Bang Bang Galore!
A Filmmaker’s BLOGELLA
Written by Steve Rosenberg
Blog 44
Bang Bang Galore is my nickname for this city, the place I love to hate and the city I gradually grew to love. I think you can make friends with any city as long as you know there is an exit date. People here asked me on a daily basis how I feel about their beloved city Bangalore. I still haven’t properly answered that question even to myself. I’m not sure when or how this happened, but I’m surprised to admit that this city is growing on me.
In the early eighties, Bangalore was considered a sleepy retirement town. At 10:00 pm when the city is quiet, lady Bangalore has a complete metamorphosis, turning into that stunning woman who you notice for the first time at a late night evening affair and when her hair is swept up her face and she is wearing an elegant evening gown. Gone are the pushy street hawkers selling sunglasses and the rushing swirls of traffic and most significant, the noise dies down. At night, however, Bangalore is rather appealing.
Daily, I am asked the same question by proud Bangaloris: “How do you feel in Bangalore? Is it not like London?” I suppose on some level the city has a cosmopolitan flair, but it is unfair to compare it to a European capitol. During the day, it can feel like a dust bowl, but when you blow away the dust, there is plenty of beauty here. Barreling around the city at night, in a cool breezy three wheel open air rickshaw, I suddenly begin to notice that this city has many dazzling splashes of beauty; great neo colonial architecture, ornate Hindu temples, lush green gardens, and gentrified low rise neighbourhoods.
Educated Indians from all over the subcontinent have flocked here in a very short time this city of seven million. I try to imagine this city fifty years ago, in a time before the ascendancy of the motorized vehicle. I can imagine this was a charming quaint town during the British era. I hear that there is a metro system is now in the works.
“Bangalore is terrific!” I say. Why bother bitching to people about traffic woes? I came here to tell a story, which I am learning doesn’t seem that relevant to the average person here. “What do you think of child labour?” Unlike the daily assault of traffic, or the effects of pollution, it doesn’t register as a high priority for most people here. There are poor children in this country who are forced to eek out an existence by working. It has been a fact of life here for more than a few millenniums. This is not news to anyone here, just a basic fact of life.
Think about it! Imagine an Indian filmmaker arriving in Vancouver asking fairly personal questions about how the drug situation in the “Downtown Eastside” affects their daily lives. We all know drugs are an issue in Vancouver, but no one that I know is on a crusade to end drug use in our city. Drugs, at least the hard stuff are other people’s problem. People are not forced to take drugs, so why do they do it? You might say I am oblivious to the druggies of Vancouver. Like the beggars here, Vancouver’s drug addicts, most of which are of adult working age are always hitting me up for money. Should I give, should I not give? On the cold wet days of winter, I am more sensitive, but for the most part, I am oblivious. Let them have their drugs or outlaw drugs. I am not sure what helps, but I am clear that in my lifetime very little has been resolved. Drugs are an ongoing problem. I am more preoccupied with which TV broadcaster will wink at my latest proposal. So goes the apathy here for child labour in this country.
I guess I am wondering if all of my work on this subject of child labour is new information for the average Indian or Canadian viewer. Indians believe they understand these issues very well, yet there doesn’t seem to be the political momentum to continue talking about these issues. But I still have my fantasies. Sometimes I feel like the teenager at the rock concert who is pulling out his blue Bic lighter, not to smoke a joint, but to create a small flicker of excitement. First the people in the bleachers will pay attention to my light and then at some point the whole audience will holding up their lighters swaying back and forth united in deep thought from spark that originated from me. I want to complete this film with or without the assistance of a broadcaster. I want to honour the stories of the Born Free children; but like so many other documentary filmmakers, I am now faced with the choice of not wanting tell the whole story.
