The Spicy Killer's domain - Misal Pav at Mamledar's

This is not the place I expected when P told me he was taking me to the joint which served the most tikhat (Marathi for 'knock you off' spicy) Misal.
Misal is a famed breakfast meal of the State of Maharashtra in India. It is a dish easy to make and hence very popular. Misal literaly means a 'mixture'. Its made of dried peas and moth beans submerged in a maddeningly spicy curry. You can load it with chopped onions, a hint of lemon juice and a ready made mixture called farsan. While you get them in various magnitudes of being spicy, we friends wanted to dare the spicy version this joint produced.
The place was an extension of a government building. Most of the thoroughfare seemed to be government staff and physical labourers. Misal serves as a cheap mode of a good nutritional food and not surprisingly is a preferred outdoor lunch/meal by the lower middle strata, although it is very regularly dished out at home by one and all.
The surroundings didnt look exactly hygienic, not that most street food joints in India have that luxury. But die hard foodies like me dont even observe such hygiene blocks as the bigger desire is to have that famed dish.
"Lets get on with it guys," I exclaimed marching into the joint.
Thankfully we got a table for ourselves, which had 25 glasses of water. My friend R wasnt aware why we had selected this place for a meal and told the waiter to takeaway the extra glasses as we were just 4 of us. The waiter nonchantly ignored.
"Heck, why is the guy acting weird? I mean 25 glasses on each table of 4 people! This is ridiculous!" blurted R, rushing to the Manager and demanding him to remove the extra glasses.
The Manager ordered the needful and a victorious looking R came back to his seat.
"That was a great achievement man. Cant understand how foolish some people can get!" said S. He looked hungry by the way he was looking at the other customers lapping up their Misal curry.
We had ordered 4 tikhat Misal's and within a minute we had the piping hot dishes on our table. The curry was looking temptingly crimson. The dish had to be had with pav (a loaf of bread). The dish itself is popularly known as Misal Pav. R & S looked reluctant to eat as they werent the archetypal spicy food seekers. They came from cocooned backgrounds, where they were imbibed the rule of avoiding street food, especially the spicy types. However I pushed them in and the odessey started.
Within 2 morsels, R was in tears and sweat laden. He couldnt stand the chilly hot and spicy curry known as rassa. He gulped down as many pav's as he could to nuetralise the deadly effect of the spicy curry. And then it dawned to him why the 25 glasses of water were kept on each table of the joint. And that thought also brought an emotion of shame on his face, of the shameful folly, of being secretly laughed upon by the waiters and managers. I quickly caught this and remarked that the curry today was extraordinarily spicy. It made him feel a bit better, noticing me, the man who could gulp down half a box of chilli powder (its a hyperbole!) without shedding a tear, struggling to stay calm.
We all finally finished the meal. Strangely inspite of the spice and chilli trouble, we all seemed to relish it. Thats the piece of magic this place brings out of its cauldrons and saucepans day and night. The most deadly spicy Misal's and yet the most tasty and relishing.
"It was a bad start, but A, I must say this was dhasu (Hindi slang for Phenomenal)! I mean I wanna surely come back for more!". R saying this was a testimony of the fame of this place's dish.
We signed off with a glass of taak, Marthi for buttermilk. The feeling of having a glass of sublime buttermilk after the spice typhoon was out of this world. The 4 of us left content, pledging to come back for one more daring journey into the valley of unknown, for a one on one with the Spicy Killer.