This review was sent in by Foodie

After much pondering and deliberation a friend and myself, decided to investigate this bastion of oceanic cuisine. Having been bombarded with advertising about the freshness of the various varieties of sea food. One felt it curious what all the fuss was about.

Situated in phase 2, defense, karachi. The entrance contained a fish market annexe, filled with fish tanks and a fish display on ice. We took this as a positive omen. The fish at least would be fresh! We were seated in the basement, which seem to have blue lighting for some reason , not the best set up for underground establishment. However, the icing on the cake were the casio keyboards being played by the, what can be described as hobby musician. Off course, the wall mounted plasma tv was simply lovely!!

Menu arrived in a wonderful shaadi album garb. We ordered, jumbo sesame prawns and prawn rolls. Unfortunately the rolls were soggy. As a main course, Rock lobster thermidor, ( one of the few places in town, selling rock lobster, so I was particularly looking forward to it), crab fried rice and steamed grouper in Soya sauce. The food was presented well, however, the lobster contained tinned mushrooms as opposed to fresh, surprising as we’re in the middle of mushroom season, this was rather puzzling.

The cheese was rather low quality, causing it to become reminiscent of something you scrape of your shoe. Fried rice, soggy and over peppered, also contained low quality Soya sauce. Fish was a complete disaster, as it has gone off, the stench was almost unbearable. Once again a narrowly avoided food poisoning! In conclusion, an experience not to be repeated.

So i’m standing at my favourite eat out place, Karachi Broast, waiting for my order.. when a police-wala comes in.

(Conversation has been slightly modified, but the theme is the same)
Cop to Shop Owner: are you the Shop Owner here
Shop Owner: yes……..
Cop: just coming around to inform you that we wont be around for an hour….
Shop Owner (returning back to his work): okay……… cya
Cop: Yea, you see, we’re supposed to stay here during our full shift.. but we have to eat too…
Shop Owner (Still not looking up): okay.. please go have ur dinner
Cop: Yea, the thing is… our DSP talked with your association manager and he complained about us not being here. So they setup a deal for some of the shops here to supply meals for us, and we’ll be on duty the whole time……
Shop Owner: (Totally ignoring him…): hhhhmmmmm….
Cop: ….. but whenever we come to any of the shop, they tell us its not their turn, or to goto another shop. Humey buhut sharmindagi hote hai aise maangney mein….
Shop Owner: (wishing he was somewhere else..): umm hmmmmm…..
Cop: So we’re just telling you guys we wont be around for an hour. We hope nothing will happen during that time.. but if khuda-na-khasta it does, you know we wont be around to do much.
Shop Owner: mmm.. okay…. cya
Cop: Yea.. but if we get to have dinner from here, we’ll be around to make sure nothing happens. And do our duty to the fullest.
Shop Owner: (almost visibly agitated by now): ummm. hmmmm…………
Cop: (sensing nothing can be gotten here): Any idea where would your association manager be right now?

thats when someone came and took him along to see the Association manager. I was just standing there, looking and getting amused all the time.

There’s excitement in the air!!

Over 15 cities all over the world are offering up the best of what they have to offer to the world this holiday season. Karachi is one of them, and so is Islamabad. Other cities participating are Los Angeles, Washington DC, Chicago, Seattle, Detroit, Portland, Dallas, Sacramento and Philadelphia from the US, Montreal from Canada, Vienna, Berlin, London and Graz from Europe, Karachi, Islamabad and Chennai from Asia and Melbourne from Australia, making this a truly globe-spanning effort. Since we’re already half-way through the exercise, i thought i’d let you in on what some of the other cities are upto.

David Markland at Los Angeles Metblogs is keeping a running list of the various gifts the cities are offering up. The list, or The Guide as he calls it is maintained here.

The list is definately worth checking out. My favourite gifts by other cities so far are the Black Cab from London, the TV series Dallas from…. well Dallas, Improv from Chicago and ofcourse the Simpsons from Portland. Which ones are yours?

Update: Till from Berlin has setup a delicious bookmark for all the gifts given from each city. Check it out here.

When you think of nihari, only one thing comes to mind… YUMM!!!

The texture, spiciness, and tenderness of this dish makes it a all-round favourite of everyone who’s ever been to karachi.

A little history: Nihari is originally a dish from the Muslims of Delhi and is most popular in Pakistan. It is a stew made from beef or lamb and curry. The Muslims of Delhi are the ones who actually brought it to Pakistan and popularized it there. Nihari originated as a dish of the Muslim upper class society in Delhi. It passed to other classes as Muslim ascendency and power declined. This was after the waning of Mughal power in the mid to late 18th century when many muslim families from the Mughal nobility became impoverished.

“In the spirit of all the holiday gift giving that will be taking place over the next couple of months, all the Metroblogging cities are giving 7 gifts to the world throughout the week of NOV 26th – DEC 2. This is 3rd Gift to the World.”

You’ve probably noticed im following the roll out of dengue and its related activities with quite some interest now. My last thread was on how to detect the presence of dengue carrying mosquitos around your home/office. Today, i bring you a prevention technique which caught my eye recently.

Without further ado, i present……

Prevent Dengue Fever – The Islamic Way

Translation: Read surah #64 AT-TAGHABUN and blow it on a glass of water. Serve this glass of water to everyone in the house. Inshallah good health will follow (Anyone can come up with a better translation, let me know). Interestingly, according to the MCA website, Surah At-taghabun relates to Mutual disillusion…

P.S. Dengue fever is still quite an active threat, dont take it lightly. Prevention is better than cure afterall.

“In the spirit of all the holiday gift giving that will be taking place over the next couple of months, all the Metroblogging cities are giving 7 gifts to the world throughout the week of NOV 26th – DEC 2. This is 4th Gift to the World.”

In karachi, we dont have much museums. Atleast, i didnt think so, and when a couple of friends decided to go visit Mohatta Palace, i was esctatic. The experience was so good that today, i present to you as Gift #4 from Karachi….. The Mohatta Palace.

Named after its founder, the Mohatta Palace was built between 1933 and 1935 by Shivratan Chandratan Mohatta and was used as the residence of Fatima Jinnah, sister of our great leader, Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Today, its used as a musuem featuring ceramic arts from over the centuries and the Jewel in the Crown exhibition which features the history of the city. Within the four walls, it carries a lot of the partition era memorabilia, including pictures, letters and even instruments from DJ Science college.

Outside on the grounds stand three picture displays, featuring various personalities from the partition time. Once you go through there, you realize why so many major roads in the city have been named after these famous personalities, such as I.I. Chundrigar, Abdullah Haroon and so forth. Also within the grounds, stands a beautifully restored Rolls Royce used by Jinnah, as well as an old fire engine belonging to the city.

The whole experience is definately an eye opener and i strongly suggest everyone in the city and who comes to visit the city to definately give it a vist.

It’s 4:00 am in the morning, I just woke up and Hey!! It’s Raining!!… Yeah I am all wet and can’t go back to sleep right away, so I thought I did make a quick post . ByTheWay the rain will surely bring some chill to the weather. What do you say ?

Starting from Zainub Market, all the way to Empress Market, comprised of Bohri Bazar, Electronic Market, Abdullah Haroon Road, lies an area that can truly be regarded as shoppers paradise. Here you can find everything that money can buy. Be it clothes, leather jackets, snake skin purses, carpets, cosmetics, jewellery, perfumes, shoes, pet animals, books, sports equipments, cell phones, consumer electronics, handicrafts, paper items, crockery, furniture, books, cheap dentists, doctors, black magic experts, palmists, ghost busters, you name it. If you can’t find it in Saddar, it doesn’t exist. And that holds true for car parking as well. It’s better that you take a cab.

Here you will find the true Karachi. Here, if you are skilled enough, you can negotiate to buy anything 50% off the list price, or lower. Here, if you are not careful enough, you can easily be a victim of a con artist. Here you will find best chana papri (yum yum!!) in town. Here, if you have the eye for it, you will find some genuine artifacts, and some not quite so genuine.

This is Saddar, the heart of Karachi.

….in peak high traffic hours, the driver infront of you believes he is in the dating lane???

“The dating lane” is far left lane on certain roads where aspiring romantics drive slow and enjoy each others pleasant company. This term was coined revealed to me by a seaview resident, who gets to see these pretty often.

Back to the question….imagine yourself in the far right lane, during peak traffic hours (say 8.15/20 am), on Shahrah e Faisal and the driver ahead of you strolls at a leisurely pace…..what do you do??

This is not a poll…..commenters may feel as creative as they please. but whatever you do, please do not post a comment that says “i agree with xyz….i would do the same etc etc…”…

Get those creativity juices flowing…

:)

(in case you were wondering what this has to do with karachi aside from the fact that Shahrah e faisal has been mentioned, well….i faced this scenario this morning…was left wonder what all one could do).

During the process of our city’s (extremely partial and selective) beautification Ideas 2006, I found benches being installed. yes, benches.

Why on earth would the CDGK and/or the CBF install benches along Shahrah-e-Faisal? These benches are located the PAF museum side of the road, in the area loading from the Faisal base entrance to the Museum. Thankfully they have cleared up the shrubs that used to be back there, lets hope something worthwhile grows there now!.

Back to the point, who walks that length??

Additional places where benches were spotted:
1. Millenium Mall intersection
2. Karsaz/Stadium Road/Dalmia intersection (bench located in small green patch between entry and exit from Karsaz Road, facing Dalmia Road).

Again…this city needs gardens, not makeshift green belts (read patches) with benches on it!