Notes From Vietnam

 

 (This column first appeared in the 8th May 2022 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/from-baguette-sandwiches-to-roman-catholic-architecture-the-colonial-legacy-is-everywhere-in-vietnam/article65378330.ece )

Notes From a Tea Estate

 

 (This column first appeared in the 13th March 2022 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-a-tea-estate/article65214069.ece)

Notes from Kihnu

 (This column first appeared in the 15th August 2021 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-kihnu/article35891338.ece)

Notes from Leh

 (This column first appeared in the 20th June 2021 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/food/notes-from-leh/article34849496.ece )

Notes from a kallbad

 

By Raul Dias

Almost exactly a year ago, when countries around the world started going under lockdown one after the other like some sort of uncertain global game of dominos, there was one among them that resolutely refused to let its chips fall. And that country was Sweden.

Faced with mounting criticism, the Scandinavian county still managed to flatten its Covid-19 curve rather rapidly and effectively. This, without ever implementing a full-scale lockdown. A controversial strategy that at once had the country’s health leadership claim victory. But the cynics were not so impressed with this apparent inaction. And rightly so.

With many Swedes choosing the more sensible self-quarantine and social distancing, cases of mental unrest and depression saw a remarkable upswing across the country. All the while getting further exacerbated by the long, dark and miserably frigid Nordic winter that sets in as early as late September. Enough to send the country hurtling down the precipice of a major mental health crisis.

Slam Dunk

Recognising this and attempting to remedy it by turning to one of the Sweden’s greatest outdoor winter traditions of ice bathing called kallbad in Swedish is a charity initiative taken on by a few of the members of the Ladies Circle of Sweden club, Gripsholm in south central Sweden. Earlier this month, on the 7th of February at exactly 11.30am Sweden time, 80 women across the country—led by Anna Lyckström, a club member who came up with the idea—plunged simultaneously into the icy waters of lakes, ponds and other semi-frozen waterbodies nearest to them. Some of the ladies living in the high north of the country needing to saw through almost 60cm of ice to get through the water!

All this to raise both money and awareness in the fight against mental illness. Together, they managed to amass just over SEK 8,000 (INR 70,000 approximately) for the national charity project Fonden För Psykisk hälsa (Foundation of Mental Health). With the 'simulbaths' being aired digitally over the club’s Facebook page.

Shock Therapy

A brutally cold water dip is a Nordic favourite for many due to a host of health benefits ranging from raising ones feel-good hormones and lowering stress to improving sleep and general mood. Interestingly, a 2004 study conducted by scientists at Oulu University in Finland reinforces the immense benefits of ice bathing on mental health. 

Apparently, icy water causes the blood vessels to constrict in order to try to retain body heat and the blood pressure increases to avoid cooling down. In the process to protect the body, hormones such as endorphins, are released and act as pain relief (as well as anti-depressants) for a few hours. As a result, ice bathers are known to lead more active lives and are generally happier and more fulfilled people. 

But the Swedes have cottoned onto this trend and seen method to the madness for centuries. Given their nonchalance towards public nudity and taking full advantage of the coastline and multitude of lakes and rivers, skinny dipping in their icy waters is a national obsession come autumn and winter. With a session in the scalding hot sauna completing the therapeutic experience.  

Hot-n-Cold

Speaking of sauna, equally popular is the concept of spending a cold winter’s day in one of the many cold bath houses across the country, most of which are open year-round. These serve several purposes. Not only do they prepare one for the invigorating open-air kallbad, they typically house a number of saunas to sweat it out in, both before and after an ice bath.

It was during the last quarter of the 19th century that the first few cold bath houses began to surface across Sweden. All greatly inspired by the facilities found in health resorts in places like Switzerland. But before the fully-fledged bath houses emerged, stair-equipped outdoor swimming pools started cropping up as early as the 1850s. 

But keeping up with the times seems to be a mantra for many bath houses that earlier had specifically dedicated areas for men and women given the nudity aspect. Take for instance Malmö’s Ribersborgs Kallbadhus that now acknowledges transgender and non-binary people by making the bath house gender egalitarian.

(This column first appeared in the 28th February 2021 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-a-kallbad-or-ice-bath-in-sweden/article33940727.ece)

Notes from Baijnath

 

By Raul Dias

For a handful of places across India, the celebration of good versus evil, that today’s Dussehra festival espouses, is not as definitively black or white as most would like it to be. But then, nor is the mythology that birthed it and thousands of other festivals—both religious and otherwise—not just in India, but around the world as well. Myriad interpretations abound, each shining light on hidden facets.

Just ask the inhabitants of the sleepy little town of Baijnath in the Northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh! While this year’s Dussehra festivities might be muted ones across the country due to the pandemic, in Baijnath, Dussehra is an annual no-show.

Unsung hero or wrathful foe?

Perched at an altitude of 4,311 feet on the Himalayan Dhauladhar mountain range, Baijnath is one of those rare places in India where neither Dussehra has ever been celebrated, nor the ensuing drama of the Ramleela ever played out. All this, thanks to an unlikeliest protagonist at the very vortex of it all—Ravana. 

Legend has it that the ‘demon king of Lanka’ was an ardent devotee of Lord Shiva and prayed to him deep in the Himalayas seeking immortality. In return for which Ravana chopped off his own ten heads at the altar. So impressed was Lord Shiva with this act of devotion that he is said to have restored the heads. Only this time, six of the heads for the six Puranas and four for the four Vedas. 

The 12th century Baijnath rock temple constructed in the Nagara style of architecture and the surrounding town of the same name were built upon this myth. And to this day, in honour of Ravana’s dedication to Lord Shiva, neither is Ravana’s effigy burnt by the residents, nor do they buy sweets or light any fireworks. Interestingly, the town is also totally devoid of jewellery shops. This is apparently to mourn Lord Hanuman’s torching of Ravana’s Lanka which was said to be made of gold. 

However, according to some, it is not entirely the respect for Ravana and his devotion to Lord Shiva, but also that all-consuming emotion of fear that prevents any Dussehra celebrations from taking place in Baijnath. As in most small towns across India, myths of destructive wrath and punishment abound here too. Everything from decades of bad luck to more ominous ones in the form of an unnatural death to those who take part in any Dussehra festivities, keep the Baijnath townsfolk away, come Dussehra night.   

Dussehra dodgers

Baijnath, however, is not alone in its shunning of Dussehra festivities. There are other Ravana-sympatico places in India where the shine of Dussehra is a tad diminished, if not fully taken off. While the people of Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh refer to Ravana as their ‘son-in-law’ as they believe that their town is the paternal home of his wife, Mandodari, Bisrakh in Uttar Pradesh claims him as its own. According to local belief, Ravana, the son of a sage named Vishrava and Kaikeshi, a Daitya princess was born in Bisrakh.

As it is believed that Mandore in Rajasthan is where Ravana married Mandodari, on the day of Dussehra, priests of the local Ravan Ki Chanwari temple perform the shraadh ceremony for his soul. In Maharashtra’s Gadchiroli District, the village of Paraswadi is nothing but a glorified hamlet, home to a handful of people from the Gond tribe. They call themselves Ravanwashis or descendants of Ravana, resolutely refusing to be identified as Hindus. 

Perhaps there is no better place than one actually named after Ravana to seek an answer to the million dollar “was he good or evil?” question. Ravangram in Madhya Pradesh is a village that has a legion of devotees who actually worship a 10-feet-long reclining statue of Ravana in an ancient temple constructed by a sect called the Kanyakubja Brahmins that Ravana was said to be a member of.

Putting it all into perspective, one cannot help but ponder on a rather controversial quote often attributed to Winston Churchill. Is history truly written by the victors?                      

(This column first appeared in the 25th October 2020 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-baijnath/article32931241.ece)

Notes from Bulgaria

By Raul Dias

In early June this year, as demonstrations over the killing of George Floyd gained momentum in the US capital of Washington DC, it was reported that secret service agents spirited President Donald Trump away to a White House bunker. Though denials of this were issued forthwith, it is said that Trump spent nearly an hour ensconced in the heavily fortified subterranean structure. All this, as protesters rallied outside the executive mansion, resorting to everything from lobbing stones at the world’s most famous residence to destroying police barricades.  
But Trump is not alone. From tech billionaires and celebrities to other world leaders and corporate czars, all have one thing in common—plush underground bunkers equipped with all the mod cons. Safe havens to seek refuge in, in case of nuclear warfare, civil unrest and…yes, raging pandemics too!
If there is one place in the world that gives a whole other meaning to the term ‘bunker lifestyle’, with its abundance of repurposed bunkers, then that would have to be the Balkan country of Bulgaria.

Basement ‘bar’gains
Both the country’s capital of Sofia and Plovdiv, its economic hub have plenty of subterranean marvels to sink your cultural teeth into. From the former’s recently unearthed Roman city of Serdika to the latter’s resurrected grand Roman stadium, a relic from the time when Plovdiv was known as Philippopolis. However, it was the country’s communist era bunkers and erstwhile bomb shelters that fascinated me the most on my trip to Bulgaria last summer.
In Sofia, I found myself getting down on my knees to buy everything from chewing gum to local sweet treats like the fig jam-smeared mekitsi fried dough from the rather strange looking pavement-level ‘klek’ shops. With their name borrowed from the Bulgarian word for kneel (klek), these squat shops have an interesting history. During the cold war, the Soviets repurposed basements of apartments throughout Sofia to serve as bomb shelters, with designated separate spaces for each family to seek refuge in.
After the fall of communism in Bulgaria in 1989, residents of the apartments converted these basement shelters into an assortment of commercial spaces like shoe repair shops and haberdasheries to bakeries and mini convenience stores. Shops that could serve just one kneeling customer at a time though small sliding windows, with the shopkeeper’s head at the level of the customer’s feet. Rendering them perfect for current social distancing requirements amidst the pandemic.
However, there are only a handful of these klek shops left in Sofia today. In a sort of third wave of conversion, new life is being infused into the shops with several being transformed into diminutive art galleries, basement cafés and even a few two-person only speakeasy-style cocktail bars.     

Going with the flow!
I soon learn that Bulgaria’s subterranean wonders are not just limited to remnants of the country’s Roman and communist eras. And once again, Sofia is a notable example of this. With over 30 mineral hot springs that can be found within the city and its surroundings, hydrogeology is something that is taken very seriously here. In fact, the city’s ancient coat of arms even has a figure depicting the Greek god Apollo bathing at one such mineral spring.
Speaking of bathing, the Regional History Museum behind the grand Banya Bashi Mosque in the heart of downtown Sofia was once the old Turkish public mineral bath house, functional till 1986. Adjacent to the museum, at a red and white-bricked water fountain, is where one can find several people partaking in the city’s mineral-rich water bounty by filling up huge bottles and jerrycans with the free, slightly salty-tasting warm water that flows from rows of ornate brass taps that don’t even freeze in Sofia’s sub-zero winters.
‘What lies beneath’ truly takes on a whole other meaning in Bulgaria, it seems.

(This column first appeared in the 30th August 2020 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-bulgaria/article32462731.ece)

Notes from Hanoi

By Raul Dias

In the future, if pop culture historians were to ever dredge up the top social media trends that defined the ensuing Covid-19 worldwide lockdown, I can bet my last coffee bean that dalgona coffee would be right up there riding the crest. The creamy-headed beverage, itself, jostling for space with everything from banana bread and bad home haircuts to auto-tuned renditions of bella ciao.
And while the genesis of dalgona coffee is (erroneously!) attributed to both, a popular Korean caramel-coffee candy of the same name and to our very own, beaten to submission desi “phheti hui” coffee, its true origins lie in the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi in the guise of ca phe trung. Something I discovered on a trip to Vietnam a year ago. This, back in the good old days when I believed social distancing to be my private idiosyncrasy and when ‘Corona’ was still just another brand of beer! 

Egged On
Lending a certain gravitas to the “necessity is the mother of invention” proverb, dalgona coffee’s egg-enriched predecessor ca phe trung was the canny invention of a Hanoian barista named Nguyen Van Giang in 1946 at his coffee shop called Café Giang. Relishing the thick, creamy and surprisingly non-eggy tasting hot coffee seated in the legendary café perched along Hanoi’s ‘Coffee Street’ aka. Trieu Viet Vuong in the historic Hai Ba Trung District, I got a crash course in all things ca phe trung, thanks to the chatty manager.
Apparently, a post WWII shortage of tinned condensed milk that went into the then-popular iced ca pe sua da, steered Giang in the direction of stiffly beaten egg yolks to provide a creamy heft and rich taste to the coffee beverage that he decided to serve hot. Thus, imbuing his brand-new coffee concoction with a sort of rich, Tiramisu-esque texture and taste. But unlike dalgona that has just the creamy layer sitting atop hot or cold milk, ca phe trung has a thick body all the way through, making it more of a hybrid hot dessert than drink. One that is best tackled with a spoon, not sipped.

Back Story
Akin to the coffee beverage version of a set of nesting Russian dolls, I was soon to learn that there was yet another story within the story related to how Vietnam’s obsession with condensed milk—both as the dairy and sweetener component—in regards to its coffee drinking experience came about. And it was the French colonialists that set the course.
After producing the easy to cultivate robusta variety of coffee beans in Da Lat in climatically suitable central Vietnam in the early 1900s, the French realised that milk was hard to come by. This was bacecause milk and other dairy products had never been a part of the Vietnamese diet. And still are not, to this day. To fill in this deficit, the French started to import tinned condensed milk which was first used in traditional French coffee preparations like café au lait and then in the more localised Vietnamese iterations that sprung forth.

Chain Reaction
Over my one week in the country, as I dove further into Vietnam’s coffee culture, I soon came to some interesting realisations. There is no ‘grab-and-go’ coffee shop concept here. People prefer to sit down at cafés and have leisurely, conversation-enhanced coffee drinking sessions. Despite being second only to the Brazilians in terms of coffee bean (both arabica and robusta) exports at an annual turnover of about $3.10 billion, the Vietnamese prefer the sharper, bitter flavour and higher caffeine content of the less popular robusta coffee beans for their personal consumption. And this is why the big international coffee chains like Starbucks and Gloria Jean’s Coffee—both of whom primarily use the milder arabica beans in their beverages—have failed miserably in the local market that is dominated by cheaper, more artisanal cafés.
And why not? It is in places like these, that are literally on every street corner in the big cities and small towns of Vietnam, that one can get a taste of even more experimental versions of coffee beverages. From a yogurt coffee to a hipster-chic avocado and banana smoothie-meets-frappe called sinh to ca phe chuoi bo, the variety on offer boggles the mid. Maybe even a dalgona, someday. If not already.     


(This article first appeared in the 28th June 2020 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 8 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-hanoi/article31922421.ece)

Notes from Armenia

By Raul Dias

Picking an accommodation option that sits cheek-by-jowl with a primary school is always a risky proposition. One that is fraught with countless somnolence-threatening annoyances. From loud, early morning assembly calls and mid-day playground cacophony to afternoon marching band practice, the ultra-light sleeper in me has encountered it all.
But my recent stay at a family-run B&B in Yerevan—the pink-hued capital of Armenia—that shares a wall with one of the city’s most popular public schools, showed me another, more surprising facet to Armenian academia. One that struck a home run in more ways than one…

By the Book
With one of the most ambitious school chess programmes in the world, the chess-obsessed nation has made the game a compulsory subject on the national curriculum. An initiative of the then Armenian President Sersh Sargsyan who was also President of the Armenian Chess Federation, since 2011, children studying in grades two to four have two weekly chess lessons that are graded just like any other school subject. And just like the one next door, these classes are often conducted in the school playground that have sets of purposefully built concrete chess tables in a designated corner.
To keep up with this new demand, Armenia now has more than 4,000 qualified chess teachers in its school system besides national champions like Levon Aronian as visiting faculty. The once number two chess grandmaster in the world, also known fondly as Armenia’s David Beckham, today, regularly coaches kids in chess at schools across the country. Interestingly, a 2009 BBC World Service report titled Armenia: the cleverest nation on earth shows that with its population of a little over three million, Armenia is among the world leaders in chess with one of the highest numbers of chess grandmasters, per capita.  

Indian Connection
So, where and how did it all begin for this Armenia-chess love affair? Curious, I visit the Tigran Petrosian Chess House–the ‘Ground Zero’ of all things chess in the Caucasian state. Nestled on Yerevan’s leafy Khanjyan Street and built in the early1970s in the typical Soviet brutalist architectural style, the building is named after the Soviet Armenian grandmaster Tigran Petrosian who became the World Chess Champion in the 1960s.
Here, I learn, that although chess was institutionalised during the early Soviet period, the country has always had a historical love of the game that goes way back to the Middle Ages. This was proven with the discovery of an ancient chess set in the citadel of Dvin—the medieval capital of Armenia, in 1967.
At Yerevan’s imposing grey basalt Matenadaran museum of manuscripts, a digital copy of Shatrang: The Book of Chess (1936) by Joseph Orbeli and Kamilla Trever tells me more as it augments the India-Armenia chess connection. Called chatrang, a word derived from the Sanskrit term chaturanga, which translates to “four arms” (representing elephants, horses, chariots, and foot soldiers), chess apparently came to Armenia from India via the Arabs in the 9th century, when Armenia was under Arab rule.

Check, mate!
“Shakh yev mat,” is a victory cry I hear all of a sudden as I settle down with my 200 Dram (Rs 30) blueberry softy cone at a bench outside the Moscow Cinema on Yerevan’s arterial Abovyan Street next to a giant pedestrian chess set. But then, the Armenian equivalent of “check mate!” is something that I’ve been hearing at almost every public square and city park I’ve sauntered past in the last few days. There’s probably na’er a public space in Yerevan that doesn’t have at least a couple of chess tables, with players of all ages hunched over an intense game of chatrang.
On a free walking tour of Yerevan, as a passing shot, our guide Varko lets us in on a little-known chess world secret. As it so happens, Garry Kasparov, the former Soviet grandmaster, and easily the world’s best ever chess player, is of Armenian heritage, though he was born in Baku, Azerbaijan. Apparently, his original surname was Kasparyan—which has the ubiquitous finale of an Armenian surname, which usually end in “ian” or “yan”.         

(This article first appeared in the 9th February 2020 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 10 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-armenia/article30762980.ece)       

Notes from Sofia

By Raul Dias

Here’s an honest observation. Sofia isn’t a beautiful city. The modest sized capital of the Eastern European country of Bulgaria will never be up there with the top five ‘must-visit’ destinations in one’s lifetime. Nor will it ever be bestowed with those silly, rather patronising monikers of ‘Paris of the East’, ‘Venice of the South’ etc. But what it does have in abundance is character. Everywhere you look there’s an oxymoronic grittiness coupled with a breathless vibrance. And probably one the greatest contributors to this is Sofia’s bounty of street art and graffiti in all their candy-coloured brilliance and in-your-face insouciance.

First ‘Impressions’
Ever the thrifty traveller, one of the first things I did after checking into my hotel was to sign up for a free graffiti and street art tour of the city. Run by a bunch of passionate art students and experienced street artists who double up as guides, the two-hour long walking tour is their way of helping visitors discover Sofia and its colourful history.
And speaking of history, I was told by my guide Stella that it is thanks to Bulgaria’s socialist past that the street art sub-culture and era of the true-blue graffiti artist emerged. The drab, Soviet-style apartment blocks with their plain, grey exteriors provided the city’s 21st century street artists with a range of ideal surfaces for large scale mural art. It was also the sudden ‘invasion’ of satellite television and the emerging hip-hop scene of 90s America that served as harbingers of this sub-culture.
At first frowned upon, slowly street art came to be respected for what it is—art! In fact, graffiti is so well-accepted in Sofia that the tram stop under the National Palace of Culture (NDK) is officially called “NDK Graffiti”, all thanks to the abundant, ever-evolving graffiti than can be found around the tram stop.
Municipally sanctioned street art in particular also started to be used as a means to deter artists from committing random acts of vandalism. A few years ago, “Theatre on the Street”—an art project by Bulgarian NGO, aptly named Transformers—saw 30 artists, over 10 days transform 51 pavement-side electrical boxes into graffiti art along Sofia’s theatre-infested Rakovski Street.   

  

Interpreters of Maladies?
At one of our stops, a car park on the city’s arterial Knyaginya Maria Luiza Boulevard, a little north of the busy Serdika metro station, we were met with a rather evocative mural by local graffiti legend who goes by the tag of Bozko. A veritable nom de plume, a tag we’re told, is not just an artist’s signature and mark of territory, but also an allusion to their style.
In the case of Bozko, that style is something that borders on hallucinogenic with otherworldly characters harbouring hidden social messages. For example, painted below a peeling Chupa Chups lollipop advertisement, his Pinocchio-like figure from a project series titled Urban Creatures seems to reference the untruths the advertising industry perpetrate with its ever-growing beak-nose. The interpretations are limitless.
With a diametrically opposite style from Bozko, Nasimo, another local Bulgarian muralist, I was told, is known for his dreamy, largely figurative works that draw a lot of inspiration from classical art and convey a sense of escapism from reality. Behind the old Turkish Thermal Bath House, we stopped by two of his pieces a few meters away from each other. Both sublime. But the one that caught my attention the most was a photorealistic mural depicting an embracing couple with cupid superimposed onto them. The fading rays of the evening sun bouncing off the glass panels of the adjacent building and casting fluid-like rippled effects onto the wall, made the piece even more magical than it was.

(This article first appeared in the 28th July 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 27 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-sofia/article28723200.ece)

Notes from the World’s Oldest Vegetarian Restaurant

By Raul Dias

Ever the sceptic when it comes to anything remotely “record-worthy” within the realm of one of my life’s greatest passions i.e. food (coupled with my callously carnivorous proclivity!), I really wasn’t looking forward to my very first meal in Zurich, Switzerland. My friend and local Indian culinary guru, Ity Tiwari had all but dragooned me into a pure vegetarian lunch at Haus Hiltl.
A veritable Zurich institution, Hiltl, as it is more commonly known as today, is believed to be the world’s oldest vegetarian restaurant, having been founded in 1898. The stately-looking restaurant, perched on the city’s crowded Sihlstrasse street, even has a shiny plaque from the people at the Guinness World Records to corroborate this claim.
Coming from a country like India, it seemed rather strange for me to see such a title bestowed on a restaurant in Switzerland of all places. For here, no meal in general is complete without a serving of a hunk of meat with some potatoes and the ubiquitous cheese on the side. But some quick, on-the-spot research confirmed this as being very much the case. And so, I soldiered on, tucking into my yummy cumin-dusted roasted cauliflower soup and saffron gnocchi, while a few interesting morsels of Hiltl trivia served as accompaniments!

Born of Necessity
Founded by a family of German immigrants in 1898, and originally called Vegetaria, the restaurant was a boarding house for vegetarians with a small attached café. But thanks to the concept of vegetarianism being virtually non-existent in Switzerland at that time, with vegetarians even mocked as ‘grazers’, the erstwhile establishment didn’t have much success.
It was only a few years later in 1904 when a Bavarian tailor named Ambrosius Hiltl was rendered jobless due to rheumatoid arthritis, did he take over the restaurant and rename it Haus Hiltl, after he was prescribed an all-vegetarian diet by his doctor. Not only was Ambrosius cured of his affliction, but his restaurant was looked upon as a novelty to which scores of locals flocked, making it an overnight success. Something that it enjoys to this very day thanks to its famous pay-by-weight vegetarian buffet that’s a rage with Zurich’s hipster brigade.
And today, as an annexe, it even has the world’s first “vegi butcher” called the Hiltl Shop on the adjacent St. Annagasse street. Here is where one can stock up on everything from all-vegan mock meats like seitan and tempeh—where the former is made from wheat gluten, while the latter from fermented soybeans—to the wacky ‘noix gras’ hazelnut stand in for the controversial goose liver foie gras.

The Indian Connection
But talk of India and its rich vegetarian influence on Hiltl seemed inevitable as I was taken on a short, post-prandial tour of the gargantuan, three-levelled restaurant and shown the photograph of India’s late former prime minister Morarji Desai relishing a plate of pakoras at the restaurant. It was Ambrosius’s daughter-in-law Margrith, who, in the 1950s, introduced recipes and elements from Indian cuisine into Hiltl’s repertoire.
Understandably, at first it was mainly the Indian guests who responded with enthusiasm, but over time they were joined by more and more locals. The art of Indian cooking remains a major element of Hiltl with their channa masala being the top seller and a personal favourite of Rolf Hiltl, the fourth generation Hiltl who runs the restaurant today. “I have an affinity to Indian cuisine, due to our family and company history, and because of its wide variety of spices,” says the Hiltl great-grandson who caused quite a stir in 1993 when he introduced alcoholic beverages to the menu for the first time. But the Hiltl’s adherence to vegetarianism is non-negotiable and so strong that it is rumoured that they are even known to deny entry to those wearing fur. ‘nuff said!       
The Mumbai-based writer and restaurant reviewer is passionate about food, travel and luxury, not necessarily in that order.

(This article first appeared in the 19th May 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 27 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-haus-hiltl/article27160593.ece)

Notes from Indore

By Raul Dias

While other airports in India resort to a blend of wordless instrumental and folk tunes that serve as the ambient muzak, Indore’s Devi Ahilya Bai Holkar Airport relies on the mellifluous voice of singer Shantanu Mukherjee, a.k.a. Shaan. “Ho Halla”, which was Indore’s Swachhta Anthem song for the Minister for Urban Development’s Swachh Survekshan 2019, has now become a sort of battle cry in the Madhya Pradesh city’s cleanliness-fronted war. And for someone with a borderline cleanliness OCD like myself, spending a few days in Indore was like finding my own personal urban version of Valhalla.

“Swachhta aadat hai, swachhta utsav hai” (cleanliness is a habit, cleanliness is a celebration), goes a line from the aforementioned song, which was part of the Indore Municipal Corporation’s (IMC) cleanliness campaign that saw it clinch the title of India’s cleanest city for three years in a row now from 2017 to 2019. The song even plays as municipal vehicles go about collecting garbage from households. In fact, I was later told, it is the de facto and mandatory caller tune of the phones of municipal officials and elected representatives.

Tastefully Clean! 
Now, if Indore’s meandering, perpetually bustling Sarafa Bazaar street were to be a human being, it would most certainly be accused of having a split personality. By day, it is a warren of jewellery shops enticing patrons with gleaming necklaces and rows of stacked bangles.
However, every night at 10 p.m., it dons another avatar: that of a street food haven serving up everything from the typically Induri mashed corn and ghee snack called bhutte ka kees, to the molecular gastronomy-influenced ice paan that makes your breath go all frosty thanks to the addition of liquid nitrogen.
But it is also probably one of the only food streets in the world that’s totally devoid of any food detritus. I saw not a single styrofoam plate or plastic cup littering the ground. Every one of the 200-plus food stalls is provided with segregated garbage bins for both dry and wet waste. And once the feeding frenzy winds down way past midnight, municipal trucks with specially fitted, pressured water jets hose down the street, leaving it spotless for the commercial onslaught of the day ahead.

Seven Plus One

Interestingly, this newfound cleanliness zeal is not limited to the authorities alone. Indore’s citizens too have taken to the cause with fervour.

This is most evident at celebratory occasions like the ‘great Indian wedding’! Giving a cool new fillip to the saat pherasor seven pledges — each corresponding to a round of the sacred fire to solemnise the ceremony — is Indore’s version of the eighth pledge. With it, the newlywed couple is administered the oath of cleanliness. And here’s another uber cool initiative: dustbins are even distributed during such wedding ceremonies to guests as return gifts.
Speaking of dustbins, for the last two years, the IMC is believed to have distributed thousands of bottle-shaped dustbins — which neatly fit into the car door bottle-holders — to vehicle owners to encourage them not to litter on the roads. So chuffed was I to see them that I even picked up a couple to take back home for friends and family, each for a mere ₹35.
And as for one of India’s biggest problems, open defecation, the city has employed something known locally as ‘dabba gangs’ that patrol the city, discouraging open defecation and urging people to use the newly constructed public toilets that one can see everywhere in Indore.

Will it be a case of fourth time's a lucky charm for the nation’s cleanest city in 2020, or will it be ‘cleaned out’ of the competition? I’d wager a bet on the former.


(This article first appeared in the 7th April 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 27 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/indore/article26743786.ece)

Notes from St. Petersburg

By Raul Dias

My metal tray slides along the purpose-built rails generating a loud, clanging sound as it collides with the person’s in front of me. I mutter a feeble apology and swiftly move ahead. The grumpy lunch lady behind the plexiglass screen glares down at me, grunting every time I point at something that catches my fancy on the buffet counter she’s manning. Plonking down a bowl of luridly pink soup and a quarter plate of the greyish hamburger patty onto my tray, she all but ‘banishes’ me to the cashier with a wave of her mighty arm.
Now, before this begins to sound like some dystopian, boarding school-meets-prison lunch hall memory I’m conjuring up, let me set the record straight. I’m in St. Petersburg, trying out a dining experience that I had been wanting to have a go at ever since I had heard about it. Lunch at a Soviet era stolovaya is slowly becoming something of a tourist must do when in the most western city—culturally speaking—of Russia.
And so, there I was at the Ligovsky Prospekt branch of Stolovaya n.1 Kopeika, a popular stolovaya chain in St. Petersburg, where both, the brusque service and the pink-tinted beetroot borscht are said to be equally legendary!   

Servings of Nostalgia
The word stolovaya simply means “canteen” in Russian and is a nostalgic leftover (pun intended!) from the Communist USSR days when providing an “adequate” level of care and provision for the population in all areas of their lives was the well-flogged mantra. The Germans even have the perfect name for this—ostalgie. Loosely translated, this implies a sort of nostalgia for the bygone communist days.
While these are public cafeteria-style restaurants that can be found everywhere in Russia, it is St. Petersburg that boasts the most number of them—both old and more recent, 21st century iterations. Each trying to distil the bleakness and “dark” atmosphere of the older ones into them. Right down to the Soviet style prints hanging on their walls and work staff that are mostly from the ex-Soviet republics of Central Asia.
In St. Petersburg, most stolovaya are open 24/7 and are cash-only establishments. And in a city where buying groceries and cooking one’s own meals can be a rather expensive affair, eating all three meals at a not-so-friendly neighbourhood stolovaya is the norm. For here, a hearty lunch of a soup, a soft drink, a main and a dessert can often be bought for as less as 200 roubles (Rs 218 approximately).

Herring under Fur Coat!
Speaking of dishes, the food on offer at most stolovaya are simple, homestyle, fill-your-belly kind of no-frills stuff. Here, one can expect to find dishes like the ubiquitous mayonnaise-doused fruit and veggie Salad Olivier that is known to the world as Russian Salad. Apparently, the salad was named after Lucien Olivier, a Belgian-origin chef who invented it at Moscow’s Hermitage restaurant in the 1860s.
Equally popular are other dishes like the kotleti hamburger-style patty and the beetroot borscht–both of which I’d tried earlier and loved. Not so much the insipid, watered down kompot, however. This soft drink is said to be a stolovaya mainstay and is made from synthetic ‘fruit’ syrup with tiny bits of fruit flotsam bobbing along its room-temperature surface.
But then there are some stolovaya specimens that are so confounding to a non-Russian that seemingly innocuous dishes like the pickled fish and boiled eggs shuba salad end up with weird translations such as ‘herring under fur coat’ on menu boards. The traditional Russian dish of yezhik (literally, hedgehog!) is another example, where the rather tasty side dish of rice-spiked meatballs has a strange-sounding English translated name.
Interestingly, breaking away from the traditional stolovaya model as far the food is concerned seems to be the latest trend in Russia. I was soon to find out that there are a bunch of speciality stolovaya options in St. Petersburg such as all-vegetarian (Rada & K on ul Gorokhova 36), organic and even a few where the emphasis is on ethnic cuisine. Puris in St. Petersburg, anyone?


(This article first appeared in the 10th February 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-st-petersburg/article26212860.ece)

Notes from Tashkent

By Raul Dias

I’m technically still on Indian soil, sitting ensconced in a giant metal tube that’s taking the form of an Uzbekistan Airways’ airplane, en route from Mumbai to Tashkent. But I’m also instantaneously being made aware of the fact that remnants of the former USSR are very much alive and kicking in the country I’m to be deposited in, four hours later. The cabin crew greet me with a hearty “dobro pozhalovot!” in Russian. The safety briefing is a trilingual English-Uzbek-Russian one, the rather robust wordage and flat intonations of the last language not lost on me. But that’s just the tip of the proverbial ‘Soviet-influence iceberg’, constant montages of which reveal themselves to me at almost every turn I take over my next two days in Uzbekistan’s capital, Tashkent.

Past Perfect
An hour after I land, I find myself on the brink of a mini meltdown as I try to navigate my way through block after block of bleak, Khrushchyovka-style residential buildings in the Tashkent suburb of Chilanzar. Bereft of a charged cell phone, I’m trying desperately to locate the elusive building number 26 where Yura Vedenin, my friend of Russian descent has promised to let me spend the night in his tiny, two-room apartment. Named after Soviet statesman Nikita Khrushchev—in whose era these low-cost, concrete-panelled apartment buildings were developed all over the former Soviet Union during the early 1960s—the ‘Khrushchyovka’ is a suburban Tashkent mainstay.
The next day, at the city’s glitzy Tashkent Janubiy Vokzal southern train station, I try to make sense of the indecipherable Cyrillic alphabets that form alien words printed onto my bullet train ticket to my next destination, the ‘Silk Road’ city of Bukhara. God bless the kind-hearted ticket counter lady who takes the effort to pen down all the vital details on the back of my ticket in Roman numerals and alphabets. Without her intervention, I’d surely be in Cyrillic blunderland!
On my way back to Chilanzar from the train station, I burrow my way underground to experience for myself the brilliance of the Tashkent Metro I had heard a lot about. Opened in 1977, the metro today has 29 stations, each a shining (pun intended!) beacon of the former USSR’s legendary hubris. ‘Opulent’ as an adjective doesn’t really do justice to the grandeur and scale with which each of them has been built and decorated, with everything from pink marbled walls to be-chandeliered ceilings. One of the most beautiful of these is the Kosmonavtlar station where Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova—and the first woman in space—is immortalised with a mural, wherein the ceramic wall panels surrounding her portrait fade from blue to black in imitation of Earth’s atmosphere.

Spaces like no other
And speaking of space, just like this station that was influenced by the ambitious USSR space program, Soviet architecture in Tashkent too greatly references the cosmos and science fiction. One such building in Tashkent is the turquoise-domed Tashkent Circus built in 1976, that pays homage to Yuri Gagarin’s epic journey into outer space with its flying saucer like appearance and alien limb-like pillars.
But it is the typical soviet, brutalist style of architecture that augments the USSR’s overarching influence over Tashkent, 27 years after Uzbekistan declared its independence as a brand-new nation in 1991 post the historic breakup of the Soviet Union. It was the devastating Tashkent earthquake of 1966, that gave rise to this style of utilitarian architecture where form and function trump ostentation and ornamentation of any kind.
Seemingly caught up in a time warp when bell bottoms and acid rock ruled, the gargantuan Hotel Uzbekistan, centrally located at Tashkent’s Ground Zero—Amir Timur square—is the perfect specimen of 70s Soviet modernist architectural style that’s associated with social, utopian ideology and influenced by the works of Le Corbusier, Frank Lloyd Wright and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Though a tad tired and scruffy looking today, this icon of Tashkent’s Soviet past draws in nostalgists by the busloads eager for a morsel of melancholy…however brutal. 

(An edited version of this article first appeared in the 20th January 2019 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7  https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-tashkent/article26035588.ece)

Notes from Hungary

By Raul Dias 

Like any seasoned traveller, I have a non-negotiable set of ‘rituals’ that I need to perform when visiting any new place. Chief among those is to visit a food market to get a pulse of the quotidian life of the local people. I love nothing better than to see bossy grannies haggle their way though a purchase of tomatoes. In European markets, I greedily look forward to the generous samples cheese-mongers and charcutiers put out for gourmands like myself.

So, on a recent trip to Hungary, the minute I was done with checking into my hotel in Budapest, I sauntered down to the city’s Great Market Hall housed at the end of the famous pedestrian shopping street Váci Utca on the Pest side of Liberty Bridge at Fővám Square. And while I did get my fill of both bargaining octogenarians and some rather strange local charcuterie — particularly the lókolbász or horse meat sausage — I encountered row upon row of stalls in the market dedicated to a single spice. Paprika.

Revelling in all its sweet-n-smoky glory, paprika is the de facto spice of Hungary, where almost the entire cuisine pivots around the axis created by the spice. And paprika-obsessed Hungarians have a certain Mr. Christopher Columbus to thank. Originating in Central Mexico, the spice that consists of dried and ground chillies made its way to the far Balkans via Spain when the Turks introduced paprika to the Balkan Peninsula in the 18th century during the Ottoman rule.

Dash of heat

Interestingly, thanks to it being packed with Vitamins A and E and capsaicin — which is said to have anti-cancer, antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties — paprika was first used by Hungarians as a medicine for treating typhus. It is also capsaicin that gives chillies their heat.

In fact, up until 1920, all paprika was super-hot. It was only when a hybrid variety of the plant was created in the southern Hungarian region of Szeged that paprika got its distinct sweet and smoky flavour profile. In fact, the Szeged paprika museum is said to be a very popular tourist spot where everybody is sent off with a 10-gram sampling of paprika.

Back at Great Market Hall, I soon realised there is no one paprika that fits into all dishes. A rather patient stall owner with much better English language skills than my non-existent Hungarian gave me the paprika 101. Apparently, the two most common types of paprika are either édes (sweet) or csipős (hot). But one could also go for the különleges deep red, finely ground paprika, which is mild. Or for those with a predilection for a dash of searing heat in their food, the rózsa, a dark red, medium-coarse paprika which tends to be very hot, is your best bet.

At lunch later that day at Zeller Bistro, a Budapest icon that regularly gets its share of ‘five star’ reviews for its wide range of paprika-rich offerings, Zoltan, an old university buddy, introduced me to a plethora of Hungarian classics that hero the spice. We started off with a cliché. Better known to most as goulash, gulyásleves is by itself a very basic meat and potatoes kind of stew that gets elevated to high gastronomic heaven when a dash of paprika and cream are added to it. Similarly, halászlé, the humble fishermen’s soup — made using river fish like carp or pike fished from the Danube — takes on a spicy hue when the warmer édesnemes variety of paprika is added to it.

By then, utterly obsessed with all things paprika, I found myself at Paprika Molnar factory, in the village of Roszke 15 kilometres from Szeged city. It is here I took a guided tour and learnt how things weren’t all rosy (pun intended) for paprika very recently, almost causing a national crisis.

In 2013, production hit a rough patch when Hungarian paprika exports slumped, as buyers across the world turned to cheaper supplies mainly from China and Latin America. This was in the wake of two years of unpredictable weather Hungary faced, resulting in the poorest yield of the paprika-producing capsicum annuum chilli in 50 years. I was told there was even talk of the possibility of Hungary having to import its very own treasured spice.

But in the last five years, things have taken an upward swing with production back on track, and once again, all is well in the land that literally worships its ‘red gold’.

(This article first appeared in the 2nd December 2018 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-hungary/article25642593.ece)

But in the last five years, things have taken an upward swing with production back on track, and once again, all is well in the land that literally worships its ‘red gold’.

Notes from Myanmar

By Raul Dias

It’s two days into my long-awaited trip to Myanmar and I’m a tad dejected. No one seems to have the slightest inkling when I speak of erstwhile Burma’s greatest “gift”’ to India—and one of my favourite on-screen dancers of all time—the Anglo-Burmese Helen Richardson, simply known to us as the mononymous ‘Helen’. Not my Bollywood-obsessed taxi driver whom I hail at the super swanky Yangon International Airport. And certainly not Sanda, my loquacious hotel receptionist who can always be found humming the latest filmi ditty. But one mention of Salman Khan, Helen’s stepson and every face lights up with unabashed adulation, coupled with starstruck wonder.

India Calling
In fact, the Nay Pyi Taw Cinema, still sitting pretty amidst all its faded grandeur on Yangon’s main arterial Sule Pagoda Road—and a stone’s throw from where I’m staying—is showing Race 3, Salman’s latest dud (well, in India at least!) to jam-packed houses. And get this…in its original, intended lingua franca of Hindi. No dubbing required for the Myanmarese hoi polloi who are said to devour every new Bollywood offering ravenously. And as much I would have loved to see this first hand, sitting through two-and-a-half odd hours of the flick seems like self-inflicted torture. And I’m no masochist! 
I choose instead to take in the city sights, starting with the most hallowed of all of Yangon’s pagodas—the sublime 2,500 years old Shwedagon Pagoda, glinting in the mid-day sun in all its golden splendour. Three hours later and a quick consult with my trusted travel app lets me know that I’m just a few meters away from the site of a rather interesting desi connection. Said to be the location of the grave of Bahadur Shah Zafar, the last Mughal emperor of India, the dargah on Zi Wa Ka Road built in his honour may be off limits for my shorts-clad self, but the caretaker is happy to take a picture of the innermost sanctum sanctorum that houses the tomb for me with my phone.

Same, Same Yet Different!
Interestingly, it is the local food that augments this apparent Myanmarese-Indian affinity the most strongly for me. The highly-authentic Bombay-style mutton biryani (with potatoes, et al) that I buy a take-way portion of at the Nilar Biryani Shop on Anawratha Road comes with a little dose of home sickness, as its septuagenarian owner fondly tells me that his grandfather emigrated to Yangon from my home city of Mumbai in the late 1800s.
The next day, for a teatime snack, I saunter down to the paan stalls-infested Northeast corner of Yangon’s Maha Bandula Park, where along Merchant Road street food hawkers peddle a dish that defies convention. Yes, the samosa salad or samusa thohk with its decidedly Indian underpinnings is an evening time snack that is the delicious sum of its chopped vegetable samosa bits, stewed chickpeas, fried shallots, cabbage, and sliced boiled potatoes parts. To this, a ladle full of fiery broth is added just before serving, making it a sort of spicy soup-salad hybrid.
For dinner, I go for a chitti kala meal that’s said to be an interpretation of Chettiar cuisine and one that is very popular in Yangon. My thali-like dish of a flaky htat taya palata (layered paratha) is the perfect mop for gravies like the piquant chicken curry and the green peas stew called pé-byohk. I wash this down with a near-to-authentic falooda-like drink called hpaluda and chase all this with a single malaing lohn i.e. Myanmar’s version of the gulab jamun.

Hamara Bajaj
A few days later, I find myself whizzing past pagoda after pagoda in the ancient, holy city of Bagan, nestled in the heart of the country. My autorickshaw driver Win Min Oo, while declaring his undying love for his India-made Bajaj tuk tuk, lets me in on one of the greatest culinary surprises I’ve yet to encounter. While speaking of his wedding a few years ago, he tells me that no feast in Myanmar can ever be considered complete without the serving of a dish he calls danbauk and insists is Indian. It’s only a few hours later, post some intense culinary research, do I realise that Win was talking about. Apparently, the Mughlai slow oven cooking method of dum pukht is what the people of Bagan call the regional variant of biryani that is served with mango pickle, fresh mint and green chili. 
Marvelling at how films, culture and most importantly food can be great equalisers—never mind the distance in both time and geography that exists between old Awadh and modern-day Bagan—I settle down for my sunset dinner at one of Bagan’s many Irrawaddy riverfront restaurants. A plate of fragrant danbauk in front of me and my ears tuned in to an 80s Bappi Lahiri song.   

(An edited version of this article first appeared in the 28th October 2018 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-myanmar/article25333644.ece)

Notes from Kodaikanal

By Raul Dias

The gravitas of each of the 21, notorious hairpin bends one encounters en route to Kodaikanal via Palani below, was beginning to take its toll on me as I battled the ensuing waves of nausea. A raging earache threatened to exacerbate my misery, whenever my trusted SUV’s wheels made contact with the pothole-ridden asphalt of the hilly road. To top it all, I had just burst a blood vessel in my right eye thanks to a spontaneous subconjunctival haemorrhage that left me looking like the antagonist of an 80s Ramsay Brothers’ horror flick!
Little did I know then that I was following the same path—both literally and figuratively speaking—taken by a bunch of American missionaries way back in the mid-1800s. It was then that the bucolic hill station of Kodaikanal provided them with the much-needed succour as they convalesced from the dreaded malaria contracted in the plains below. But more on that little vignette later. First a bit of a revelation…

Cleanliness and Godliness
Having had my soul scarred for life by images of the disastrous effects mass tourism ‘bestows’ upon other Indian hill stations of its ilk, I was prepared for a place strewn with used chip packets, juice boxes and other ugly tourist detritus. But not Kodaikanal, apparently. Here, it was evident that the neatly lined garbage bins and ‘Keep Clean’ signage were clearly doing their job. Clean, freshly swept roads and sidewalks greeted me as I passed shop after shop on Kodaikanal’s famous Seven Roads junction selling rock candy, homemade chocolate and other sundries that are crucial elements to the tuck boxes of the students who board at the many schools Kodaikanal is famous for.
I was later to learn of the vital role both students and local youth play in keeping Kodaikanal as clean as it is. Both the Kodaikanal Lake Protection Council and the Vattakkanal Organization for Youth, Community and Environment (VOYCE) is active in preserving Kodaikanal’s environment where plastic bags are banned, and vendors encouraged to use recycled paper bags. All these measures were adopted after a study conducted by the Department of Atomic Energy confirmed that Kodaikanal Lake had been contaminated by mercury emissions.
Another surprise for me was the high concentration of churches that can be found here. Christianity brought over by the aforementioned American missionaries seems to be thriving here, as I recognised the Tamil versions of popular hymns sung in the La Salette Church next to where I was staying. The daily evening novenas, as a lead up to the annual 15th August feast of the Assumption of Mary, were followed by orderly processions taken out by the devotees with decibel levels well in check.

American ‘Invasion’
In another interesting departure from the idea of the ubiquitous colonial British-established Indian hill stations that served as cooling off places in summer, Kodaikanal was established in 1845 by a posse of Americans who sent up their women and children from Madurai below to both, seek refuge from the bloodthirsty mosquitos of the plains, and to recuperate from the rampant Malarial epidemics.
And the American influence is amply evident in Kodaikanal to this very day, specially in the unique architecture one sees there. Many of the original cottages and bungalows with names like Sunny Side and Shelton and modelled on those found in America’s colonial north-eastern New England region have today been repurposed keeping the original aesthetics as they were. In fact, the hotel that I stayed at is one such building that was one of the earliest structures constructed in Kodaikanal. Today known as The Tamara Kodai, the large barn-like building itself was originally called Baynes Bungalow owned by Mr. Baynes, a District Judge. When it was later sold to Father Louis Cyr in 1860, it was renovated to serve as a chapel thanks to its high-pitched roof and long wraparound balcony with its rooms used as a rest house for priests from Nagapattinam.  
Speaking of chapels, the former St Peter’s church that once stood in the abandoned old American cemetery along the town’s fecund Lower Shola Road had a tin roof salvaged from the many biscuit tins the convalescing children would go through. Well, they do say that necessity is the mother of invention, don’t they?     

(An edited version of this article first appeared in the 26th August 2018 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 8  https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-kodaikanal/article24770764.ece)

  

Notes from Switzerland

By Raul Dias

Fronted by the magnificent views of the hills of the city of Ascona on its Northwestern shoreline, Lake Maggiore—or ‘Lago Maggiore’ to use the lingua franca of Switzerland’s Italian speaking region of Ticino—is a rather unique waterbody. Not only is it the largest lake in Southern Switzerland, with its shoreline divided between the Italian regions of Piedmont and Lombardy and the Swiss canton of Ticino, but Lake Maggiore also holds within its placid waters a little secret. Tea.

Down to the Tea
Yes, around one hundred tea plants can be found on the Isola Grande, the larger of the lake’s two islands, close to the Ascona shoreline. But with these planted as mere sample crops, Ascona’s true claim to fame as home to mainland Europe’s (there is another on the mid-Atlantic Azores Islands of Portugal) first and only tea plantation, however, lies a little farther up a hill. Aptly called Monte Verità or ‘Mountain of Truth’, it was on this hill, perched precariously above the city of Ascona, where revolutionists, artists and philosophers once used to experiment new ways of life, all thanks to one man.
In 1964, Baron Eduard von der Heydt bequeathed the Monte Verità complex to the Swiss Republic and Canton of Ticino with the request that “Monte Verità be used for international artistic and cultural activities at the highest level”. So, in the mid-90s, taking this request seriously, Peter Oppliger an expert in medicinal plants and self-confessed ‘tea philosopher’ started experimenting with cultivating tea plant saplings brought in from India, China, Sri Lanka and Japan.
However, it was only in the autumn of 2005 that this botanic miracle of cultivating tea in Europe became a reality, thanks to Oppliger’s efforts and because of Ascona’s unique microclimate. It was then that the first harvest of the Camellia Sinensis variety of tea could successfully be made into a small amount of green tea.

Japan in Switzerland!
Today, in-keeping with the Monte Verità communal philosophy, combined with Oppliger’s aim of non-commercial cultivation, the modest-sized plantation is open for free to all those who are interested in understanding tea cultivation and production. Set up to resemble a bucolic Japanese tea garden, replete with gurgling streams, a zen garden and a gazebo, it is here where volunteers take guests on a tea quest of sorts.
“Il sentiero del tè” or “The Tea Way” is a course which has been built according to Japanese philosophy. Along this path, tea enthusiasts get to experience every aspect of the culture of tea from around the world. With everything from our very own desi chai deconstructed, to the modern-day trend of cold brewing explained to the, well…T!
However, it is at the last station, where the most intense of all tea experiences takes place. In a purpose-built Japanese style log cabin called a chashitsu, guests are taken through a ritual chanoyu Japanese tea ceremony.

Add Ons…
But it’s not all about tea atop Monte Verità. For architectural style enthusiasts like myself, the Monte Verità Hotel next to the tea plantation with its large communal balconies and wide corridors presented itself as a perfect specimen of the languid, rather fluid lines of the Bauhaus architectural movement of the mid-20^th century. A style that itself was born out of the post-WWII need for austerity by embracing utilitarianism and community, while vehemently condemning ornamentation of any kind and thus a continuation of Baron Eduard von der Heydt’s ideology of fostering artistic and communal expression.

(An edited version of this article first appeared in the 22nd July 2018 issue of The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine section on page 7 https://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/travel/notes-from-switzerland/article24481825.ece)