Actually, celebrating Christmas is a phenomenon that’s picked up only over the last 3-4 years in India. While it would be a truly heartening if everyone celebrated it in the true spirit, what it has ended up as, is another date in a Brand Manager’s or a Marketing Manager’s annual promotion calendar. That the New Year is also around the corner makes it even more happy and prosperous for the good folks who want us buy their wares. Anyway, more ranting on that later.
Having stayed in Bangalore for over six years now, one of the things I’ve missed out on (and trying to make up now) is to explore and experience the real Bangalore. Far removed from the world of IT/BT, malls, pubs (not quite, pubs are indeed a part of the real Bangalore experience), constant cribbing about the autowallahs & traffic, there is a world that provides a unique flavour to Bangalore.
One of my long pending weekend projects has been to document the churches in Bangalore and the stories around them. Bangalore had a very strong British and hence, a strong Christian influence and that is visibile in the once you get towards the Central Business District (M.G. Road, Brigade Road) and the Cantonment area. The other project is to arrive the number of roads in the vicinity of Brigade Road. Naming them from the top of my mind – Brunton Road, Commissariat Road, Residency Road, Magrath Road, Richmond Road, Primrose Road. Another project is to arrive at the number of towns in the Cantonment Area. Again, naming them from the top of my mind – Frazer Town, Cox Town, Benson Town, Cooke Town and God knows (someone knows for sure) how many more.
So it was Christmas time and I thought it’ll be a good time to go around Bangalore to visit some of the prominent churches. Not only would I get to see them nicely decked up for the occasion, but also get a chance to know more their histories. Till this Church exploration happened, the only church(?) I had been to in Bangalore was the St. Mary’s Basilica and that too during Ramzan. It is almost a ritual for me to visit Shivaji Nagar during Ramzan at late nights and spend time at the St. Mary’s Basilica while I’m there. It’s quite intriguing, the streets outside are heavily crowded and immensely noisy with all the Ramzan revelry. The Basilica, though located on the same street is incredibly peaceful and spending 10-15 minutes inside calms you down.
Deepti and I were discussing about making the Church visit happen on Christmas eve for a while and as is the case with most trips/excursions that eventually happen, everything was finalized and materialized in the last few hours.
I did some quick research on the prominent churches in Bangalore to visit during Christmas and strangely, an old (2007) article on Mint was the most helpful. Quickly marked the locations and the routes on a map and here’s what it looked like:
With our regular cab guy not responding, a cab was booked with TaxiForSure and it turned out that the driver was right in front of the house when I called him to give directions. With some plum cake packed, we set out to explore a different Bangalore!
We picked up one of our friends from Koramangala and decided to start with the St. Francis Xavier Cathedral in Frazer Town. I had a printout of the map and was constantly checking with the driver if he was sure of the directions. I’ve had some crazy experiences with cab drivers messing up with directions and hence wanted to be careful. Our driver seemed to be relying on the navigator app which was quite impressive.
Out first stop was the St. Francis Xavier Church Cathedral in Frazer Town. Nearly 150 years old, the Cathedral is a very imposing structure. The festivities had already begun with people greeting each other and getting into the Cathedral for the mass. While everyone was quite decked up for the occasion, I was truly the odd man out. In my 3/4th and the jacket with a camera in my hand, I stood out very well from the rest of the crowd! But then, it doesn’t matter, does it? I went inside the church, spoke to a priest to check if I could take photographs when I was told that I could very well do so without disturbing or obstructing the prayers and celebrations.
Some photos from the St. Francis Xavier Cathedral:
And one final photograph of the majestic Basilica!
Nikhil Kulkarni 
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