A Haven? Awake in Bangalore.
Matching the rapid pace and the serenity of this city. Hope we are not parallels.
(Image credits: Priyanka Sacheti, A Home For Homeless Thoughts)
This flash essay is part of a collaborative, constrained-writing challenge undertaken by some members of the Bangalore Substack Writers Group. Each of us examined the concept of ‘BANGALORE’ through our unique perspective, distilled into roughly 500 words. At the bottom of this snippet, you’ll find links to other essays by fellow writers.
Growing, running, walking, learning, experimenting, building and travelling for nearly two decades now makes Bangalore casually intertwined into every event without any pre-occupied thoughts.
From the endless clatter of its exemplary weather to its shrinking future hanging on an indefinite list of reasons, I haven’t processed a day without raging on its bitter-cold, windy, warm, raining or scorching weather. Was there any day I didn’t talk of how slowly Bangalore moves compared to our social media accounts online?
The punctuality to walk back home without further delays is a skill I learnt from its timely rainfalls. The dark-circles I developed are gifted by its glorious weather because who can wake-up early regularly when the chilling cold freezes our limbs? Plus, our Generation is happy in staying alert and vibrant over the night and we do end up seizing the day too! Mostly applicable on most of the days. The startup drive is our lingua franca, isn’t it?
What makes walking exceptionally enticing in Bangalore? The fact that nobody cares, nobody dared in my case, nobody forces cultural confinement and the liberating but still grounded scope it permits in almost everything from eating at any stall, wearing any footwear, pajamas, shorts or hats allowing you to be the eccentric like the wildest flower in the simple lanes. Where the simple lanes, streets, roads and outlets offer Bangaloreans almost everything needed for survival, I can’t understand from where did the new lavish, luxury mall, ultra-brick-mortar changeover appear from? Maybe that’s called infrastructure development or infrastructure development externality?
But the climate crisis is a reality in Bangalore. The transformation it has undergone in terms of depleting water-resources is not just a coffee-table topic. As an observant child of what’s happening on the roads, I have noticed a 5x or maybe 10x increase in the number of water-supply trucks on roads. My brother and I fixed a water-supply tank leakage when in junior school and we couldn’t find many trucks to target to explain about the water-crisis. But this task is not doable now, given water-trucks are so abundantly prevalent that we are almost bewildered on how to address this issue.
But what amazes me is the flexibility Bangalore offers to all genders to reach the fullest of their potentials. I could study for a whole night stretch for days in a study space amongst aspirants busy scheduling, some memorizing law subjects, some preparing for CS exams, most finding solutions to UPSC prelims answers, some watching accounting lectures and most of all, we were enabling and providing a completely safe space to everyone. When did this occur? After 0000 hours. Where can I expect this? Bangalore definitely.
Catch the sight of other descriptive, intellectual and other shots thrown by our fellow Bangalore Substack Writer’s group:
> Looking Down over Bengaluru by Vaibhav Gupta, Thorough and Unkempt
> Blossom Book House, Bangalore by Rahul Singh, Mehfil
>A Walk, A Pause by Mihir Chate, Mihir Chate
> Bookless in Bangalore by Vikram Chandrashekar Vikram’s Substack
>Bangalore: A personal lore by Siddhesh Raut, Shana, Ded Shana
>Bangalore,once by Avinash Shenoy, Off the walls
>My love story with Bengaluru by Rakhi Anil
>Bangalore Down the lane of History by Aryan Kavan Gowda, Wonderings of a Wanderer
>Nagar Life by Nidhishree Venugopal, General in her Labyrinth
>Belonging by Shruthi Iyer, Shruthi Iyer
>The Street Teaches You by Karthik, Reading This World
>The Wild Heart of Bangalore by Devayani Khare, Geosophy
>A Love Letter to Bangalore by Priyanka Sacheti, A Home for Homeless Thoughts
>Movies Dates, Bangalore and Them by Amit Charles, AC Notes
>Between Cities by Richa Vadini Singh, Here’s What I Think
>My love affair with blue skies by Sailee Rane, Sunny climate stormy climate
>A City That Builds Belonging by Sathish Seshadri, Strategy & Sustainability
>There and Back Again by Ayush, Ayush's Substack