Mandani is piece of furniture mumbai housewives used for keeping kitchen utensils, if you can't recollect look at the picture. Years ago when CST was VT and Mumbai was Bombay it use to be an asset of desire for mumbai housewives.
In marathi the word mandani means organization, earlier people never cared to create metaphors; they were straight to the point. For housewives in mumbai Mandani had two main purposes, first a place to keep utensils and second to show them off.
For children’s it was a afternoon treasure hunt of sweets and spices. This was where mothers use to keep their small purses away from children and in some cases from their husbands. As teens we climbed up these stainless steel structures, we got the whole thing down at times, and after years of incursions we mastered it.
Every utensil had its own place in madani; you will find them at the same place over the years as you grew up. You could get up in middle of the night and you can pickup spoon without opening your eyes. We knew everything about it.
Very geometric, absolutely no glamour and to the point is basically what it was. For me the whole structure was very much a reflection of working class mumbaikars.
But over the years like working class mumbaikars mumbai lost this piece of furniture also. Just like everything else in mumbai mandani's were replaced with modular kitchens.
Modular kitchens are far more attractive and good looking then mandani. But they hide the structure, what you see is very attractive doors and cupboards and handles, you can't see what's inside them and they hardly make any noise. This again resembles very much to the people in mumbai nowdays.
All these years Mumbai has changed by the people and people have changed the mumbai too. Unfortunately there is no mandani today to fix these memories from the past to their places all we have is few black and white pictures.
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Tell a friend
Bury
In marathi the word mandani means organization, earlier people never cared to create metaphors; they were straight to the point. For housewives in mumbai Mandani had two main purposes, first a place to keep utensils and second to show them off.
For children’s it was a afternoon treasure hunt of sweets and spices. This was where mothers use to keep their small purses away from children and in some cases from their husbands. As teens we climbed up these stainless steel structures, we got the whole thing down at times, and after years of incursions we mastered it.
Every utensil had its own place in madani; you will find them at the same place over the years as you grew up. You could get up in middle of the night and you can pickup spoon without opening your eyes. We knew everything about it.
Very geometric, absolutely no glamour and to the point is basically what it was. For me the whole structure was very much a reflection of working class mumbaikars.
But over the years like working class mumbaikars mumbai lost this piece of furniture also. Just like everything else in mumbai mandani's were replaced with modular kitchens.
Modular kitchens are far more attractive and good looking then mandani. But they hide the structure, what you see is very attractive doors and cupboards and handles, you can't see what's inside them and they hardly make any noise. This again resembles very much to the people in mumbai nowdays.
All these years Mumbai has changed by the people and people have changed the mumbai too. Unfortunately there is no mandani today to fix these memories from the past to their places all we have is few black and white pictures.
2 Comments
Tell a friend
Bury
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Comments
It is still there in my home, despite being bought decades ago.
Kiran, I guess that is because it has one more property which is found in all true Mumbaikars - 'survivability'
The people in my house are still as noisy and to the point as ever. And i will want it to always remain that way :-)
Proper modular kitchen are too organised and they have very little space also well depends how u make it. But looks beautiful damm beautiful.
Non modular structure have lot of space also.So somebody like me would dump things into it which I prefer anyways :)Then they look shabby.So hide it then giving modular kitchen look. ;) :-D
Hehe Beauty bhi,Space bhi, cost effective bhi ;)