Change is a Two-Way Street

Priyamvada, desperate for authenticity in Chicago, takes off for her parents’ hometown and finds belonging as much in traditional festivities as at Starbucks clones. Sita obsesses about a Delhi socialite’s suicide and nerdy Ramu’s duplicity over a cup of Mysore coffee.

Sankaran’s appreciation of brevity is most evident in her endings. She patiently explores the textures of difference in each encounter and then suddenly ties up — or on occasion disentangles — the encounter. Each time, the city proves itself to be capacious enough to embrace the new while comforting the old. Ramu, for instance, is outraged by Ashwini, she with her superior prattle about “Bombay this and Bombay that”. Didn’t she know, he silently thunders, that “Bangalore was a strange city, a potpourri of beggars and billionaires and determinedly laidback ways.

People dressed down here, not just on Fridays, but every day — and gently derided those who didn’t… self-deprecation appeared modern, with its blue jeans and infotech ways, but was actually a very old courtesy. Deride yourself so others may praise you.” But many stories later he too will acquire the duly earned account of a diffident colleague with the proprietary air of the well-spoken.

Change is a matter of perspective. And Sankaran takes herself to assorted vantage points to give it wholeness. Mr D’Costa punctuates his retired days with pavement discourses, everything that transpires on Ulsoor Road is carefully tracked. Till the engineers and bankers and tax consultants move into the block of flats opposite his house. These young cosmopolitans, so far only read about in newsmagazines, are barricaded by glib lingo and global fashion. They intimidate, till an emergency draws Mr D’Costa into the Kapurs’ flat, alerting him to the altered geography of his own neighbourhood.

These are often sad stories. Their slick structure is repeatedly unsettled by yearning and nostalgia. But each time Sankaran finds a way of enlarging the idea of the city, of celebrating Bangalore.