The German Bakery in Koregaon Park - the place where a country bumpkin who had lived a life so sheltered that when asked to cuss in her language she looked blankly and said 'I don't know how to swear' in proper English - got one of her first classes in growing up....
I learnt there, while trying out their sinful pastries, how to distinguish the sweet smell of weed mixed with tobacco from normal nicotine cigarettes...The first time I realised I was among weed smoking foreigners and students, I wondered if that was crime enough to have me arrested...Little guilt pangs of a straitjacketed life, I tell you! But then the crazy student life that Pune offers gives you a masters degree in life too along with the subject you landed up in the city to pursue...
The Osho Ashram that is like a stone's throw away remained a mystery behind gates that were almost always tightly shut....But the maroon robed inmates who frequented the bakery seemed a lot of fun...more approachable..Not that I was curious enough to walk up and strike a conversation...It took me about a year in journalism to be desperately curious enough to start attempting that..
I wonder how Koregaon park will be without the German Bakery to be pointed out to as a landmark...I wonder where I can now sit watching the Osho chappal vendors sell those little light chappals that I see young girls still stuck in the psychedelic 60s era still spot in chilly Brighton winter..My friends have been posting on facebook how it was just a couple of months back that they too sat on a balmy morning in the Bakery digging in to burgers and fries and their ohh-so-awesome apple crumbles.... Some wonderful photographs of the time spent there are I think gathering dust in albums in my cupboard at home in Kochi...Its no great shake...I remember one of my friends, who had heard so much about the German Bakery before landing up there, exclaiming 'were you talking about this hole in the wall???'
That's what it is...a Little Hole...Talking of which the Blast, I heard as I compulsively listened to live streaming of news from India, blew a 6x4 feet crater in German Bakery...The little kitschy 'hole in the wall' is scarred forever...marked by terror..But this time around when I sat watching the Home Minister's press conference, for once i wasn't bothering about whether the graphics were firing right or the spellings were correct on the jackets running over Chidambaram's visuals.. I was watching it like any other viewer...feeling the sense of violation of a lovely memory left sullied by terror....that's irreparable, isn't it??
For someone like me who's never visited the city..German Bakery now remains in these words and visuals alone.
ReplyDelete:( terribly upsetting.
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