Of Quark Crashes and Kebab Platters

Flashback 2006, Mumbai: It had been only a few months since I had been introduced to Waleed Hussain at a TOI retreat. On a day in the month of Ramadan, he had offered to take me along on a food trail through Mohammad Ali Road. I was excited but a page with my story on it had to be finished. I was proofreading it when Waleed dropped in at my desk. I told him to wait for 10 minutes and he agreed and went to meet a friend on the floor. The page was read and then Quark crashed 😭. When it was up again, it didn't look like a page anymore. When Waleed came back after ten minutes he found me disappointed. I told him I wouldn't join him for the trail, for I had to get the designer to do it again. He had to break his fast. So he sat down on my chair, deconstructed and reconstructed the page in 5 minutes and proofread it in less 2, ready for print. I had never seen anyone work that fast at that stage of my career. He whispered, "I can make a page in 5 minutes but I don't want anyone to know. Let's go for kebabs."😂