The brainiac’s bordello

He arrived before she did. She walked in briskly, anticipation quickening her pace. Pleasure of the ultimate kind was waiting. Welcome to La Bordello, neon signs were blinking inside her head. Tiny inhibitions were hurriedly squashed.

He called himself Casper. That was all she knew about him. No personal information – no real name, professional details or background, not even nationality. But then, it didn’t matter, for she was meeting him for one reason only –intellectual intercourse. A tailor-made conversation that promised intellectual titillation and satisfaction at the end of it.

She wanted a mythological rush. Indian, Greek, Egyptian…myths were her choice for the evening. It was a whirlwind that met her demand. Fiery Shiva and rotund Ganesha met the witches of the West, who then moved over for Isis. The friend of the downtrodden, slaves, sinners, artisans, as well as the wealthy, maidens, aristocrats and rulers, she shook hands with Gaia of Olympus.

Aphrodite breezed in with her kiss of blessing. Voodoo was at work. Divination came next. Dervishes went whirring, shamans were tapping faster. Theyyams danced to Baul tunes. Symbolisms didn’t cost extra. Like how once Parvati Baul apparently seduced the jackals and hyenas of the Tollygunge Club with her music.

Aha! That was a talkGasm
It was sorcery of a new kind. Well, she was tooked.

No pressure, pure pleasure, that’s the La Bordello (brothel in Spanish) promise. Sriram CS aka Agni and Ramanan Subramani aka Gollum – the twin minds behind this novel social experiment – explain: “La Bordello is an intellectual pleasure house, a conversation restaurant. It is an experience that stimulates and satisfies the intellect.”

The two bored software professionals in Bangalore, perpetually pondering more pleasurable social activities, cooked up the idea over burgers and machine-made coffee. The fire in their belly was crying out for a passion platform that would liberate minds.

Acute ennui wasn’t all that sparked it. The Whore of Mensa gets due credit. Agni and Gollum thank Woody Allen, who played Prometheus via his 1975 short story. His delectable whores, who trade their minds and not bodies, who think Milton’s Paradise Lost “lacked the substructure of pessimism”, and for a reasonable fee, can compare Melville and Hawthorne, fascinated this Bangalorean duo. La Bordello flared in them. Agni and Gollum decided to play CPOs – chief pimp officers – of this pleasure house.

Agni pictured it as the swankiest of restaurants. Flashy, upmarket, a bling-and-elegant-married hotel, where pleasure seekers can drive in and order their conversation of choice. It could be Oscar Wilde’s take on religion or Edwardian society and culture in Saki’s voice or even cuisine of the Khasi tribe. Great food, good drinks, and intellectual titillation – that was the heaven he desired.

Drunk on the idea, Agni and Gollum began selling it to others. Everyone was hooked, rather tooked – this is Tookish, the evolving language of La Bordello. The city was teeming with teekers (talk seekers) anyway. Tookers – conversation experts, passionate and knowledgeable about their genre of interest – were looped in. Stringent checks on passion and expertise were carried out. “They are continuously groomed to incite your passion without getting into any unpleasant situation,” the CPOs say.

However, the duo learnt soon enough that while they managed to ignite fire in many minds, building a plush La Bordello would need much more than that: The dollar demon. Agni and Gollum were staring at the Golliath; thinking of ways to tackle it, when someone suggested choosing an established restaurant, open to accommodating their pleasure house and serving minds and bellies. The stage was thus set for this social experiment at Little Italy in Koramangala.

Someone asked why anyone should spend money for conversation when friends are more than generous with it? Or if it was for specific information, can’t Googling do the trick? “While you can get a conversation or information that you seek from any of the above mentioned sources, there is no guarantee that the conversation will satisfy or pleasure you. With friends, there is always that emotional tangle. With Google or Wikipedia, you get only cold information, bereft of all passion. With Internet forums, you get more flame wars and smart-aleck comments than a worthwhile intellectual experience,” the CPOs say.

The La Bordello manifesto evolved after several tooks (conversations). Rules, guidelines and a modus operandi were decided upon. They arrived at a blanket charge of Rs1,000 that would include the conversation and lunch/dinner for the teeker and tooker, and any taxes involved. To qualify for a took, the teeker has to be over 18. They would have to undergo a screening process, and a quick series of e-mails/phone calls to ensure that the took goes smoothly.

To bank on the intrigue value, it was decided that tookers would withhold all personal information, including their real name and personal contact. “This is to ensure that the conversation does not drag down to mundane levels. Our aim is to distil the purest intellectual delight from a conversation, free from all adulteration and offer it to you,” the manifesto states. “La Bordello’s attempt is to find out if people can bend their minds and derive varied pleasure from the intellect, the same way they derive sensory pleasure by tasting different food.” Their lofty vision: to lead mankind to the next evolutionary level in areas of aesthetics and intellect; to kindle and direct society to explore new avenues of sophisticated pleasure that does not arise from necessity, but from curiosity. La Bordello launched a couple of weeks ago with a by-invite-only evening party at Little Italy. The word is spreading fast, and took-requests are flowing, say CPOs.

To book a conversation, or for more details, www.tooker.in/reservation.html or write to took@tooker.in