for the best kabab rolls and chaat this side of  (insert favourite bridge here).

and of course the hidden prize of boat basin ended it up with kings and queens, the only pizza in town at the time. (claims arise that jacana in PECHS on tipu sultan road was there prior and better but thats purely a debate up for another time).

another wonderful restaurant at the time was a bit further down the shoreline called Dolphin’s located on 26th street. i still remember the amazing beef stroganoff. too bad since it got replaced by a petrol station.

if you were interested in dessert, the only ice cream parlour in town worth going to was baloch ice cream, and the only reason i say this, is because theres nothing funnier than a mallu waiter trying to pronounce pistachio. if you were a bit more uppity in the social ladder, you may ended up having a few ventures over at Carvel’s parlour too but it wasn’t as fun there (people on the other side of the bridge would say kaybees but it doesn’t count since it’s still around).

there’s a whole bunch of other places that i used to hang out at, places that just aren’t around anymore. places that people still fondly remember and talk about, but those days are long gone. they are just memories. there are many other such landmarks that people talk about today and refer to by name which aren’t around…places like submarine roundabout where a submarine used to hang out at, lighthouse (though not really a lighthouse, but the fact that the cinema there was lighthouse cinema), and many other locales, but i suppose that will have to wait for another post.

feel free to mention other fun places below in the comments or anything in the clifton area that you remember that i missed out on. actually i think i only really spoke about boat basin. oh well. *shrug*