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| Curtain call after the performance of Marathi drama 'Vaccum Cleaner. ' |
Looking at the heritage building in front of me made me stop in my tracks. I was on my way to pick up the morning newspapers in one of the bylanes in Pune Camp.
I had just collected my haul of Shrewsbury biscuits from Kayani bakery on East Street. It is a Friday today and Felix had said there could be a rush of weekend travellers picking up their stock.
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| Heritage building at Pune Camp. |
This afternoon the Marathi play 'Vaccum Cleaner' will be staged at Bal Gandharva Rang Mandir, Shivaji Nagar at 1 p.m. It has Ashok Saraf, an actor I like to watch.
It struck me that vaccum cleaner is an apt metaphor for the drive to demolish the heritage buildings and erect towers in lieu of them.
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| Queenie and myself after the show. |
The play was a riot. We enjoyed the double entendre. The innocuous vaccum cleaner acquires an agency which hurtles the play into unchartered waters. It was a full house packed with grandmas. Saraf was at his acerbic best.
We munched on bhel and veg sandwiches in the interval. Queenie was in splits. She understood far more than me, but it didn't matter. We were together.
Saraf's 50-year career in films and theatre is being celebrated next week in Kothrud through a 3-day festival in Kothrud.
As we hurtled homewards towards Kondwa in the auto, the auto driver narrated an anecdote at the Pul Gate bus terminus. He said in Hindi, that first there was Quarter Gate, indicating a quarter measure of drink, then there was Pul Gate, and finally there was Swar Gate. First you drink a quarter, then you have a full measure, and then you die (the Marathi word for swar.)
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Pic taken by Brian Mendonca at Bal Gandharva Rang Mandir, Shivaji Nagar, Pune on 30 December 2022.
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