The Hindu Business Line : Big city blues with a dash of strong filter coffee

The private airline taking one to Bengaluru from Mumbai had the air of a retail outlet as air hostesses (like chanawallas on the streets) walked the aisle selling water bottles at Rs 100 per bottle and sandwiches at Rs 150 per piece. No deals were struck; the food will be recycled as the airline industry tries to trim losses.

The modern airport in Bengaluru built by the Siemens-led consortium does not impress while the redesigned Santa Cruz airport has a pleasing style (pardon me for the bias). Airports in India have no architecture and the acres of cement and glass depress.

Unlike in trains, one cannot get into small talk with the human being in the next seat strapped to wires, mobiles and laptops. IT seems to be distancing people. Not being a world-frequent traveller jetting from Washington to London or Beijing (the address everyone flaunts today), one did not announce the disappointment when meeting my cousin, Shivkumar.

Yet, the Bengaluru newspapers had news of top IT bosses expressing their displeasure over the poor quality of work at the airport. They should know as they spend more time in the West than in Bengaluru. Eagerly waiting for a controversy, the politicians have moved in with the State Assembly forming a joint committee to look into the new buy of Bengaluru.

Located far away from the city, the public has to start hours ahead of the take-off to ride past stifling traffic jams. The flight landed in the afternoon and one took a Volvo bus costing Rs 150 per ticket into the city – a one hour ride. Settling down at my cousin’s apartment at Indiranagar the mobile wailed and my friend Madhukar Rao was on the line with a, “Welcome to Bengaluru and its traffic jams”.

There is a sameness to all cities: traffic jams, IT towers, malls, flyovers, apartments with a TV in each room. It only follows that the talk is the same – high school fees, a desperation to own a car and an apartment by the time one is four-years old, the 24x7 dream to land in New York and the prayers and promises to various gods if one hits the target; it is as if human beings in Indian cities do not any more live, love or lie down.

“If you are not an IT human, none has any regard for you in this city. You have to own at least three houses – one for living and two as investments,” remarked Madhukar, who is an IT software professional.

My niece Srinidhi told me of her school fining children for “every minor infringement of discipline” to make a pile. “They make money out of punishing us and teachers are ever ready to punish,” she said.

On Sri Rama Temple Road in New Tippasandra, there is no space between one housing society and another nor a playground. The road has the width of two cars and “till a few years ago, the entire place was empty”. Shivkumar recalled the happy times of his youth spent in Big Street, Triplicane in the then Madras. “Children do not touch dust or play anymore. For any sport there are classes where children end up hating sports,” Shivkumar told me.

On the way back from Kodagu, the Volvo bus halted for a few minutes at Mysore, the R.K. Narayan acreage. One looked around for Swaminathan (Swami) or at least Manjunath who brilliantly did the role of Swami. Manjunath should be around 40 today. They were not there as Mysore 2008 is not Mysore 1950. Perhaps, the ghost of Narayan has fled Mysore.

In the Shankar Nag directed Malgudi Days, one can count four to five cars gently rolling along (assuming Malgudi is Mysore) with most people walking and bullock carts creaking. Today Mysore has become Pune. They started as places for the old and retired; they are now homes for the young and climbing.

Still around is the Mysore Palace, which one saw for a minute as the driver of the Volvo was keen on overtaking a horse cart. “Bengaluru may not be a Garden or an IT city; it is surely the second capital of Tamil Nadu,” said Shivkumar, a view shared by Madhukar. That may partly explain the top class dosas, wadas and uppmas early in the morning at small stand-in street corner shops. They are not the lean, leathery Mumbai variety which one can clean up in one swipe and go to the doctor the next day. The masala dosas, wadas with chutni and sambhar are sumptuous and one can relax over them; also they were cheap with a Rs 50 note going a few feet unlike in Mumbai where it cannot move an inch with inflation at 20 per cent despite the “stable” claims of the Finance Ministry and RBI. On three mornings, Shivkumar took me to the joints which one misses in Mumbai. At the stand-in counters, we chatted – the financial crisis, economic journalism, sports - over the food. At 8 in the morning at Koramangala, a customer inquired in Kannada whether he should withdraw his money from banks and keep it at home.

“The politicians and bankers will pocket your money in the banks and their paid goondas will steal the money from your home. Our democracy does not give you a choice. In India, it is best to be a friend of a banker or a politician and earn protection; being a poor (despite many government schemes) on the street is risky as the police and municipal officials will go after you during a clean up at the bidding of politicians, ” replied Shivkumar, who is strong in Kannada. We usually ended the chats with strong filter coffee.

Bengaluru and Kodugu did not disappoint with their filter coffee. The coffee gives a kick and one craved for it all the hours. For about six days, one consumed many cups of coffee and also bought two kg of coffee seed from Honey Valley at Rs 150 per kg.

One spent a few hours reading dated copies of Deccan Herald with sensational sugarless, coffee offered by Tilaka, the Malayali lady with a dash of sacred ash on her thin forehead. She was always there, freshly dressed, at around 6 in the morning to hand us the first round of coffee. One will make it again to Bengaluru and Kodagu for the filter coffee alone.

P. Devarajan

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