SURTIS are enterprising people! Sunday evenings, when time generally hangs heavy on everyone who has nothing definite to look forward to doing, most families make a plan to head to Dumas. Outsiders may be forgiven for imagining that Dumas is Surat�s most fascinating nightspot. It is not. But, in terms of popularity among the people, is is certainly the most hip and happening public place of all in this South Gujarat city.

Dumas is a beach some 15 kilometres outside of the Surat Railway Station, which is in the central part of the city. One straight, long ribbon of road, broad enough to be a four-lane carriageway, heads from the city to Dumas. And Sunday evenings, this road sees a busy stream of traffic heading for Dumas in one long and unending flow. Almost everyone seems to be headed there. Cars packed with families and their friends. And two-wheelers, defying all carrying capacity, and bearing four and five. The traffic policemen, aware of the Sunday evening culture in Surat and the people�s propensity for Dumas, turn an indulgent eye to this sort of thing. By 6.30 p.m., when the sun sets in the Arabian Sea off Dumas, all vehicles on the road switch on their headlights and the scene from the periphery in the dark, looks like a dark forest in which fireflies are making their way in formation!

Few Surtis, if any, actually care to venture onto the Dumas beach itself. And, indeed, there are several among its young population who have not set foot on the dark and dirty seashore more than once in their 20-odd-year lives. But Dumas, they will visit every Sunday they are in Surat! What makes Dumas such a popular hangout is the vastness and openness of the area. Towards Dumas, slowly the residential and corporate buildings start dwindling, and small restaurants, fast food outlets, shopping centres, gardens, �larries� � handcarts on which all kinds of sinful Surti snacks are prepared fresh and sold, start appearing. It is here that the city�s less conservative movers and shakers, head to.

Cars are parked and two-wheelers are put on their stands neatly at the side of the road. There is space for everybody and more. And yet, the traffic continues unhampered. There are no traffic jams in Dumas. But, yes, crowds of people of all ages and sizes. The early part of the evening, while it is still light, is spent in catching up from last Sunday. Also for those shy girl-meets-boy situations that in other cities are conducted more discreetly in five-star coffee shops. More weddings are finalised at these meetings in Dumas than Surat�s religious heads would care to mention. And after they are wed, and have families of their own, the couple that met at Dumas continue the tradition of visiting their old meeting ground every Sunday after Sunday!

This, however, is not the big thing about Dumas. Nor the line of �larries� that offers everything that Surti vegetarian homes would not dare to even dream about. Amritsari fish, tandoori chicken, all kinds of tantalising gravied meats on sizzling tavas, American Chopsuey and Sweet Corn Chicken soup, simple omelettes with pav, more elaborate baida-roti, and harmless seaside fare like corn on the cob, pani-puri, bhel-puri, kulfi and ice-creams, sherbets and golas, vegetable sandwiches, coconut water, sugarcane juice, brightly coloured sweetmeats... This everybody indulges in for a bit before they settle down to the main reason for their coming there.

And the main reason for Surtis to make the 15-kilometre, 20-minute drive or ride to Dumas is the family dinner that is had by the side of the road in between parked vehicles. Mats are laid out and sheets spread over them as soon as it gets dark. Some enterprising people get petromax lamps, others cleverly bag the spots beneath the street-lights, and yet some other families turn their cars around and switch on the headlights to illuminate their little party! Smaller families raise the hoods of their cars and vans, and sit in the dickey space to have their dinner. Children below five, are strategically placed on the roofs of the vehicles for the remainder of the evening. And then the real entertainment begins!