There comes a moment in every young man’s life when he must face his demons – not in the boardroom, not on a battlefield, but in the far more fearsome arena of adulthood: the kitchen.
My younger son Vikas, now trying to survive in Melbourne, has just entered that phase. Though he has landed a good position in a reputable MNC, the poor chap has to cook, clean, mop, shop, do the dishes – and still find time to act like he is having the time of his life. It is a rite of passage. And watching him, I am taken right back to my own days of domestic disorientation, when I first landed in Qatar to join the newly launched newspaper, The Peninsula.
The great domestic awakening
It was supposed to be a professional milestone. Except, my family’s residence visa got caught in some bureaucratic loop for nearly six months. So while I was busy editing news stories and designing pages, I was also discovering that oily, soulless restaurant food from every corner of the world tasted oddly the same – and not in a good way. And fast food, for me, has always meant junk food. That’s when I decided to embrace my culinary destiny.
Until then, I had only mastered one dish: the humble omelette. And in my completely unbiased opinion, it was the best omelette the world had ever seen. Gordon Ramsay would’ve wept.
Luckily, the apartments provided by my office for the staff were fully furnished and had all the essentials: fridge, kettle, table, chairs. I didn’t have to go hunting for appliances. I just had to buy a few basic utensils, a knife set, and a chopping board. Then began the daily ritual of calling my mother or my wife – one for moral support, the other for actual instructions – on how to make rice, dal, or a modest mutton curry.
The early days were a disaster zone. Rice was either undercooked or resembled sticky modelling clay. Dals were either bland or blew the roof off my mouth. But eventually, through trial, error, and sheer hunger, I reached a state where I could produce something edible and even… enjoyable.
The chapati challenge
And then came the great chapati challenge. You would agree no journey into self-reliance is complete without trying to make chapatis. My first attempts were unclassifiable. One resembled Australia, the next looked like Africa, and another like what the USSR used to be. But after many flour-dusted evenings, I cracked it. Round, soft, puffed-up beauties that almost made me want to open a food truck called Rotiland.
Suleimani and the art of acquired taste
In the middle of this, I developed a strange affection for suleimani chai – a strong, golden-brown tea with little or no sugar, introduced to me at The Peninsula. I didn’t like it at first. Too bitter. But slowly, it grew on me. Now I serve it to all my guests, assuming they will love it too – until my wife swoops in to rescue them with regular, sweet, milky tea. Over the years, she has learnt to make my perfect cuppa, though she is a coffee aficionado.
Enter the next generation
And now, decades later, Vikas finds himself in a similar solo act. Before flying off to Australia, he wisely picked up a few kitchen tricks from his mother – how to make a simple curry, cook rice without boiling the house down, and navigate the spice box without setting off alarms.
Unlike me, back when mobile phones were in their infancy, he didn’t have to buy expensive calling cards or time his long-distance queries from phone booths. One WhatsApp video call and he has got a full cooking masterclass, with zoom-ins on the tadka pan if needed.
He is also a digital-age doer. YouTube has replaced my notebook of scribbled recipes. If we want him to try something new, we just send him a link. He now makes dals, pasta, chicken curry – even biryani – with only occasional casualties.
The IKEA Olympics
He has been slowly assembling his own space – literally. Every week, a new appliance or furniture box arrives. He opens it, reads the instructions (unlike most men), and puts it all together. The latest was a work table, which he assembled while doing push-ups in between – just to show us how exhausting the task was, or that he is keeping fit.
I watched the time-lapse video he shared and felt a pang of deja vu – he and his older brother (both kids then) used to help me assemble flat-pack furniture when we were in Qatar and later in Dubai. They would proudly hammer the wrong screws into the wrong places. And now here’s Vikas, doing it all himself with flair.
Five months in, he is cooking confidently, managing chores, setting up his home piece by IKEA piece – and yes, even giving others tips on what knife to use for chopping onions. From zero to domesticated hero, in record time.
A home away from home
It’s heartwarming – and mildly hilarious – to watch. Because at the end of the day, it is not just about being able to feed yourself. It is about making a home away from home, one chapati-shaped continent at a time.
And as long as he doesn’t try to serve Suleimani to unsuspecting guests without a milk-and-sugar safety net, I would say the boy is doing just fine. Until then, here’s to sons who fry, fathers who fumble, and the lifelong adventure of learning how not to set the kitchen on fire.