This is different from my usual posts. I am not going to be writing philosophical things but would like to lay down some dishes on the table. I am a Bengali who's been in Bengaluru for the past 7 and half years. I must start by saying that my perception of this place was nothing like what it turned out to be over the years. While growing up, I had my science and English teacher from Madurai. When they first came to my hometown in Alipurduar, there means of communication had to be either Bengali or a little Bihari dialect inspired Hindi. Let's face it, Bihar is the closest to my home town and we do have a lot of UPites and Biharis there.
Kendriya Vidyalaya allows to have teachers from various parts of our country. In my school in particular, we tried speaking in English but i for one was never good with it. I could write but i could never speak. I would say - i was representing the majority mass of my school who were like me. So what did Mr. Ramanath or Miss TS Asha Devi do to survive? They would talk to us in English but then we wouldn't be able to reply back. They would try to speak in Hindi but we wouldn't understand. A great contrast. Over the years though - both Ramanath Sir and Asha Ma'am picked up their Hindi skills. I was a bit surprised about them not knowing Hindi from before, since all of my friends could speak the language. I only realized the portion of the population of Bengalies not well versed to speak Hindi when i went to College but that's for a different time. Along side Asha Ma'am and Ramanathan Sir - I had the company of few pseudo Telegu guys studying in my class. I say pseudo coz, these guys were so well versed with Bengali that even my mom wouldn't know where they were actually form. There's a huge bunch of them in Alipurduar. I was good with GK in my school time and I had read that Kerala is the first state in India that achieved 100 per cent literacy. The other reason was of course the fact that Kerala and Bengal were the only two states with the communist governments. Add to this the "Mile sur mera tumhara" video on doordarshan...and I would know that there are some languages in the south which are distinct and different unlike of course the common perception that exists here in the south that people from "North" (they only know that there are North Indians and South Indians), think that they are all from Madras. I tell you, that's a BIG FALSE assumption. Or maybe - we are talking about stereotypes here.
So I land up in Chennai for my first job assignment. During my college years, I had heard about Bengalore (then) as the city that hosted a bunch of rock shows. There was a swagger about the place. It was so called the "hep" town to be in. The opportunity to get posted in Bangalore within the first 10 days - did fill me up with a great deal of Joy. So I land up here in Bangalore and honestly, i was blown away by the contrast in climate across these two cities which are separated by approximately 250 KMs. Bengaluru was cold in August, the nights were chilly, literally cold in 2007. I am a bad traveler w.r.t clothing or accessories. I don't like carrying much. I didn't have anything to wrap myself around other than a bed sheet which my mom had packed in my bag. I had a Sony Ericson phone. I switch it on to listen to the FM radio and Hola! I heard a channel dedicated to English music!! I will never forget that feeling (call it fixation) but i was amazed by that. Kolkata never had it and now i was in this city where I was looking forward to meeting all of my rock gods and was gifted with the chance to headbang in style.
This post turned out to be bigger than what i anticipated, so i am going to write over a continuation on the same about the cultural experiences I have had after coming to the City of Bengaluru in my follow up post.
Kendriya Vidyalaya allows to have teachers from various parts of our country. In my school in particular, we tried speaking in English but i for one was never good with it. I could write but i could never speak. I would say - i was representing the majority mass of my school who were like me. So what did Mr. Ramanath or Miss TS Asha Devi do to survive? They would talk to us in English but then we wouldn't be able to reply back. They would try to speak in Hindi but we wouldn't understand. A great contrast. Over the years though - both Ramanath Sir and Asha Ma'am picked up their Hindi skills. I was a bit surprised about them not knowing Hindi from before, since all of my friends could speak the language. I only realized the portion of the population of Bengalies not well versed to speak Hindi when i went to College but that's for a different time. Along side Asha Ma'am and Ramanathan Sir - I had the company of few pseudo Telegu guys studying in my class. I say pseudo coz, these guys were so well versed with Bengali that even my mom wouldn't know where they were actually form. There's a huge bunch of them in Alipurduar. I was good with GK in my school time and I had read that Kerala is the first state in India that achieved 100 per cent literacy. The other reason was of course the fact that Kerala and Bengal were the only two states with the communist governments. Add to this the "Mile sur mera tumhara" video on doordarshan...and I would know that there are some languages in the south which are distinct and different unlike of course the common perception that exists here in the south that people from "North" (they only know that there are North Indians and South Indians), think that they are all from Madras. I tell you, that's a BIG FALSE assumption. Or maybe - we are talking about stereotypes here.
So I land up in Chennai for my first job assignment. During my college years, I had heard about Bengalore (then) as the city that hosted a bunch of rock shows. There was a swagger about the place. It was so called the "hep" town to be in. The opportunity to get posted in Bangalore within the first 10 days - did fill me up with a great deal of Joy. So I land up here in Bangalore and honestly, i was blown away by the contrast in climate across these two cities which are separated by approximately 250 KMs. Bengaluru was cold in August, the nights were chilly, literally cold in 2007. I am a bad traveler w.r.t clothing or accessories. I don't like carrying much. I didn't have anything to wrap myself around other than a bed sheet which my mom had packed in my bag. I had a Sony Ericson phone. I switch it on to listen to the FM radio and Hola! I heard a channel dedicated to English music!! I will never forget that feeling (call it fixation) but i was amazed by that. Kolkata never had it and now i was in this city where I was looking forward to meeting all of my rock gods and was gifted with the chance to headbang in style.
This post turned out to be bigger than what i anticipated, so i am going to write over a continuation on the same about the cultural experiences I have had after coming to the City of Bengaluru in my follow up post.
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