Cafe Mondegar : An interesting cafe with the murals of Mario Miranda — pub culture caricatures.

      Since my college days, as a fan of Mario Miranda, I have been following his cartoons till today. Introduced through The Illustrated Weekly of India to the Indian audience in 70s, Mario Miranda and R.K.Laxman both became familiar names within a short period. Both the cartoonists were totally different in their perception and approach to their respective works. Mario liked to capture the life of affluent and westernised people and unmask their reality beneath that show off, whereas Laxman liked to capture the feelings, aspirations and predicaments of common Indian man in different situations.  Both were equally good in sensitising the situation and bring out the best — both were equally famous.                                                                   

. I was in Mumbai to attend a function in the month of November 2017, and was staying at YWCA , which is  quite nearby to this Mondegar Cafe, to be precise, a fifteen minutes’ walk. It is at the entrance of Colaba as a landmark. Whenever I visit Mumbai, I never miss to visit this cafe because of its ambience, because of Mario Mirando’s exquisite murals on its walls. One needs to visit this place to see and feel the celebrations of Mario Miranda’s cartoons in each and every corner of this joint, in all possible manners. This cafe has two big murals: one reflects the life in Mumbai, and the other one reflects the atmosphere of the cafe. These murals adorning the walls of the cafe since1990s have given visual treat to the visitors who drop in to chill out, after a hectic day.

 A few minutes after the dusk, when we entered the pub, it was bustling with people, mostly youngsters. Big tall beer bottles were sitting at the centre of each table. The Mirando girls with toothy smile on the containers meant for tissue papers were there to greet everyone. The girl holding a fork in hand on one of the containers, with a big smile invited us to a small cosy table in the corner. From that point, we could see and feel the commotion in the other room too. Interestingly, the other room had a very large mural of a man carrying huge wooden beer containers on his cart pulled by a horse and westernised men standing in three piece suits with funny looks, by Mario Miranda in black and red. We ordered beer and finger chips. To feel the hustle and bustle, to hear the clattering of the glasses, to enjoy the visual beauty of the pub, we were there. The waiter came with a tin of beer, a couple of glasses, and a plate of finger chips. Wherever we stretched our eyes, we saw Mario glaring at us amusingly, I thought. With Mario’s drawing on the plate, the finger chips tasted very delicious. The waiters sported Mario’s cartoons on their white T shirts. I politely asked one of the waiters to take some photographs for me,  he obliged very happily after knowing that it is for a blogger. Enthusiastically, he took some more photographs and obliged me and Miranda together.  We said cheers to Mario and enjoyed our drinks with a relish. If every artist’s works adore the walls of public walls in this way, there will be a great  cultural change.