Sunday, August 26, 2012

Our Bangalore - A day in namma Silicon valley


Mani wakes up at five in the morning on Sundays. He never minds the morning chillness of Bangalore and takes bath in ice cold water. He then wears his trousers with suspenders which gives him a mid-nineteenth century look. Sharp at six in the morning, he steps out of the house and walks through the Mahatma Gandhi road (MG road) which remains uncharacteristically quiet on Sunday mornings (but for the omnipresent auto rickshaws). He reaches the fag end of the MG road, the trinity circle, at 6.45 sharp. He then climbs the spire of the Trinity church and waits till his watch ticks to 7AM and then strikes the huge brass bell.

The sound of the bell gets dampened in the cosmopolitan buzz of the city. But in those pre-independence days when Bangalore remained as a military outpost for the Brits, the sound of the bell would be the wake-up call for soldiers to attend the sunday morning mass.
Mani is one of those few remaining traces of the erstwhile British Bangalore. It is quite interesting that the name 'Mani' translates to 'Bell' in Tamil, which happens to be the mother tongue of Mani. His father was one among thousands of migrant laborers that the British deported from Madras presidency to work in Bangalore. He grew up in Benson town which is on the periphery of the Bangalore cantonment railway station. He had seen a dozen of Victorian buildings torn down for some fancy software buildings or for the more fancier Metro-rail project. He never complains how the Mayo hall which until late 1990s can be viewed from anywhere in MG road, is currently just another building crunched between shopping malls and high-end pubs. He never registers his grief about  the 'Bible society of India' renting their building to the 'Hard rock cafe'. For Victor Mani Anburaj, Trinity church is all what mattered.


Later that sunday, I catch up with Arun in an urban coffee-shop in Indira Nagar. He is (of course!) an engineer by profession and whenever he is not travelling on official assignments to USA, he researches about the history of Bangalore. He tells me that much of history of Bangalore is unwritten and hence he has to meet many of second or third generation Bangalorians (there are not many) and collect information from them. He is an alumini of St.Josephs (these native Bangalorians take pride in their school). For example, every time I meet Arun he never forgets to tell that Rahul Dravid is also an alumini of St.Joseph's and how he had seen him practice cover drives in the school grounds with white flannels. 
Out of curiosity, I ask Arun "who were this Benson's, Cox's and Fraser's? who had lent their names to the old Bangalore districts of Benson-town, Cox-town and Fraser-town" . His answer surprises me. They were just another Englishmen. He sips the last drops of his Irish coffee on the sides of the mug, and says "They were neither battle-heroes nor martyrs. They were just common British soldiers" and with a tinge of laugh adds "That's what Bangalore is all about isnt it? You can come here as anybody, the city will make you somebody". I should agree to him. 
Later we take the metro to MG road again, and walk the entire time through Brigade road doing some shop-hopping. I ask him about the continuous affiliation to English names for Bangalorian streets and roads which is quite uncommon in India, for its a general trend nowadays to rename them to Indian names. He shows me the plaque in the corner of MG road announcing 'Field Marshall B M Cariappa road', and adds "if you tell an auto-rickshaw driver he wont understand it". 
Bangalore has long forgotten the Indian names which the government tried to push. Still Cavalry road, Commissariat road, Infantry road, Lavelle Road exists in their old names. The only person who had broken this tradition is Bangalore's own local boy - 'Anil Kumble' who after his 10 wicket haul against Pakistan in Cricket, has a circle named after him.

Bangalore is pseudo-western slams Nabanita Sen. She had spent her young days in Kolkata before migrating to Bangalore for work. She never feels Bangalore beyond the steel and concrete buildings of multinational companies in Electronic city. She stays in a 'Womens PG' (paying guest accomodation) in Madiwala, which is for practical reasons is a tower of Babel. 
That Sunday evening, We had decided to meet in one Bangaliana restaurant in Koramangala for dinner. "Try Rohu fish or Katla , it is authetic Bengali cuisine here", "I had never thought life would become so mechanical",  "I got an onsite offer to Canada, may be next year I will spend there" , "Aamir Khan had signed for Dhoom3".. To follow her conversation is just like driving a motorbike in peak hour in Bannerghatta road. 
After dinner and an ice-cream in corner house, we take a lazy Sunday evening walk. I casually ask her if she has any plans to move back to Kolkata. "No way! What will I do there" is the reply with a smile.
Nabanita wants to shop for some shawls, I take an excuse of recharging my mobile and stay outside the shop looking at my fellow bangalorians with Wordsworth'ian patience - Thousands of software engineers  thronging the shops in Koramangala in their late Sunday shopping spree with same frenzy and zeal as late Christmas shopping, People in neatly pressed formals offering credit cards of multinational banks, The sodium vapor lamp emitting a yellowy haze adding some more charm to the cosmopolitan crowd. Time and again a trendy motorbike whizzes past with thin girls in the pillion almost clinging to the fat machine and not-so-fat rider. 
Nabanita comes after half an hour buying nothing. We decide to walk down to Madiwala. We cross the road  at Madiwala checkpost , where a speeding BMTC bus almost runs both of us down. In Madiwala after dropping her in her PG, I look for the omnipresent auto-rickshaw to get back home. "1 1/2 meter sir" smiles the auto-driver.

(I wish to thank Mr.Arun, who made me understand history of Bangalore. He conducts Victorian Bangalore walk tours on sunday mornings http://www.bangalorewalks.com/html/Victorian-Bangalore-Walk.html)






3 comments:

Suriya said...

Good narration and very interesting facts!
I felt as if I had been to Bangalore last week :)
How come "pubs" missed to find a place in the blog?!!?

Abhishek Harwalkar said...

i liked the association of "omnipresent" with bangalore autowalas...nice one...sometimes i feel u know more cosmopolitan face of bangalore than me...!

Unknown said...

Very Good one DP,You 've still got the taste with you man.
Enjoyed being in Bangalore after a lapse of 3 years through your blog.
Iam waiting for you to write a blog covering the 'pubs and hubs of bangalore'

Keep writing mate :)
Paavalan.