Meet Mr. Jhabvala...

On a lark, I looked up Jhabvala in the Bombay phone book. I thought there would be a few, but there were only two numbers, one with a different spelling. So after a while I got the mobile phone number of one Mr. Hoshan Jhabvala.

"Hello?" he said in an accent disturbingly like my father's.

"Hi, I'm an Australian travelling in India at the moment, I'm in Bombay and I'm a Jhabvala too. I was wondering if you'd like to meet?"

"You're a Jhabvala?"

"Yes. I saw your number in the phone book."

"Of course. How long are you in Bombay for?"

"I'm not sure, no plans."

"What is your father's name?"

"Cyrus."

"Ok, I'm busy right now, but let me call you back in an hour and you can come to my house tomorrow if you like."

"Sure, bye."

So the next day I'm on the train up to Bandra, a classier area of town. It turns out that Hoshan is my cousin (not sure to what degree, our great grandfathers were brothers. Mum, you can work that out). Also, that anywhere in the world you find a Jhabvala we're going to be related. The name comes from a family who were land-owners in the village of Jhab, in Gujarat. Yes, there is a place called Jhab. He showed me photos of the house, where there's still a Jhabvala living. It's 6 hours drive away but I might pay a visit to the ancestral home.

I got a family tree and some history and a culture and religious lesson from Hoshan and his wife, it was all very strange and interesting. They have a 19 year old boy who I didn't meet.

Incidentally, Hoshan has an impeccable collection of 400 or so blues, jazz and soul cd's, arranged in an arcane system known only to him, housed in a large bookshelf type thing. Sound familiar?

Here's a pic of their door-plate:


Here's me and Hoshan (sorry Gran, Hoshan and I). We've got some facial hair going on:


Also, it's pronounced Jhabwala.