When the Nizam lost his teeth
The Nizam was a bon viveur. We will refrain from talking about his sexual mores, as this tale has got a U certificate. Instead we will talk about his interest in hunting, in gambling … no, we will not, we will concentrate on his love of gastronomy. No my friend, I am not implying that he was a gourmandising Gargantua. No, he had a healthy appetite and he himself used to say that he had the finest palate on the subcontinent. He sometimes challenged his cook to leave out one spice from his menu, and after one mouthful he would tell him what was missing.
Every morning, after a half hour session at court where he listened to his ministers_ while munching badams and raisins_ he had lunch. This lasted from just befor noon to three in the afternoon. The menu consisted of mango lassi, peacock roasted on a charcoal spit with eighteen spices, venison samosas, curried fish, seven vegetables cooked in sesame oil, followed by a plate of methi pak, ras mallaï, rasgula and jalebi. I omitted the mention of alcohic drinks as per instruction from the lord chamberlain.
After a nap, as the sun was going down, he would begin to feel a little hollow opening up in his stomach, and he would make for dining room, ready for the main meal of the day. I say day, but it lasted until the early hours of the morning. I will not spend time listing what he ate, I think it would be more economical to tell you what did not appear on the table. To be honest I cannot think of anything.
Unsurprisingly his teeth began to trouble him, and there was little the court hakeem could do to arrest caries. We will refrain from drawing attention to the bad odours emanating from a mouth full of bad teeth. Then little by little the Nizam began losing his teeth. Special prayers were held throughout the land, to no avail. The decay was unstoppable.
This situation made eating difficult and painful. The chefs learnt to soften the meats, and although the Nizam did not like this much, he had to accept the inevitable. However inevitably his majesty lost all his teeth.
In the animal kingdom, when an old lion no longer had teeth, there was little the forest could do for its king. He wilted and died of starvation. Unsurprisingly the Nizam had no intention of dying.
He ordered his ministers and advisers to form a think-tank with the brief of finding the means of keeping him alive, and well-fed. The wise men_ in those days women were not deemed clever enough to have opinions_ divided themselves into subcommittees, and they discussed and argued for days, with no solution in sight. In forty days, not a single workable idea emerged from their combined erudition. Then one the forty-first day, one sub-committee cried, Eureka! They had found a way. Or so they thought.
A team of six chewers were hired to come work full time at the court. The palace kitchen would continue to prepare the rich menu the Nizam was accustomed to, and the plates would be passed to the chewers, who would chew mouthfuls until they became swallowable, when these would then be passed on to the toothless potentate.
This worked, but only to one extent: it kept the Nizam from starving, but his morale was on a downward spiral. There was nothing to live for, he said, for once the food was ready for his ingestion, all their taste would have disappeared.
The population found itself in the throes of sadness as they watched their beloved ruler wilt in front of their very eyes.
The think-tanks tried to think outside the tank, but to no purpose.
Then one morning, a sufi beggar came in through the palace gate. The pallid and haggard Nizam had partaken of some qahwa in the morning, but nothing else. He was seated in his garden whilst an oudh player was strumming his zither and humming to it. He invited the beggar to join him. The old white-bearded man sat next to his ruler who was so enraptured by the melodies that he had tears in his eyes, but he noticed that his companion was quite unmoved. Surprised, he asked the man if he liked the music. No, he replied.
‘I am a sufi. The pleasures of the physical world means nothing to me. I left all material possessions behind and now I roam the land in search of Allah’s truth. I find no joy is man-made music. Only Allah’s music pleases my ears.’
‘Allah’s music’
‘Yes, the wind whistling through the trees, the patter of rain drops on the roofs of houses, birdsongs …’
The Nizam was perplexed. He shrugged and ordered a servant to bring a full five-course breakfast for the beggar, but the latter shook his head.
‘Huzoor,’ he explained, ‘I only eat dry bread … I eat only to survive, tasty morsels are lost on me.’
‘No,’ insisted the Nizam, ‘to please me … just for once, since I can’t eat, let me at least enjoy the spectacle of someone lapping up the best.’
‘Well huzoor,’ the sufi explained, ‘if it pleases you, then I will obey my king, but I have trained myself not to enjoy the taste of good things. I chew without tasting and then when I have finished chewing, I swallow.’
‘Alham dolillah!’ said the Nizam, the colour returning to his cheeks.
