Let's call it purple tourism: Pride in Bangaluru

This past weekend we went to Bangaluru, which was yet again a different India. It's an India of five-story malls, corporate-sponsored Pride Marches, vast public gardens in the heart of the city, luxury apartments with pools and gyms, and food without any ethnic context. In short, our Bangaluru was the neoliberal India, a reminder that mostly-unregulated knowledge-driven capitalism is a powerful force that's shaping millions of lives in India.

Our Bangaluru adventure began at the Swargate Bus Depot in Pune, where Saum (who wasn't able to come with us but who had taken the bus before because his sister lives in Bangaluru) and I met Casey to prepare for our journey. There had been some ticket confusion earlier and up until moments before we got on the bus we didn't know our ticket numbers. Of course, it turned out our IDs were all we needed so that worked out, and soon Casey and I were on our trip to the distant capital of Karnataka. 

Sunrise of sorts through the fog.

It was a fourteen hour bus ride but we slept for ten of those hours, after which point we were basically there. We didn't wake up for the sunrise but we did get to see the still-red morning sun through the mist of rural Karnataka.

Bangaluru is a beautiful city. The streets are straight but crowded, and billboards fill the skyline and ground walls. It is definitely a big city on par with Mumbai rather than the more subdued, possibly even intellectual climate of Pune, though everywhere was apparent the glitz brought by the large tech industries. After debarking from the bus we took a quick rickshaw ride to Mantri Mall, beside which was the new apartment complex in which the Khubchandanis (parents of one of my favorite Northwestern professors who is no longer at NU) live. Their apartment is beautiful, filled with Southeast Asian Buddhist art and will a peaceful wind-chiming terrace with a gorgeous view.

Mahatma Gandhi road, with a light rail.

After a conversation in which karma was discussed extensively, we sat down to a breakfast that included eggs, wheat toast, cheddar cheese, and papaya. In other words, a vegetarian's paradise. And then from there we were driven to a location in South Bangaluru where there was a Pride Carnival where there were vegan snacks and handmade jewelry. We had a nice conversation with the guy who made the snacks, for whom this was also the first Pride Carnival, and it turned out he wasn't himself vegan. The cashew nut butter was delicious anyway.

A commercial street, but not the one named "Commercial Street".

We were there early though so we wandered around, shopped a bit in what could have passed for The Magnificent Mile because of all its namebrand stores, and the had lunch at a place Saum recommended called Truffle's Ice and Spice, where we ate American food and a dessert called a "Kaluha Fantasy".

Preparing to eat a fantasy.

Fully satiated, we returned to the carnival, where the cultural performances still hadn't begun. We looked around and some of the stuff that was being sold, which included what looked like a couple people's personal belongings (I guess like a garage sale), and some hand-carved wooden bangles and forks made from guava trees. We also met Suresh, who makes candles, including rainbow candles that smell like cranberries. Casey went to get her tarot cards read nearby so I ended up talking to Suresh for a bit while I waited. He's Tamilian, though he has been in Bangalore 25 years, and only recently started making candles. I suggested when he make rainbow candles that he make each color a different smell, an idea he didn't seem to think as much of as I did, and then we ended up talking about the community in Bangaluru. For example, it turns out that even without the marriage bureau and family pressure, colorism is alive and well in the androsexual men community, where even a fashion sense, confidence, and symmetrical features don't make up for skin color (a conversation that made me uncomfortable as a pale-skinned American for privilege reasons). We also talked about the fact that Bangalore has also changed a lot in recent years in a way that many Bangalurians find unpleasant; it's gotten much more crowded and much less vegetarian. Suresh was also one of several people wearing superhero shirts; whether this has something to do with how Indian society closets sexual minorities or not is up to your interpretation.

The diversity fair, complete with lots of food, but several hours before the performances started.

Finally, the performances started, and Casey and I sat on the root of a tree to watch. The first act was a guy who played Ed Sheeran, Coldplay, and The Lumineers covers (we met him the next day too; his name is Ian and he's from South Carolina), followed by a singer songwriter (who's named Mahesh and has a SoundCloud but I don't know the link) who reminded me a little of Fountain Penn. Casey was a fan of both. Another man sang Hindi love songs to his life partner (luckily some people in front of us translated), and a pair of men dancing salsa. There were also more classical forms; one woman (who I believe was one of the organizers) danced kathak, another person danced Odissi. There were drag performances, beat boxing, and a rousing street theater performance indicting IPC 377 (which mixed English, Hindi, and possibly Kannada).

One strange tidbit is that at the fair they announced that permission for the march had been briefly rescinded by the police because of fears about the Kiss of Love protests. The organization that plans the march managed to assuage the fears and get permission but had to tell us all to avoid PDA during the march, a piece of conservative prudery that seemed strange among the liberal triumphalism of the Pride March. This New India is clearly marked by some tension, where couples (even straight couples) kissing on the street is unacceptable but a march that in large part celebrates and affirms illegal (under IPC 377) behavior is kosher.

Casey and I ended up ducking out of the fair before the performances were over because it was getting dark and they had been going on for hours, and after deciding Cubbon Park was too dark to visit we returned to Mantri Mall, where we took a peek at Bangalurian consumption practices. Inside Mantri Mall, the first thing we noticed was the Taco Bell, KFC, McDonald's, Krispy Kreme, Starbucks, and Baskin Robins. We went to the Taco Bell briefly, but since the bean burritos cost considerably more than a dollar I was too offended to try them. After some short rounds Casey and I decided we weren't ready for global capitalism and returned to the apartment and had a nice dinner where we discussed the places Aunty Shoba (my professor's mother) had travelled.

Doing yoga on a tree in Lalbagh Botanic Gardens.

The next morning we got up bright and early to leave the house by seven thirty in order to get to Lalbagh Botanic Gardens, which are free entry from 6-9 am. When we got there, Casey took my camera and forced me to pose. I communed with some trees (which are apparently not appropriate to climb), and then we went to Cubbon Park.

In our first experience, Cubbon Park, unlike Lalbagh, was not very well kept-up, and had lots of litter. Yet it's unkemptness was great because it in some ways felt more wild, like nature. We also saw some people doing puja, a father jogging with his two daughters, and a nice security guard that tried to talk to us in Kannada. Then we found a library in the park! Casey thought we needed library cards but I didn't and I walked right in. There's a huge variety of books arranged Dewey Decimal, though not a large collection of YA. I also met a friend named Sijao who was studying for his exams and said hi.

A panorama of the library.

After leaving the library we discovered that there was much more to the park than we'd first thought, including loads of flowers and trees, one of which I climbed.

This is a beautiful, lush land I see.

We walked from Cubbon Park to Mahatma Gandhi Road (which ironically is the most commercial, global firm-dominated places I've seen in India), and after a delicious Chinese and Thai lunch we took a rickshaw to the City Railway Station. We got there thirty minutes early though; we couldn't find the march and even ended up getting a rickshaw to go to the ending point! Luckily a nice person with flowers in their hair let us know we were in the right place, and soon many more people began showing up.

Me, Casey, Nick. Nick and I are sporting Casey's rainbow drawing skills.

We met Nick, who is from Shillong originally, and his friend Amalie from Norway, as well as Ian, who had played guitar the night before, and his friend Shubhang, who goes to the same college, wears sunglasses, is Australian, and gave me a free hug. Ian had markers, which Casey took full advantage of and decorated all of our cheeks with rainbow art. Before the march started, we also met Sheetal, who works for the MoMA in NYC and is a Northwestern alumna (go Cats!). I'm constantly amazed by how varied people's places of origin are. I've met Indians from Tamil Nadu, Meghalaya, Saudi Arabia, Gibraltar, the US, Australia and Ghana, all living in Bangalore. It's incredible!

Ian, also with Casey's artwork on his cheek.

The march itself was huge, far bigger than the one in Pune (though still quite a bit smaller than Istanbul), and had a great welcoming energy. (It helped Casey and me that most people spoke English.) People chanted slogans; one of my favorites went "1-2-3-4 Open up the closet door; 5-6-7-8 Don't assume your kids are straight," which, considering the number of people I've met in India who aren't out to their parents, is a pretty relevant chant. I also saw a sign that declared that "The right to life is a fundamental right", and heard chants of "My body, my rights!" Those two rhetorical devices had a beautiful reunion in such a different context from the American culture wars.

A couple and others holding brightly-colored umbrellas for pride.

The march was several kilometers long, and in the process we all lost and found each other several times. We also marched right by where we were staying, and through an area with BJP flags hung up (Nick explained that area was mostly pretty high caste and conservative). Finally, the march ended in a large amphitheater called the Maleshwaram Grounds. Unfortunately Casey and I couldn't stay had to rush off and grab our stuff in order to catch the bus, so we didn't get to hang out with any of our new friends. I was sad about this, but we did catch the bus home (though the ride was both chillier and less comfortable than the first since we sat near the front). We got home in one piece though, several hundred miles travelled and one beautiful weekend in our memory.

The end of the parade at Malleshwaram Grounds, a football stadium/cultural events space.

As for you, dear friends, have you ever had an experience where you met new people but then had to rush off? Did you stay in touch with them? Even if you never see them again, as I will probably never see most of the people I named here, are you glad you met them, and what did you learn from them?