Meherbai’s  marvelous Mandli met for the first time in the brand new year for lunch at Meherbai’s club to discuss their New Year’s resolutions.

Keki Khadhro: First things first. Let’s order food.

Polly Pipyu: No! First the hot drinks. Then food, along with cold drinks.

Keki ordered large quantities, in the hope that he will take home the left-over food. Polly and the ‘boys’ (all over 70) ordered whiskeys, mocktails and beers while the Mandli girls ordered cocktails and mocktails along with fish, chicken and paneer starters. The starters were so finger-licking good that nobody touched the four plates of peanuts and six plates of wafers.

Keki Khadhro: Never waste food. Why are you all wasting the wafers and the pea-nuts?

So saying, he emptied the wafers in a plastic bag he had brought along and pea-nuts in his wife’s old meli-gheli-bajaar-ni-theli.

Baji Bachelor: I have resolved that this year I’ll marry a nice rich girl who can finance me for life.

Coomi Kaajwali: Bajibhai, you are already 80, so how much life remains? Not much!!

Baji Bachelor: I already have two girls in mind. Both nearing 80. One is a divorcee and the other a widow. Best part is, both have one flat each in Cusrow Baug and one-and-a-half foot in the grave. Now, I just have to do eena-meena-maina-mo and settle down with one of them. I want to be happy like my married friends.

Coomi Kaajwali:  Forget it. When you’re single, you see happy couples everywhere and when you are married, you see happy singles everywhere.

Lovejibhai Le-Le-Goor-Goor: My resolution is to build my body like John Abraham.

Amy Atom Bomb: Mareray! You are so skinny and weak. Fook marey toh oodi jai! What you need is not a body but an antibody vaccine since you are always sick.

Ketu Khadhri: I resolve to give up fast foods.

Bitchy Bachamai: Look who’s talking after eating five burgers in a row last night. Ketu dear, if you give up fast food, India’s economy will suffer.

Sorabji Sali-Boti: My resolution is to sell my Khatara scooter and buy a small second-hand car with dark windows, so I can give lifts to all the pretty ladies of my colony!

Dara Daku: My resolution is to take morning walks for optimum health but what to do? I watch ‘Netflix’ till 3 a.m. and by the time I wake-up, the morning’s gone and it’s afternoon!!

Homai Health-freak: How unhealthy! No wonder you’re always sick.

Vikaji Vaaghmaru: My resolution is to stand as a Trustee for the next BPP elections.

Naju, Malai-nu-khaju: Forget it! Tamaru BP high par thi highest thai jasey. Tamari divas ni bhookh aney raat ni oongh udi jasey aney tamari wicket pari jasey. Gupchup khai pee ney mahjha karo.

Vikaji: I want some sort of post and public recognition. I want to have a public image. I want to be famous.

Jabri Jaloo: Bawa, you are already President of the Bettha Bekar Society of retired men in our colony. You’re already famous!

Coomi Kaajwali: He is more infamous than famous. Even Lovjibhai Loafer’s daughter, sexy Shirin-the-siren rejected him.

Freny Fatakri: I want to travel and see the world, but my health doesn’t permit it.

Alamai Eienstein: If your health is so bad, how come you go for five to six trips a year? Nothing happens to you then! Only after the trip ends, you start crying!

Freny: Perhaps it’s the change of weather that makes me sick!

Alamai: Forget weather! Change your mind-set. You’re always talking of sickness and bringing it into your consciousness. Give up that habit as this year’s resolution. Talk health, eat healthy, exercise and above all, stop complaining about your imaginary health-problems. No one is interested. Instead, show gratitude to God for being fit as a fiddle at 80 and traveling all over India every few months.

Bomi Bevdo: I resolve to give up alcohol – even cocktails!

Polly Pipyu: Look who’s talking!! You come to my house on some pretext or the other and polish off half a bottle of my best whisky.

Bomi: And you come to my house to polish off my Black Label, saying Pour more, Pour more when I serve it!!

Polly: Doctor’s orders. My family doctor Aspi Aspro has ordered me to have davaa-daru on time. Never mind the davaa, I never miss having daru on time!

Jaroo Geography: (So-called because of her seriously dangerous curves). My resolution is to improve my mind so I’ll start reading.

Mandli: Reading what?

Jeroo: I’ll start with newspapers and who knows? By next year, I may be reading Shakespeare.

Alamai: Do you even know where Shakespeare lived?

Jeroo: Of course!! Shakespeare lived in Ballard Pier.

Alamai: Do yourself a favour Jeroo, first buy some elementary general knowledge books meant for children and then talk of Shakespeare!

Soon, Adi Adagro arrived apologizing for being late.

Adi Adagro: Sorry folks. I’m late because I came walking and reading all the posters on the way. At the bus stop, it was written: “Aana free, Jaana free, Pakde gaye toh Khaana free.” Outside a beauty parlour, it was written: “Don’t whistle at the girl going out from here, she may be your grandmother.”

By now, lunch was over and before anybody could lay their hands on any food, Keki Khadhro filled-up his tiffin boxes (which he always carried, just in case) with the left-overs.

Keki’s wife: Keks, take home the left over Bisleri water bottles too! We can fill them with tap-water, chill them and serve them to our guests.

Just then, Meherbai’s chickenwala phoned and she asked him to send her six kilos of chicken tomorrow as she was having a lunch party.

Keki’s wife: Keks and I can’t come. We are invited elsewhere.

Meherbai: Chickenwala, send only two kilos chicken, not six kilos.

Keks wife: We are going for a Navjote in the morning, followed by Patra nu lunch and in the evening at Colaba Agiary. My Keks will carry his tiffin-boxes to both functions, so there will be Lagan nu Bhonu for the entire week at home!

Keki Khadro: Of course, we’ll give a handsome pehramni of Sagan na Rupees 21/-and save on the cab expense by taking a lift from our neighbour, Dollymai Daver in her Mercedes.

Alamai: No wonder, you two get so few invitations!

Keki: What invitation? We invite ourselves to every wedding, navjote and gambhar in town. Best to rely on self-help!!

Meherbai ended the lunch-date saying that her resolution was to read more, write more, listen more, think more, feel more and be more creative, walk daily and build-up body-muscle and try to have fresh thoughts daily to push the mind to greater limits.

Meherwanji: I’m lucky to have a wife like Meherbai who makes me experience all the fun, adventure, magic and mystery of day to day living in the journey of life!!