Introducing the future Princess of Bombay.

Once, a few days into my time in the capitol I decided that sooner or later I was gonna have to get over my dread of eating alone. Always and without fail the food of any country or trip or experience or visit with a friend or random day in the city or really any day at all is my access point, it’s the catalog of memory through which I organize my life’s experiences. Details on a particular day or memory get fuzzy, but I can tell you with precision EVERYTHING about a meal I had once on a beach in Mexico when I was eight, and so I can tell you everything about that beach. The meal is my favored part of any day, especially when I’m traveling, and I obviously hadn’t expected this to be any different. But it hadn’t really occurred to me before I left that if I was trekking by myself for two and a half months, I would have to eat by myself too. Honestly, if that thought had hit me on the other side of the Atlantic, I don’t think you could have paid me onto the plane. Let me just say… I HATE eating alone. I hate the disappointed looks waiters give you as they seat you while simultaneously calculating how small their tip will be. I hate the looks even more when instead of disappointment it’s a kind of sarcastic silent amusement. I hate the once over other diners give you unabashedly when you walk in as if subtlety and discretion don’t really matter when someone is alone. I hate that no matter where in the room you get seated, it’s always gonna be bad. It could be in a lonely corner, or right by the door, or off in a little abandoned nook by the bathroom, or smack in the middle of the room… I can’t decide which of these is worse, but the Murphy’s Law of solo dining says that it’s going to be one of them. I know I’m sounding pretty gloom and doom here, but you’ve just got to understand how much I hate this. It goes against all of the things I most love about food.

I love the sort of pageantry it. I love the progression and order and grace, the procession of pleasure that is a truly great meal. I love the exclamations over all of the delights on the menu and the shared battle over what’s to be ordered, I love the comfortable chatter as you wait, I love oohs and ahhs as dishes are tried, I love the tasting of bits of various plates, and once all of that is done I love what emerges when people sit together over food. The best conversations, the funniest jokes, the most whole-hearted laughter, the most unguarded confidences, the most pure pleasures of my life… all of them have happened over food. Maybe this is getting a little transcendental, but I think a good meal transforms. I’ve always thought that my relationships hit their true form when we sit down to eat together. My friends get closer, my family is warmer, my girlfriends look their most pretty, my guy friends get funnier, my old friends grow more intimate, my new friends connect on a deeper level. I know this might sound silly, but to me when you sit together and experience a meal, really any meal (except maybe fast food, which totally misses the point of all of this), that’s when life is best.

And all of that is why I hate eating alone so much. No matter how much my love of food remains unchanged (and trust me, it always will be), what good is a fantastic explosion of flavor in your mouth if there’s no one to exclaim over it with you, or at least (like my oh-so-patient friends in New York) put up kindly with your moaning and groaning about how wonderful it all is.

But I guess if I really wanted to make friends with loneliness, I was going to have to get over this sooner or later.

Before I left home I read this book my mom bought me about traveling alone, only half as a joke. The author had dedicated an entire chapter to eating alone. She said that restaurants are like theater, and that solo diners, by the simple virtue of them being just that, are the stars. At the time that seemed more than a little ridiculous. I mean, come on, I may hate it, but it’s not all THAT. That actually sounded kind of fun.

On my first full night in Madrid I finally bit the bullet and walked into a place, after wandering for probably somewhere around an hour looking for some kind of way out… a shining light somewhere where I would suddenly stop feeling so silly. Eventually I just gave in and found a rather ordinary little place (by Spanish standards that is, which means it was absolutely adorable), with no shining light but a very tempting risotto. And you know the funny thing? That writer was absolutely right. It was eerie. I walked in and unashamedly, unabashedly, every head turned. The waiter put me smack dab in the middle, and I felt like Little Red Riding Hood. My, what a big room this is! All the better to stare at you in. Half way through my meal I heard the little English guy at the table in front of me telling his wife (whose back was turned to me) what book I was reading, and that he hoped I knew that the ending wasn’t very good. I heard the French lady to my left comment approvingly on my choice of dish. I’m telling you, it was surreal. Anyway, my first experience only solidified my loathing of this thing.

But then I tried again, the next day. I was walking by the palace again

(Pinch me, please.)

And there was this little café and it just looked so friendly and inviting that I thought I might as well just try one more time before banishing myself forever to the world of picnics and street food. I had a paella, which really just screams Spain and it was more or less fantastic:



But what finally did it… what finally cured me of my hatred were three little Indian gentlemen in the corner. They sat down about half-way through my meal, and spoke only Indian and English and not a drop of Spanish. A lot of restaurants here, especially for lunch, will serve only Menu Del Dias, which just means a set three-course menu for a total sum price. They’re usually a steal depending on where you go, and they make me feel bizarrely sophisticated. Anyway, these little men didn’t quite get the concept, and the when the waiter approached them with a speedy river of Spanish asking them which menu they wanted they began an increasingly flustered stream of English, which prompted the waiter to throw back an even more curt bout of Spanish. Eventually I felt so bad for them that I broke in and explained what he was trying to ask them. “Oh, that’s great! You (addressed to the waiter) just talk to her, and she’ll order for us!” What began was an hour long exchange as I attempted to interpret in my broken survival Spanish the ever-growing requests of these three little men. At the end they offered to pay for my meal (which I refused… I mean come on, creepy!), and gave me their business card along with strict instructions to call them if I was ever in Bombay, and they would be at my service.

How funny.

Anyway, I think I walked away from that exchange realizing that this thing really isn’t as scary as I made it out to be… and honestly, just because you sit down alone doesn’t mean you have to BE alone.

I think little by little I’m conquering this thing. And that’s kind of cool.