Adhi Potoba

For students in Pune, especially those that have passed their SSC, the ones that are in the final year of their degree courses and everyone in between, hanging around spending entire evenings doing nothing is a big part of life. My immediate circle of 40 odd vagabonds such as myself had chosen a particular corner of town when we were 16 where we would waste a major part of the next 12 years of our lives. It was a small “ paanwala ”. For those unfamiliar with the concept of a paanwala , it is a shack, which sells beetle leaves and loose cigarettes. , a staple for said age group. Our Paan Tapri stood proudly next to a run down hotel, Village Corner. Village Corner had changed hands faster than coalition governments in Delhi till it finally shut down one day. The little cigarette shop however stands proudly to this day as the hotel that would’ve given it business stands in a state of utter disrepair. We would park our respective two wheelers next to the Paan shop and blowing hot air that ...

I grew up on Prabhat Road and our park was Kamla Nehru Park or KNP, as the college kids that order their chai "one by two" called it. My fondest memories bhel are outside the large iron gate of KNP. Bhola bhel was our "bhelwala". No real reason, that's just the guy my mother would take us to. A balding man on the wrong side of fifty with a pushcart and a permanent burnt umber complexion from making bhel under the scorching Indian sun. His pushcart had a hand painted board that advertised Bhola Bhel next to an anatomically questionable picture of Shankar . The glass containers that contained the papri and rice puffs were adorned with fading pictures of Bollywood stars whose star had faded decades ago. He cut onion really fine with a speed that would put the finest Waring chopper to shame. With a thick handle bar mustache and a cheery disposition he never failed to make serious small talk, even with his youngest customers. And for 70 Paise (in 1978) he would ...