How much champagne can you drink? The answer to that, of course, depends on whether you’re paying for it or somebody else is. I’ve rarely known people to get tiddly when they’re swiping their own credit card for the bubbly — not by the bottle, naturally, but by the glass. But its consumption is much more in conspicuous evidence when there’s no danger of a bill dangling before you after you’ve drained your ninth flute and are wondering whether you can manage the next, or whether it’s wiser to quit because the ground seems to have become wobblier than it was an hour ago.
It’s the same with food. Rarely do we settle for both aperitif and soup for lunch, and if there’s a selection of starters, you can bet that most people would prefer to share their main course to be able to spend some time debating whether or not to spring for dessert. Yet, logic deserts us when the promise of a good time at someone else’s expense means you can have all your courses, and extras, and not feel guilty for it.
At least that’s the only way to make sense of a mid-week invitation to board the Maharajas’ Express, India’s plushest train that was doing a special run from Delhi to Rewari and back for select guests — with champagne on tap. There’s something deliciously decadent about sipping champagne before noon, when the temperature outside is hot enough to fry eggs on the sidewalk, of nibbling at satays and tikkas when, on the platforms whizzing past, you can see other passengers queueing up for their hoi-polloi fare. Marie Antoinette would have approved of the hedonism — if you can’t have water, she might have added, drink Veuve-Clicquot instead.
“I could get used to this,” said my wife on her fifth glass of Veuve-Clicquot, yet proof that she wasn’t alone was manifest in the laughter and loud conversations — and not a few glasses smashing to the tinkle of crystal that, I’d read somewhere, the more maverick maharajas had grown fond of: hurling cases of their favourite glasses to the floor because the sound was delightful, and addictive. So, yes, we wanted the mousse and salmon and filo-pastry; the cold soup was a challenge to produce on the train’s kitchen and consisted of tomatoes and peaches; the prawns we all seemed to settle for (over chicken roulade, understandably) could have put a Michelin-starred restaurant to shame. And there was even more champagne, or wine, to go with the courses — no wonder the tipsy guests who went off to view the suites on board seemed to sway more than the train warranted.
Proof that all good things come to an end, some earlier than anticipated, was the rude shock that returned us to the platform and heat outside. No more were there musicians serenading us; no more welcome arches of flowers; the red carpet had been rolled away — and we were actually expected to walk up the staircase to cross the railway lines and descend once more to more humdrum lives and the waiting cars outside.
Still, it was in the haze of the fabulous experience that we went out for dinner to my brother’s home the same evening. He didn’t offer us champagne, which was parsimonious of him, there were bland sausages for hors d’oeuvres, the service was a little tardy, the beer glass that broke didn’t have a musical sound to it, and the meal wasn’t served on 24-carat tableware. And if the atmosphere wasn’t convivial, you could blame it on my wife. Did she want a cocktail, my brother had asked her, only to have her reply, “As long as it’s free.” Some of us, it appears, still have to get the Maharajas’ Express experience out of our system.