Very nice. I, too, visited my own Engineering college nearly 10 years ago, after 25 years, and went through a similar journey of sorts. Some places remained, and some were forever lost to time and commerce. Ditto for my once hometown, which I do visit regularly. A visit to one such place, considered an "institution" (The Marzorin Bakery), never fails to flood me with nostalgia for a simpler, more innocent time when the cutney sandwich was the highlight of the day. These days, the sandwich is drier than I remember it to be, but the feelings from being in that place more than cancel any urge to visit some place fancier. I would be very sad if this place closed or even changed into something I could no longer relate to, even if that were the only way for it to survive. I consider this selfish desire for a place to remain frozen in time a direct consequence of a peripatetic existence where roots can be traced to the country at large because the places are no longer the same.
Like you I used to a place called Novelty in Jangpura in the 70's for burgers ( fried of course) and Sandwiches. They had a counter and stools like a deli. Recently passing the lane I found it buzzing and offering a similar fare. But either my taste has changed or the ingredients used now made the experience disappointing. Memoryin old age is a fickle friend unfortunately and my nostalgia was seemingly misplaced. Btw your piece hit bang on. Cheers
It's not bad but seemed a bit synthetic. I ate the chicken which was actually chicken ham..yuck! but egg I am told is better but was not available. The cold coffee is similar to Depauls
Thanks. I saw this sandwich shop in reels recently and was planning to visit here. I don't have any baggage of nostalgia with it so I can just go for that vintage deli feel ( I know the sandwich won't be great) :)
I still go for a maalish every couple of weeks. Catch up with the salon guys, some random neighbours also drop by.
Salons are an institution, one that start with 90s Salman songs and end with "sir detan karwa lo iss baar toh kaafi zarurat hai" every single time, without fail.
I'm not sure nostalgia visits all of us equally and your piece made me sit with that discomfort for a while.
My elder brother and I grew up in the same house, walked the same streets, ate from the same places. Yet when we meet now, he never reaches for the old days. He has a wife, kids, a thirteen and an eighteen year old, and he seems to move through life with an ease I find both admirable and quietly baffling. The past doesn't seem to pull at him the way it pulls at me.
I used to think that people who don't feel nostalgia simply had better memories. Now I wonder if they just have a present that holds them more firmly.
Do we even have the capacity, as humans, to know whether our current life is genuinely happier? We are terrible judges of our own contentment in real time. We only seem to know it in retrospect, which is, ironically, the very engine that drives nostalgia.
For me, it has stopped being a gentle ache. It is beginning to eat at something. And I often wonder if my mind's compulsive need to travel backwards is less about love for the past and more about a quiet dissatisfaction with where I am now. That's the part I find hardest…nostalgia as a symptom, not just a feeling.
We also live in a world that sells nostalgia back to us constantly, which makes it harder to know what's genuine grief for lost time and what's been manufactured. I find myself wanting to break free of it, even as I keep returning.
Your line about the invisible road being detonated by time…that stayed with me. Because some of us are still standing at the crater, unable to move.
'You take the man out of the city, but not the city out the man." I always come back to this line because at any point of time, the geography around us: the city, the colonies, the home... they all built our personality, voluntarily or not, consciously or not.
We outgrow them sometimes, as you mentioned. Sometimes we long for that old, familiar place.
But when I go back to my place where I grew up, I see my favourite spots no more functioning, I see the roads severely packed with vehicles, traffic and house construction hardly controllable.
Right now, I look back at the calm days where this was the perfect neighbourhood. I sometimes wonder if that was a dream. I don't hate it now. But at times, when I look at it, it feels like a place that once was home but I outgrew it. And I keep loving it retrospectively.
Anurag bhai... What a writeup, thank you so much. It read it and I could imagine the scene frame by frame. I had a similar experience in childhood where the salon owner (Naai) lakde ki ek dukaan banate hai jisko Khoka bolte hai Shekhawati side. Bilkul vaisa hi experience raha tha. Dhanyawad wo experience re-imagine karvane ke liye.
I remember this juice shop in Delhi Cantt where we used to go every so often. I never thought much of it. But the evening before I was leaving Delhi to go to college when I went to the same market after a gap of a week or so, I saw that the shop wasn't there. Instead, they'd made an oppo-vivo store in its place. I remember having a breakdown in the market then and there.
Your writing has triggered my memories (and others in the comments), and I feel there needs some research available to public on how nostalgia works collectively. Nostalgia, to me feels like a craving, like running fingers along the edge of a knife to feel the sharpness. A cut is bound to happen someday. Every once in few years I would go to the colony I had spent my childhood and walk the same lanes, see the old, abandoned house I had lived in, until recently I found the colony demolished by the municipality for new building spaces. That was bound to happen someday
Very nice. I, too, visited my own Engineering college nearly 10 years ago, after 25 years, and went through a similar journey of sorts. Some places remained, and some were forever lost to time and commerce. Ditto for my once hometown, which I do visit regularly. A visit to one such place, considered an "institution" (The Marzorin Bakery), never fails to flood me with nostalgia for a simpler, more innocent time when the cutney sandwich was the highlight of the day. These days, the sandwich is drier than I remember it to be, but the feelings from being in that place more than cancel any urge to visit some place fancier. I would be very sad if this place closed or even changed into something I could no longer relate to, even if that were the only way for it to survive. I consider this selfish desire for a place to remain frozen in time a direct consequence of a peripatetic existence where roots can be traced to the country at large because the places are no longer the same.
so very well articulated!!
Like you I used to a place called Novelty in Jangpura in the 70's for burgers ( fried of course) and Sandwiches. They had a counter and stools like a deli. Recently passing the lane I found it buzzing and offering a similar fare. But either my taste has changed or the ingredients used now made the experience disappointing. Memoryin old age is a fickle friend unfortunately and my nostalgia was seemingly misplaced. Btw your piece hit bang on. Cheers
Btw in 1970's the dad used to run it but now I am told that the daughter in law is in charge. Maybe just hearsay
It's not bad but seemed a bit synthetic. I ate the chicken which was actually chicken ham..yuck! but egg I am told is better but was not available. The cold coffee is similar to Depauls
Thanks. I saw this sandwich shop in reels recently and was planning to visit here. I don't have any baggage of nostalgia with it so I can just go for that vintage deli feel ( I know the sandwich won't be great) :)
I still go for a maalish every couple of weeks. Catch up with the salon guys, some random neighbours also drop by.
Salons are an institution, one that start with 90s Salman songs and end with "sir detan karwa lo iss baar toh kaafi zarurat hai" every single time, without fail.
❤️
Desperately look to escape tyranny of present feels the line best describing life post COVID
Wah.
I'm not sure nostalgia visits all of us equally and your piece made me sit with that discomfort for a while.
My elder brother and I grew up in the same house, walked the same streets, ate from the same places. Yet when we meet now, he never reaches for the old days. He has a wife, kids, a thirteen and an eighteen year old, and he seems to move through life with an ease I find both admirable and quietly baffling. The past doesn't seem to pull at him the way it pulls at me.
I used to think that people who don't feel nostalgia simply had better memories. Now I wonder if they just have a present that holds them more firmly.
Do we even have the capacity, as humans, to know whether our current life is genuinely happier? We are terrible judges of our own contentment in real time. We only seem to know it in retrospect, which is, ironically, the very engine that drives nostalgia.
For me, it has stopped being a gentle ache. It is beginning to eat at something. And I often wonder if my mind's compulsive need to travel backwards is less about love for the past and more about a quiet dissatisfaction with where I am now. That's the part I find hardest…nostalgia as a symptom, not just a feeling.
We also live in a world that sells nostalgia back to us constantly, which makes it harder to know what's genuine grief for lost time and what's been manufactured. I find myself wanting to break free of it, even as I keep returning.
Your line about the invisible road being detonated by time…that stayed with me. Because some of us are still standing at the crater, unable to move.
'You take the man out of the city, but not the city out the man." I always come back to this line because at any point of time, the geography around us: the city, the colonies, the home... they all built our personality, voluntarily or not, consciously or not.
We outgrow them sometimes, as you mentioned. Sometimes we long for that old, familiar place.
But when I go back to my place where I grew up, I see my favourite spots no more functioning, I see the roads severely packed with vehicles, traffic and house construction hardly controllable.
Right now, I look back at the calm days where this was the perfect neighbourhood. I sometimes wonder if that was a dream. I don't hate it now. But at times, when I look at it, it feels like a place that once was home but I outgrew it. And I keep loving it retrospectively.
The video is so good!!!!!
loved Bake Hut's black forest cake! So many birthdays in Jaipur were only celebrated with Bake Hut cakes.
Anurag bhai... What a writeup, thank you so much. It read it and I could imagine the scene frame by frame. I had a similar experience in childhood where the salon owner (Naai) lakde ki ek dukaan banate hai jisko Khoka bolte hai Shekhawati side. Bilkul vaisa hi experience raha tha. Dhanyawad wo experience re-imagine karvane ke liye.
enjoyed reading it a lot. anyways, back to assassinating my youthful mornings♥️🙃
I remember this juice shop in Delhi Cantt where we used to go every so often. I never thought much of it. But the evening before I was leaving Delhi to go to college when I went to the same market after a gap of a week or so, I saw that the shop wasn't there. Instead, they'd made an oppo-vivo store in its place. I remember having a breakdown in the market then and there.
Your writing has triggered my memories (and others in the comments), and I feel there needs some research available to public on how nostalgia works collectively. Nostalgia, to me feels like a craving, like running fingers along the edge of a knife to feel the sharpness. A cut is bound to happen someday. Every once in few years I would go to the colony I had spent my childhood and walk the same lanes, see the old, abandoned house I had lived in, until recently I found the colony demolished by the municipality for new building spaces. That was bound to happen someday
The short film was beautiful. Especially the moment when the sounds change into music. Loved.
Anurag You said you don't share good things and don't promote them.
But suddenly we got blessed by recommendation "6:30 without her "
Why is sudden change of heart ?
I didn't want to promote it as stand alone but with this piece it makes sense as accompaniment of mood.