Remembering Time: Bangalore and Familiarity

By Akhiya Ajitkumar 

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Bangalore: I am in the vast space, in a breach between time. This breach appeared when I was first created, and since then, I have routinely found myself returning to this opening for a rendezvous, a clandestine meeting with my alternate selves. 

I am Bangalore, the capital of Karnataka, discovered by King Kempegowda I in the sixteenth century. But my identity reflects that of the present, specifically the year 2026. My past visits me here sometimes, and we exchange our evolutions and experiences. She is about to arrive any second. We call her Bengaluru. 

While she finds her way through the portal, let me introduce you to the newest member of our meetings- Future Bangalore. They are mysterious and don’t reveal more than what needs to be revealed, lest the future be changed. So we don’t ask them a lot of questions, out of respect and fear of the unforeseeable.

Bengaluru: Bangalore! My family! Always pleased to meet you in every century. 

(She wraps her arms around both of us, her infinite arm of stars and dusts of human life, rejuvenating and lethal.)

Bangalore: Let us all sit now, and begin. We don't have a lot of time, and I have a lot to say.

Bengaluru: Of course. Go on. We are listening. 

Bangalore: I have called you all here today to discuss my fate. I am afraid. Now I understand Bangalore, that I can't ask you what happens to me, and your silence perplexes me. You seem like you are okay, but I’m not. Bengaluru, you were an empire. Trades across all directions in the lands and prosperous networks bound your time in glory. I am envious. Your tales of interconnected history, though not without conflicts, reflect something I feel I lack. 

Bengaluru: History is written by the victors, Bangalore, don't forget that. 

Bangalore: I understand what you mean, and I don’t mean to undermine that all of what occurred has what led to the present moment that I have become. How could I? I remember it. The empires that fought for control over me changed and mixed, and challenged the cultures I have embodied. And I have embodied multitudes within me. Yet I cannot ignore that today, when I look around me in the cities and roads that lie within me. Scattered across the large, wide roads that don’t fit them all together. Groups forming, reforming and separating in prejudice of a superior culture. I see people without a memory to guide them. I am them. Yet I am not a part of them, as much as I could be. I am a city alienated. I am the people, isolated. The rich tapestry of languages, cultures, and knowledge has created a heritage that now sits untouched within me. We have forgotten that we are bound together. Wasn’t that the part of our history that was re-contextualized, re-written, re-purposed for separation? I am afraid of who I will be.

Bengaluru: Time is cruel, power is vicious, and prejudice feeds on both. The cost is cosmopolitanism.

Future Bangalore: You will recognise yourself in me, both of you. Familiarity will persist, despite. Evolution is an assemblage of multitudes. 

Bangalore: My identity is within you, and mine is in yours. History will persist, and the future will be the witness, indefinitely.