Our shop is as organic as it gets - has only grains, fruits, vegetables and dairy products. Short eats are locally made and certified as organic, So for a shaving cream it needs to be an errand in sin to an inorganic shop, unless one uses an App for delivery. But a part of me still would want to get out, past the leafy road to periurban Bangalore, all a hop away. Cows on the road, strays near garbage, two wheelers and four wheelers in Brownian motion from gated apartments - I get to my inorganic shop - well stocked with detergents and soaps, along with food grains and junk food from assorted sources, I would typically find smaller shops that sell peanuts and the like, a medical shop run by a disabled person - it breaks my heart to ask him for anything outside his reach, but he has a smile and he says he needs to make business. Today the assorted shacks selling fruits and vegetables were closed, and I was determined to give the small timers a shot, And so I head towards the main road and try and find push carts that had fruits. They were gone, I take a left hit the main road and turn left to Anchepalya - another street in random motion with a mosque, temple, medical shops and shacks selling wares jostlling for space,
Guavas slightly bigger than a baseball caught my eye. So I pulled over and stopped. This guy had apples, oranges, guavas and bananas. While oranges looked far from fresh the rest were good. Got a Kg of each - I knew this guy would know hindi, spoke to him in Hindi, paid in cash for old times sake, and then my eyes wandered to the temple to his right. He gave me an extra banana, peeling it saying this would be good. It was. The temple like the many small ones in Bangalore had a majestic tree. It was 2 in the afternoon and it was closed. On it steps there were kids playing. Their mom in a burkha kept a watchful eye. I had my bagful of fruits and a smile - these lanes can give social media a lesson.
In a couple of hundred yards, the road would turn to the right - and become less crowded, with a new temple to my right, a government urdu medium primary school which also hosts elections every time it is held, a Benedectine monastery to my left, it hosted a zen meditation retreat earlier this year. Another left turn and I would be back to my leafy oasis. Our new additional household help, a muslim lady went early on October 31st to buy firecrackers for her kids.
Is it just my neck of the woods? In Nilgiris where we are running an NGO the labourers, tribals from Masinagudi wanted a week off for Diwali. The program was kicked off as per their custom with a puja for the implements that give them livelihood, while the staffers irrespective of whether they went to a church or a temple wanted to by firecrackers for the kids at home,
And so unfolds the mosaic of India, seen from a community called Mosaic. The community is called Malhar Mosaic. A song may be in order, but rendered by me would be surely unmusical.
