True grit

Isn’t it strange, my son has a rich father!” my friend laughed. “I dream that one day my chips will be sold across the globe. You may think it’s a dream and laugh it off, but the fact is I landed in Bangalore with 200 rupees in my pocket. Today I have a turnover of about Rs 50 lakh per annum.”

This dramatic declaration came at the end of an early morning phone call I received a few weeks ago. “Hi,” said an unfamiliar voice, “remember the king of the moon?”

Of course I remembered. It was Frank Chatelier, a senior from school in Durgapur, West Bengal. We had last met over 40 years ago. He had essayed the role of King of the Moon in a school production. “I don’t know why, but I think of that play very often,” Frank said and then went on to share with me the amazing story of his life.

As he spoke, I remembered the tall boy who used to sometimes roller-skate to school on what seemed then a long distance — all the way from the CMERI (Central Mechanical Engineering Research Institute) colony to the MAMC (Mining and Allied Machinery Corporation) colony where St Xavier’s High School was. I knew he had sisters but I didn’t know he was the only son. I didn’t know he had suddenly dropped out of school.

“I packed a small bag and ran away from home,” said Frank; he had had some difficulties in school. He was about 18. He hopped on the Coalfield Express and arrived in Calcutta, the big bad city of our small-town lives. After wandering around Calcutta for a while, he managed to get a job on a Greek ship and for three or four years he wandered the seas. When he was done sailing, he went home for a bit until he got another call, this time for a shorter stint, on another ship.

Meanwhile, his parents passed on and the siblings moved to Calcutta. The four girls went their own ways, but he found himself at a dead end. “I remember once asking a chap for two rupees,” Frank said with a wry laugh, “and he shooed me away! To tell you the truth, I touched rock bottom.” In desperation he did drugs. He was rootless, homeless… “The language of the streets, I wouldn’t want to repeat to anybody,” he said, remembering those days.

Then, hope came in the shape of a friend who had left home too at the age of 12. He was going to Bangalore, to open a restaurant. He persuaded Frank to come along.

Nursing a bad back acquired while working as a deckhand, Frank went along and made himself useful doing odd jobs. But after a while when he realised he couldn’t make ends meet, he decided to return to Calcutta. His friend’s parting words still ring in his ears, Frank said: “When the chips are down, even a raw deal is something worth clinging on to… don’t ever burn your boat till your yacht is ready.”

Back in Calcutta, though, the yacht was still not ready. Feeling ill in body and heart, he asked himself one day if this was what he wanted. Is this how he wanted to live the rest of his life? He decided that no matter what happened, he would stand on his own feet. And so, somehow, he put himself on the Coromandel Express to Madras, and from there boarded the Bangalore Mail.

“Your life story sounds like a film script,” I said, interrupting Frank’s flow of reminiscences.

“You won’t believe it,” he replied. “I remember wishing the train journey would never end. While travelling I had at least a place to sit. In Bangalore there was nothing.” Except more struggle. He worked as a labourer and house painter. He sold eggs on the street. He somehow scratched together some rupees. He survived thanks to the support of a girl who later became his wife, and his own persistence.

“I believe there is someone watching over you always,” Frank said. When he made his next trip to Calcutta, some friends requested he bring them the famous Chinese prawn chips from there. He brought back many packets and sold them successfully. That’s when he got the idea. As it was not feasible to go up and down between Bangalore and Calcutta, he decided to make them himself.

“For about eight months, I researched through trial and error, boiling and spoiling,” Frank said. But at last he managed to create what for him was a good recipe for prawn chips, or crackers as they are referred to in North America and some other parts of the world. In 1988, he began to market them under the brand name Chateliers Waves.

From the time he worked with a kitchen stove, a couple of knives, a cutting board and a few well-worn pots and pans, today he has come a long way. Waves has ten flavours now: garlic, tomato, mint, cheese, onion, prawn, chicken, crab, seer fish and tuna fish. Like vadaams or papads or sundigay , the crackers have to be fried in hot oil and they “open up like a flower”.

Frank recalled the time he packed his wafers in plastic bags, sealed with a candle flame, and placed them in a few shops that sold frozen meats. Those who tried his product once began to ask for more, and he found it hard to cope with the demand. “It’s hilarious on hindsight,” he said recalling the time he went to a supermarket chain, requesting they retail his product. Do you have a food licence? No. Are you registered with the sales tax people? No. Can we see your bill book? “I didn’t have one! And the counter girls burst out laughing!”

Now, the gangly boy who played King of the Moon and then found himself drifting, provides employment and a life to some ten people, uses indigenously designed machinery, and manufactures, packs and markets from his own space at Chikka Byrathi in Bangalore. Over the last 25 years, the business has grown, and his life has opened up too. His sisters helped, chipping in with timely funds that earned them an interest from the cracker business.

Of course, it hasn’t been all smooth sailing — three of his sisters passed on, the power cuts don’t make life easy, getting steady workers is a challenge, nor is retailing a cinch, but Frank’s undaunted. While his wife, Dorothy, watches over production — his son, Clayton, is itching to join the business — and keeps the team’s spirits up, he focuses on upgrading the infrastructure, streamlining systems and improvising the machinery on his own.

“Recently, a couple of businessmen from Surat came, wanting to expand the business, but I turned down the offer. I like to have the freedom to run my business the way I want. I can provide for my family and for the people who work for me, although getting people to work is hard. But I am contented.”

Since that over-an-hour-long conversation, Frank and I have had many chats. We also managed to meet when St Xavier’s Durgapur recently celebrated its golden jubilee and some members of the first few batches reunited at Kolkata and Durgapur. Frank came with his warm-hearted sister, Florence, his ‘rock of ages’. And even though he needed the help of a stick to walk, he looked as dashing as ever.

And yes, the Queen of the Moon was there too among a host of others who had played stars and stardust!

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