In the heart of Pune’s Old City, about a minute’s walk from my grandmother’s house, is a mixed (open and closed air) market made up of two narrow lanes that cross each other: Tulsi Baug. It is one of my usual destinations for small trinkets, odds and ends as well as occasional clothes shopping.
During this trip, as my mom and I stood waiting for her purse to be mended (new straps put on to completely match the old ones), we decided to get some ice cream at the always-crowded store, Kawre Brothers. As I stood outside the shop and ate my butterscotch cone, I marveled at the uniqueness of the place I was in. There are not that many places (fewer still outside India) that can boast the diversity that Tulsi Baug has to offer.
I start with the numerous livelihoods of people who work at Tulsi Baug. At the top you have the larger stores (pakka – with four walls, some of which take credit cards). These are stores you can get all types of cosmetics, fake (and semi-real) jewelry, clothes, etc. Now the term jewelry in India encompasses infinite number of pieces, some of which I’m sure men wonder, where does this go again? You can get bits of shiny metal to adorn yourself from your head to your toes. Case in point: This time I bought to such shiny pieces to put in my hair bun (one that I wore at my engagement and one just for fun!). Moving on the cosmetics: while Tulsi Baug still sells henna and organic soaps and shikakai for hair, shopkeepers have kept up with the times. Alongside henna cones, you can buy Maybelline lipsticks and Cover Girl eye shadows (the fake kind and the authentic for at least twice as much). In a lesser number, there are stores that sell pots and pans, fake flowers for ALL your religious needs, bindis, random plastic items (soap dishes, etc.) and “western clothes”. There is even a store dedicated to: fake hair! So really, anything and everything you need can be found here. I unabashedly admit, if you need bangles… I know a guy.
And those are just the stores. Right outside the stores you have the stalls. These are slightly cheaper places where you can get hair clips, mobile phone covers, some cosmetics and jewelry and purses (D&G anyone? How about a Gucci?). For us, these stalls are primarily used for cheap hair clips as well as henna cones (yes they are cheaper than the stores and produce the same results). At the lowest level of the food chain are the street sellers who usually carry whatever they sell and wander up and down the lanes. Now people have an interesting relationship with these sellers. I find them irritating. They usually sell items that I have not yet found the need to buy (welcome mats, dish washing pads, moth balls and those glow in the dark stars that people put on their ceilings). I kid you not, these are the same items they have been selling for years. I would like to share with them new marketing techniques. They should analyze their consumers and approach ONLY them. However, they seem to approach everyone, including me. I’ll be walking purposefully to my bangle guy when out of the blue: Madam, door mats? No thanks. I believe door mats are something that you would put on your list before you left your house. They are hardly an item that you would randomly remember in the middle of shopping. But, I may be wrong. My brother on the other hand, appreciates the fact that they do not discriminate. However, for the last time, I don’t want eeeeshtars!
Another main reason for my forays into Tulsi Baug is to go to my tailor (for salwaar khameezs, not sari blouses – that’s a different guy). Now to get to this tailor, you have to look carefully between two stalls, there is this narrow one way traffic lane. For Harry Potter fans, I think of it as the Lane of Requirement, it only appears when you need it, because otherwise it’s invisible. At the end of the lane is a staircase – dark and damp. It is one of those staircases into which unintelligent females venture into in bad scary movies. Every time we go up it, my aunt (or mom) say: Don’t touch anything! I recommend not looking at or smelling anything either. On the first floor is a tiny room, with men who seem to be on sewing machines permanently. However odd the location, they really are the best tailors. And the clothes they are sewing are proof – they have the prettiest and most expensive looking blouses and salwaar khameezes hanging behind them.
While I ate my ice cream, I categorized the livelihoods Tulsi Baug had to offer into these three levels. I was amazed at the number of people employed in these two gallis (lanes). However, in those ten minutes, I also people-watched – something I’ve never done in Tulsi Baug. Because of the crowds, my previous expeditions have been of a search and retrieve nature. What I found was something that I absolutely LOVE about India. It is the week before Ganesh Chaturthi and Eid. Therefore, Tulsi Baug is ridiculously crowded. However, there are few places in the world (repeating myself but o so true) where you can see people of two huge religions mingling together. These are conservatives of both religions out to celebrate their different festivals. Women in all black, men in beards and skull caps haggled at prices of socks and handkerchiefs alongside women in saris (the Marathi kinds – pants style) and men in dhotis. A unknown fact about the world is that the universality of human beings is seen outside jewelry/cosmetic shops – men (holding shopping bags) standing outside looking bored while women crowd around the counters.
Now Old City Pune is just that, its conservative, OLD school, where I have gotten stopped on the road and chided (by random unknown lady) for wearing a skirt. However, in Tulsi Baug, you can find people from all different generations. You can find the pre-independence old people, going to the temple or to their usual stores and you can find college girls (yes sometimes wearing a skirt) giggling in large groups as they buy earrings. Likewise you can see the occasional foreigner, a little overwhelmed at the sights, smells and sounds, and you can see the whole family from a nearby village, making a day trip to Pune to buy everything they need for the next couple months.
So there is religious diversity, varying levels of modernity, rural vs. urban divide in Tulsi Baug. Additionally, there are literally every combination of human relations that are known to mankind. I saw whole families, young couples (married and not), old couples, really old couples, mothers with children, grown children with their old mothers, fathers alone with children (buying ice cream and balloons), siblings running errands, college friends (all female, all male, mixed), aunties shopping together, etc. If I’ve missed a combination, ask me about it and I’m sure you can find it at Tulsi Baug. With all the types of people in Tulsi Baug, I’d like to think of this as a miniature India.
I’m not sure if I’ve conveyed the true essence that is Tulsi Baug. But since it is an integral part of every trip of mine to Pune, I had to share it with those not fortunate enough to experience it themselves.
