The Centaur hotel chain was owned by Air India, hence the name. It represented commie nationalism at its worst – a government owned and operated hotel, with terrible service, badly maintained, but probably at the best location in the city. The Centaur hotel chain was later auctioned off (amid a ton of corruption, but that’s another story).
So if the hotel was terrible, why did we go to the Juhu Centaur so often? There are three reasons – their chicken burger actually tasted pretty good when you were pissed drunk at 4 in the morning; it was close to Avalon, one of the sleaziest clubs in Bombay, where we inevitably ended our club crawl as all the other places had shut; and probably because we didn’t know any better.
The Juhu Centaur is now the JW Marriott – one of the blingest and best run hotels in Bombay now, but sadly it seems to have lost some of its old greasy spoon charm.
Assorted ramblings, rants and raves about Music, Food, and Fast Cars
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
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The Air India logo is the centaur (man-horse thing with a bow and arrow), hence the name for the hotel.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, the Marriott bought our beloved Juhu Centaur and turned it into the JW Marriott.