It all started with some of my friend and I discussing some project and at 3:15AM I suggested that we go down for a bite at the night mess. Two of my friends (Anshul and Sumar) quickly picked up some cash and got ready, but when we got to the mess, we got to know that the mess/canteen had run out of all eatables by that hour. We got the idea to explore open place outside the campus to grab a bite at 3:30AM, and the one suggestion that came from the security guard at the gate was Medu Mess near IIT. An auto driver told us that it would be open in the next few minutes, and so began our trip to the Famous Medu Mess. The one we were told about by our seniors. The one which is a legend since it is the only source of decent food at such odd hours of the day.
Little did we realize that it is located in some interior corner of some locality. Initially we were under the impression that the auto driver is taking us to some secluded location and we would be ripped off, since there was no source of light to indicate the existence of a mess or any sort of eating place. He took us through routes that I had no clue about. Finally we stopped in front of a few shops with their shutters closed and a lamp post with barely enough illumination. When we asked the auto drive where the mess was, he pointed to a dark alley narrowly lying between two adjacent shops. Somewhere inside that alley was the Medu mess. At the first glance you would easily miss the alley, but then the auto driver seemed to know what he was talking about. Personally, I was not too sure about his intentions. When we got to know that the mess would be opened at around 4AM, we had to kill another 20 minutes. We tried to chat about the weird stuff that we saw at 3:40AM when almost whole city is sleeping. We saw poultry that was just brought in for a butcher's shop , the stray cat that took a liking for Anshul, the huge houses in the neighborhood and the distant cars that were visible. Anshul even shot a video of how the chicken was offloaded from the truck swearing about how we sell our souls when we eat non-vegetarian food referring to the cruel treatment of the poultry. It was Sumar who reminded Anshul that he himself was a hard core non-vegetarian and wouldn’t even give all this a second thought the next morning.
A little while later a few of our other colleges also turned up to grab a bite. These colleagues who are from South India told us about the awesome South Indian food that the Medu mess serves. Within the few min after that, a police patrol jeep drove down the road narrow street towards us. We were all under the assumption that this was just another routine patrol and nothing really to be concerned about, but when the jeep stopped its engine right in front of the mess, we were confused. One of the police men started asking my south Indian friends some questions, while Anshul, Sumar and I were standing a bit away from the jeep. Unfortunately my curiosity got the better of me and I poked my head closer to the place of conversation. My colleagues called out to me and asked me to help in the translation considering that language barrier between the cop and my colleagues from south India. My colleague seemed uncomfortable and I thought to myself, "is this cop business really happening?" I wasn’t expecting all this to be the result of a bunch of hungry students in the middle of the night/dawn. I walked up to them as casually as possible, but in my head I said, “Oh, shit, why did I have to feel hungry at such odd hours? And even if I did feel hungry, why did I come over the most secluded streets. Little did I realize that at 4AM, virtually all streets were secluded", so my thought process was obviously overwhelmed by the sequence of events this night. When I walked up to my colleagues to ask if there was any trouble, I was least expecting the conversation I was about to have. The cop seemed to be irritated or probably just wanted to show who the boss was. I had no doubt about that part for sure. He asked if anyone knew how to speak Hindi or Marathi and I told him I knew Hindi. He asked me what time I eat food. At first I was confused, I thought he was asking about some why we were there, so I told him that we were hungry and were “Studying” so wanted to grab a bite. A few more questions from him and my responses around our forthcoming exams seemed to convince him enough to get him off our back. The next thing we realize that the cops are beating on the door of the Medu mess and talking to the meek fellow who comes out. Poor chap who hadn’t even opened his shop for business got in trouble for operating at hours outside the permitted timing. The chap was taken inside the police jeep and had a “Conversation”. The auto drive gave us a hint to get back in the auto and keep our heads down. He said, “You guys won’t be getting anything to eat for quite a while from this place today, until the chap sorts out this matter of course”.
We obeyed the saviors of the moment and followed his lead. Within seconds we had hit the street to head back to the college campus. A little while later we crossed a police check post and Sumar noticed a policeman on a bike right behind us. He told us that this time we were in some serious trouble. But just then the bike zoomed past us and we took a breadth of air to our starved lungs. At 4:40AM when we landed back in the campus, we paid the auto drive 100 bucks and concluded that the night was quite an epic one. Not only did we shell out 100 bucks, dodged nosy cops, and sleepy like hell, we were back to square one, being hungry.
PS: pardon my typos or any other errors. at 5:30AM, I am a bit sleepy to notice how my english is structured.
