Roaming around in Bengaluru: Musings through the eyes of a New Zealander

A travelling Kiwi, roaming around India's tech capital, pens down her thoughts on her everyday experience.

I’ve been living in Bengaluru for 12 weeks, but it feels a lot longer than that.

The city has crept into my blood, and already I’m chuckling at Whitefield memes and making jokes about the Ejipura flyover.

I come from Dunedin, a ‘city’ of 130,000 people in the south of New Zealand.

I look different, which means that no matter how long I'm in Bengaluru, I'll always be recognisable as an outsider.

Yesterday, I walked into a small restaurant on Avenue Road, and a well-meaning customer tried to explain the process of ordering.

Last week, on my way to a new friend’s house for dinner, someone tried to help me “find my Airbnb”.

Although this unnecessary help exasperates me, it’s also understandable. I have seen very few Westerners here who don’t have the distinctive wide-eyed look of a tourist.

And when I meet another Westerner who evidently lives here, like the man who jogs around my local park, we avoid eye contact and do our best to blend in with the crowd.

We long to order our food unaided, and for no one to try to help us find our Airbnb.

But this isn’t likely to happen anytime soon. Bengalureans are by their nature incredibly helpful, warm and friendly.

To my amazement, I haven't encountered a single rude or dismissive person.

I attempted to learn Kannada before I arrived, meeting weekly in a Dunedin cafe with a Bengalurean couple, who drank cappuccinos while they tried to teach me the finer points of past and future tenses.

I thought it was the least I could do, especially coming from New Zealand, where there’s a growing conversation about using Te Reo Māori — our indigenous and co-official language — more meaningfully in everyday life.

To my embarrassment, once I arrived in Bengaluru, learning Kannada — and even Hindi — slipped down my priority list as I got swept up in the excitement and challenges of being here.

Instead, I focussed on my work, the friends I’m making, and roaming around the city.

“Roaming around” — this is a very Indian turn of phrase which I have a fondness for. It implies just the sort of unfocussed wandering I like the best.

I'm trying to roam around the entire city, even though I know this is impossible.

Recently, I went to Basavanagudi and saw the regal and imposing Nandi, strolled Gandhi Bazaar, and spent hours looking at beautiful items in shops before treating myself to a banana leaf meal.

It's so easy to eat “veg” here — vegetarian food is everywhere, delicious and clearly marked by that helpful green circle inside a green square.

There is no confusing middle ground, unlike in New Zealand, where you might order a veggie burger only to discover the patty has been fried in animal fat.

The bustle of Bengaluru

Most of the time, the bustle of Bengaluru excites me: the people in their suits, their sarees, their party frocks, the ones carrying goods on their heads, driving tractors down the road, nearly everyone with a cellphone in hand.

But when I’m in the wrong mood, it can be overwhelming and infuriating — Bengaluru is not a relaxing city, especially when caught in a traffic jam.

When walking, one has to be constantly mindful of hazards like broken pavements, cow manure and crowds gathered at roadside food stalls.

But big city life comes with big city conveniences. Last week, I walked down the road at 9 pm to a hole-in-the-wall electrician’s where they fixed my broken lamp in five minutes, for Rs 50. 

In New Zealand, all but the biggest shops are shut by 6 pm, and this job would cost at least Rs 1,000.

Worse still, in Dunedin it’s difficult to find a cafe open after 3 pm.

Another Bengaluru convenience I’m taking full advantage of is ride-hailing apps; I use them daily for both autos and bike taxis, both of which have their benefits.

I prefer the feeling of freedom as a nifty two-wheeler navigates the traffic with ease, but autos are my go-to when travelling in groups, in poor weather, or when totally exhausted by roaming around.

I think they even look picturesque in their smart green and yellow outfits, improving rather than distracting from the urban environment.

New Zealand lacks the economies of scale to make Uber — our only widely-used ride-hailing service — affordable and convenient; there, it is an extravagance for me, useful only as a last resort to get home after a few wines.

Meet-up culture

Bengaluru’s large population also ensures that there are events happening constantly — guided city walks, craft events, movie clubs, live music, and festivals. This makes a pleasant change from Dunedin where I’m sometimes so desperate for activities that I find myself at model train exhibitions and chicken shows.

Often, the events I attend in Bengaluru are part of organised meet-ups. Meet-up culture is big here; it seems that this anonymous-feeling city is full of people desperate for connection; we arrive at events shy and alone, and leave having made new friends, or at the very least having spent some time in pleasant company.

From my new friends, I learned that, for the most part, people in Bengaluru worry about the same things and laugh about the same things as they do in New Zealand.

The world seems smaller once you realise that everyone knows the same films and has the same relationship problems.

The differences

Of course, there are differences: here, there is immense pressure from family in terms of both lifestyle and marriage, which can mean that people are less free to follow their hearts.

Bengaluru also has a relentless hustle culture, caused by the frantic competition for better jobs and better pay.

The people I spend time with are young and educated, all hoping for a comfortable future; they know that they must not squander the precious opportunities they have been given by their parents.

Every day, they see the alternative life they might fall into if they don’t hustle: working long hours at hard and unpleasant jobs for very little reward. The struggle is real.

In New Zealand, despite some people falling through the cracks in our rickety social security system, there is technically the safety net of an unemployment benefit for those who need it.

This means that people can breathe a bit easier, knowing that a period of unemployment or low income will not leave them homeless or destitute.

This difference in work culture might explain why more experimental, underground art is less common in Bengaluru than in New Zealand. Bengalureans lack the time or mental space that accompanies a flourishing non-capitalistic creative community.

In New Zealand, I had the privilege of studying a vague and directionless Bachelor of Arts at university, which eventually led me decades later to journalism.

Financial privilege and inequality

But I’m finding it difficult to come to terms with the financial privilege that life in India permits me; ride-hailing feels like my own personal chauffeur service, and Instamart is a magic wand.

I’ve never thought of myself as someone who lives this way, and the privilege sits uncomfortably, especially when I see the vast inequality around me.

So I make an effort to catch buses when I can, especially on rainy evenings when it’s challenging to book an auto. As long as the bus has available seats, it’s a comfortable ride: there is light to read my book by, should I want to; I’m protected from the rain; and the movement is smooth.

Many of the people on the bus have lives that I find it hard to fathom. It’s a cliche, but the gap between rich and poor is massive in India, especially through the eyes of an outsider: waste pickers, children selling roses, young men with their mulberries at the traffic lights.

I find it confronting to be asked for money so frequently in Bengaluru —sometimes I find myself saying no without thinking about it.

Most of the time, I give what I can, but frustratingly, this depends on so many factors — the change I have in my wallet, whether I’m in a hurry, how many other people I have given money to that day, my mood.

Although begging is technically illegal here, it’s hard not to feel that some sharing is in order.

Unfortunately, I don’t have much time left to do this, or much of anything really.

I may have given the impression I’m a permanent fixture in Bengaluru, but my time here is coming to a close in a few weeks, and I’m in denial about this.

There’s so much I’m yet to do; I still haven’t seen a film, or visited the “friendly orange cat” in Banashankari who has their own Google Maps co-ordinates.

Back home in Dunedin, the seasons are changing. The puddles will have stopped icing over, and people will have put away their heavy winter coats.

Spring flowers like daffodils and crocuses will be raising their clean leaf-spears from the earth. Lambs are being born.

In Bengaluru, I only know the monsoon season.

I've developed a sense of when the rains are coming, the heavy charged feeling in the air, which means “catch an auto, not a bike taxi”.

I've learned to always carry an umbrella, and also that it will rain as soon as I leave my umbrella at home.

This knowledge will be useless back in Dunedin, but I will always carry it with me.

And if you ever come to Dunedin, just give me a call  — I will explain how to order at the restaurant.