TO THE BEST OF MY KNOWLEDGE THIS EDIFICE WAS BUILT BY MY ANCESTOR RAJA RAGHUNATH RAI BAHADUR IN THE 17TH CENTURY. HE WAS A NOBLE AT THE MUGHAL COURT IN DELHI AND WAS A SON OF THE PRINCELY HOUSE OF KUKRAJ . THIS WAS HIS PERSONAL RESIDENCE. HE LATER MOVED TO THE COURT OF SHAHJAHAN AT THE RED FORT. MY GREAT-GREAT GRAND UNCLE MAHARAJA LAL AFTER WHOM IS NAMED AN ENTIRE STREET IN CIVIL LINES DELHI VISITED THIS HAVELI WHICH WAS ALWAYS KNOWN AS KAKARANIYON BAHADUR’S KII HAVELI . OUR FAMILY HAS BEEN VISITING THIS HAVELI FOR SOMETIME NOW AND WOULD IDEALLY LIKE YOU TO HELP US GET ITS NAME BACK AND IF POSSIBLE TO URGE THE HARYANA GOVERNMENT TO RESTORE IT AND CONVERT IT TINTO A MEMORIAL FOR THE PUBLIC IN THE NAME OF RAJA RAGHUNATH WHO’S NAME FINDS A MENTION IN ANY WORTHWHILE BOOK ON MUGHAL HISTORY . YOU MIGHT FIND IT USEFUL TO READ RIZVI SAHB’S VOLUMES ON INDIA AND PERHAPS A BOOK WRITTEN BY MY DISTANT AUNT MADHUR JAFFERY , A GLOBAL INDIAN ENTILTED ‘CLIMBING THE MANGO TREES ‘ PUBLISHED BY EBURY RANDOM HOUSE WOULD GIVE YOU A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF OUR ROOTS AT NARNUAL AND OUR PROJENITOR RAJA RAGHUNATH . ERSTWHILE PRINCESS RACHNA BAHADUR PLS DO GET IN TOUCH WITH US AS WE WOULD LIKE TO GET THE ORIGINS OF THIS COMPLEX KNOWN PUBLICLY SO THAT THERE IS NO CONFUSION IN THE FUTURE FOR YOUR PUBLICATION.

The current edition of Blue Guide New York has more ample coverage of all the sights in Manhattan and Brooklyn and less detail on the outer boroughs. Partly this is driven by what can realistically fit into a single volume, and partly by the publication of The Encyclopedia of New York City, which doomed to vanity any claims we might make to encylcopedic status. For the new edition we decided to go for depth over breadth.

Thanks, too, for the hotel and restaurant suggestions, some of which we took. (Hotel Davanzati in Florence was one, a pleasing, friendly, comfortable, unpretentious place. Another was Osteria La Porta in Monticchiello—excellent.)

May I make a restaurant suggestion, which I hope you’ll be willing to consider? In Montepulciano is A Gambe di Gatto, Via dell’ Opio nel Corso, 34, in the centro storico. Here a young couple has for the past six years run a delightful, small caffè that features local ingredients, Tuscan specialties,
enthusiastic explanations of offerings (all in Italian—no “tourist” menus here), excellent wines and olive oils (each lovingly introduced by charming, some-English-speaking owner Manuel—he makes up for unknown words with lots of charisma) and superb food prepared by tiny wife Lara, who may emerge shyly from kitchen if you ask to congratulate her. They are serious “slow foodies” and carefully research vineyards, farm sources, olive oil producers.

We ate there three times, congratulating ourselves for having found it—by accident. I’d put in “moderate” price category, though can’t recall the euros now—maybe 7 or 8 euros for hors d’oeuvres, 11, 12, 13, 14 for primi– but I imagine Manuel could email you a menu if you wished.
(I notice in referencing your price designation for La Porta above that you used the one-euro symbol for it. If it’s any help, the prices there were higher than at A Gambe di Gatto; maybe La Porta has gone up and needs re-evaluating—what do I know?)

A Gambe di Gatto also sells wines and olive oils.

Email: zelfdizelf@yahoo.it Tel.: 0039 578 75 74 31

Closed Wednesdays.

The name relates to an old Tuscan proverb and why they chose it a long but lovely story.