At Toit, our customers have always been our primary focus. They’re the ones who bring life to the place, create memories and end up giving the place its familiar, friendly vibe.

And there are so many different kinds of people who come through our doors daily, that we wanted to get to know their stories.

The Kudix Mug Holder of the Month is our little way of celebrating our customers, and their unique stories.

They loathe being the stereotypical lovey-dovey couple, and will probably choose beer drinking over a romantic dinner every single time, but their story sounds like the plot for a classic rom-com—say hello to Karan and Rima, our Mug Holders for the month of Feb. 

What do you both do?

Rima: I’m a jewellery designer. I’m working for a diamond jewellery manufacturing company. So lot’s of designing and sales—that’s what I do.

Karan: And I’m a graphic designer. I run my own graphics and animation studio. It’s called Studio 9 and we do a lot of branding, anything to do with digital media in the creative space.

Are you guys from Bangalore?

Karan: Neither of us are from here originally.

Rima: I’ve been born and brought up in Libya, and I was there for 20 years. Then I was in Dubai for 4 years, I was studying there. My dad is originally from Bangalore, so he moved back here after almost 26 years, and that’s how even I came back here. I’ve been here now for almost 4 years now.

Karan: I was born and brought up in Mumbai, but I’ve been in Bangalore for about 14 years now.

So you guys are married right?

Karan: Yes! We’ve been married for two and a half years.

How did you guys meet? Tell us your story!

Rima: So we met at Bangalore Fashion Week through a couple of friends.

We were both attending the after-party. The event happens over a span of 2-3 days right? So the first day he had gone and met my friends and they happened to go the next day as well. That’s when I joined them.

I remember when we picked him up, and because there were a lot of single girls in our group, our friends were like “we’re going to pick up this hot guy, he’s really cute and stuff”, and we just said “we know what your hot guys are! We’re not interested!”
I remember saying that he must be some ‘chomu’ but then I ended up marrying this ‘chomu’! *laughs*

No, but it was really funny because I’m not the kind of person to go and talk to a guy for a very long time. But that entire night we were talking like we’ve been friends for ages.

One of our friends had a huge part to play in this because we both ended up going to the loo together and she was like “how do you find this guy Karan? You’ve been talking to him a lot.” And I was all like “Yeah, he’s cute.” She was shocked that I said a guy was cute, for like the first time, and said, “ You know what? I’m just telling you that he’s going to ask you for your number”, and then she just walked away.

I ran after her, asking her not to do anything because I wasn’t interested, but she just asked me to shut up and leave it to her.

Our friends made it a point to make us sit together on the way back, and I knew it was going to come.

Karan: And it did. I asked her for her number. The friend, Arpitha, said that I must ask Rima for her number. I didn’t know she pushed both of us into it. And that’s how we got each other’s numbers and started messaging.

And when did you guys get married?

Rima: It was actually very quick. We got engaged within three or four months, and married about nine to ten months after that. So it was very, very quick!

Karan: In that group of girls at the party, I only kept talking to her. And I also kept getting her drinks, so I think that helped! *laughs*

Rima: The drinks were on the house!

Karan: Hey, but it was a crowded bar, so it took some effort.

How did Toit figure in your story?

Karan: I’ve been coming to Toit since it started actually. It was this new place in Indiranagar about five years back, and my friends had come down to Bangalore, so I said we must check out this new place.
We came here one afternoon, and we loved it so much that we came back the next day, and the day after that too—three days in a row.
I remember that Amaya was serving us then, and he’s here still. This place has always been special. When they started their brewing, I loved the beers so much. It’s just been Toit all along.

Did you bring Rima here?

Rima: I came here before I met him, with my friends. And this was before they served brewed beer.
I remember the first time I came here I ordered bottled beer, but then now when I think about it, I’ll never order bottled beer here. It’s like a sin!

Do you guys come here a lot together?

Rima: This is our place, where we don’t really need to think about before coming. Like we can come here however we are. I mean, we’ve come here in track pants and stuff, and no one really cares. It’s so casual and chilled out.

Karan: Yeah. You can just be what you want, enjoy your beer, have your food.

Have you both always been beer drinkers? Or is that something you’ve cultivated over time?

Karan: I’ve always been! I mean I’ve loved beer ever since I started drinking when I was 14 or 15. *laughs*
I’ve always loved beer, and my love for beer only grew after Toit.
For us also, it’s a special place. We’ve come here two Valentine’s Days together. We don’t have to think anymore. Toit is our place, this is where what we love to eat and drink is.

Rima: Speaking about Valentine’s Day, we’re not the very typical, candlelight dinner kind of couple.

Karan: Yeah! I would prefer a beer any day.

In the 2 and a half years you’ve been together, what is the best thing you’ve done as a couple?

Karan: I think the bar hopping night was fun. It was something because couple’s don’t really bar hop on Valentine’s Day. It’s usually something more intimate. We both like doing more fun things. We’ve had great memories here as well! Like, this birthday of mine I celebrated here two years ago.

Rima: By the way, let me just say, he’s celebrated three of his birthdays at Toit, in a row. In fact, for his 30th birthday, I wanted to do something different. So we couldn’t come to Toit, but I made sure he took the Brewery Tour. That was one of his birthday gifts. So technically, four years in a row, he has come here for his birthday.

Karan: Coming back to that crazy story, I remember it was 12, and these guys ordered all the shots on the menu for me. I had to shoot them all in a go, without a break. And I’d already had six beers! So that was a pretty crazy night.

Have you done anything crazy here as well, Rima?

Rima: Yes! In fact, for my bachelorette, my friends planned this whole bar hopping thing, and we started off with Toit.
Since I was the first one from the group to get married, the girls were really excited and wanted me to do everything!
They made me go up to guys, get their numbers, me being the last person to do something like that.

In fact, I was telling them that the first guy’s number I got, I ended up marrying. So you can imagine how bad I am at doing all this! It was quite fun though.

This is our standard couple question- tell us what qualities you like the best and the least about each other?

Karan: I think the best quality about her is that she is sweet and understanding. And the biggest for me is that she loves beer! So I don’t have to look out for a drinking partner at all. I love hanging out with her because we can hang out over a beer anytime.
The most annoying I would say is not coming to Toit every week.

Rima: You’re just saying this because it’s a Toit interview! I think there are lots of things about me that annoy him!

Karan: There are, but you know, it’s all normal in a relationship.

What a safe answer! What about you Rima?

Rima: Let me start with the bad first so that I can cover it up with the good.
I think the only thing that annoys me about him is that sometimes he’s a bit too nice, and people end up taking advantage of his niceness.
Like he always says yes to everything, so I would like for him to learn to say no. And sometimes, his temper.

But other than that, you know, I couldn’t have asked for better. Because honestly, we are more like friends than being this typical husband-wife kind of couple.

We have a lot of things in common, besides being poles apart as well. So that really brings us together.