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April 24, 2000

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Fun on a Platter

Restaurants in Chennai become allround chill out zones as owners throw in plays, poetry reading, games and music to draw in crowds

By Methil Renuka

Know what? There's more to a restaurant than just food. The people of Chennai are just finding that out. So they are browsing through bestsellers on racks once they order, eyeing paintings on walls as they wait, even putting up shows of their own, doing crosswords on their table mats and wolfing down the burgers and hot chocolate on the menu while they are at it. Eateries are no longer just eateries, they're much more in Chennai these days. Priya Madhusudan, 25, is a copywriter at HTA in the city. Because both she and her husband "work so hard", it makes them want to relax even harder on weekends. The usual food-and-drink places just won't do. What they are looking for are restaurants that go the whole hog "to help you take in the comfort levels and the people better". In other words, a chill-out zone. Must have been why Tito Chandy, 34, wildlife biologist and nature lover, put in all his "money, intuitions and wacky ideas" into Earth Bazaar, a factory shed-turned-food-and-game-shack on TTK Road last April. Strikingly casual, complete with the non-gloss, matte-finished look, Earth Bazaar has a few tables strewn around here and there -- for pool, table tennis and dining -- with some caroms, dart and chess boards thrown in, a platform at the far end for plays and poetry-reading sessions, even music and dance classes. And hang on while you hang out. Chandy's also has artefacts for sale sourced from his many wanderings in the wild. He believes eateries will soon start hiring entertainment managers and visualisers to do the creative work.
Gunit Singla, who started Stop at Sam's with husband Samir last month, explains why: "Restaurants are out. People are looking for combos, for many things to do in one evening.'' So visiting celebs stop by at Sam's to hold discussions with customers, and a professional balloon 'sculpturer' keeps families flocking in. Pizza Hut in Chennai includes a 250-sq ft kiddies' recreation centre and a "jig and jive" routine that its fleet-footed staff break into every hour. There's also Coffee? on Greenways Road, a cosy little hang-out with 33 varieties of coffee, poetry-reading sessions, and sunny walls doubling up as an art gallery. Or there is Qwiky's on Village Road. Bruce Fernandes, 24, senior catering assistant at the Taj Coromandel's Southern Spice restaurant, heads there most afternoons during his three-hour break from work. And it's not just a lunch of stuffed chicken sausage that draws him there. Fernandes enjoys picking T-shirts, caps, cards, magazines, paperbacks, even undies from its racks. "Chennai was desperately in need of a third space, an in-between space after home and work," gushes Sashi Chimala who started Qwiky's last year (a branch opened last week). "It's like a community meeting place where you get everything -- food, friends, merchandise, entertainment, news, views." As for Coffee?, proprietor Nirav Shah, 24, started it last August because "most restaurants in the city were becoming dull and boring". With its leaping yellow and blue walls, that's something Coffee? is not.

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