SERAMPORE, India – It is a warm morning in March, and Ashish Bandopadhyay, 65, has gone by bicycle for 10 minutes from home to a tea store in the neighborhood of Chatra de Seramore, about 30 km (19 miles) from Kolkata.
Dressed in a pastel pole, Ashish takes care of the store, declaring that it is his “turn” to run it today. “Do not work here,” he explains with a smile while the label opens a package or milk while preparing to prepare a fresh pot of cha (the Bengali word for tea). “I am only an old and a client who loves the will.”
Located in the ancient part of the city, this hole store on the wall is known locally as Naresh Shomer Cha Er Dokan (Naresh Shome tea store). In India, the process of preparation and sharing tea forms an important part of social ties.
And that’s what this tea store is about. For a century, a space for relaxation, conversation and shared moments have bone. But it carries the social bond one step further: the client not only drinks tea but also prepares and serves it.
Ashish, who now retired from his office work with a construction company, has Bone visiting this tea store since he was 10 years old. It is where he meets friends to catch up with a cup of tea.
Every morning in the morning, the 60 -year -old owner, Ashok Chakroborty, opens the store and then leaves for the work of his office.
“One of us takes control of the store until the moment he returns in the event. Today was my turn,” says Ashish. In total, there are 10 volunteers who turn in the store seven days a week. None pay more are volunteer clients who, like Ashish, have retired and receive a pension from their former employers.
Today, Ashish arrived at the store at 9 am and closed for lunch at noon. Hello, at 3pm. “If not every day, I prefer to stay here most of the week. After my departure, another person enters my role,” he says.
There is no fixed rotation: “Whoever is free,” Ashish explains. “We keep the cash in a wooden box on the shelf after using it to buy milk or sugar. And there is only one day without a caregiver.”
Naresh Chandra Shome’s legacy
Little has changed in the 100 years that the five -to -seven tea store has been going: “Except for some bleachers and a roof repair,” says Ashish. Despite the layers of paint, the walls are stained dark with soot and smoke from the coal clay stove.
Tea is still served in clay and paper cups, with a recharge that costs only five rupees (approximately $ 0.06).
The store offers a modest tea menu with simple and direct options. Customers can choose between milk tea, with or without sugar, and black tea served or with lemon, or kobiraji cha (black tea with spices). Cookie bottles complete the offers of the stores.
Located in front of the Chatra Kali Babu crematorium, family members often come to have tea after saying goodbye to loved ones.
The store was founded by Naresh Chandra Shome, who worked for Brooke Bond, a tea company that tracks its roots to the colonial era in India. All Ashok, the current owner, knows about Shome of that period is that he left his job to become a fighter for freedom.
After the independence of India of British domain in 1947, Shome joined the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and remained an active member until his death in 1995 at the age of 77. Throughout his life, his tea store served places a meeting place or tea.
Today, the tea store is below in the local IPC (M) office. “Shome was a useful man and was active in community service. His store was well known at that time and now. There is a photo of him in the party office,” says Prashanto Mondal, 54, a regular customer in the tea store.
Remember how it was taken for the first time to the store by a shaleague duration of a lunch 25 years ago.
“There are many tea stalls in SERAMPORE, but I always come here, almost daily, due to atmosphere stores and comrade sensation,” explains the GLP gas delivery agent.
After finishing his tea, Prashanto gets up to help Ashish to fill the coal in the oven. Like Prashanto, most customers help with homework, such as looking for milk from the nearby store or filling water from the tap.
“We have heard Naresh Shome stories duration of his activists,” says Ashish. “Sometimes he would like to leave the store abruptly for urgent community service or be taken by the police, always asking their clients to take care of the store. I think this legacy has endured, customers naturally assume responsibility, the tea store in the OW
From the colonial adjustments to Bengali Adda and Cha
Around 1925, Shome opened the tea store on the ground floor of the building owned by his aunt. But before it was a meeting place for tea and conversational drinkers, the 350 -year -old building on the Hooghly River housed several types of stores, including one that sold utensils.
The wooden beams exposed on the ceiling seem to support the weight of the story. The thick limestone walls are silent witnesses of the many Bengali, Danish and English peoples that passed over the years. The store looks towards Chatra Ghat (steps that lead to the river), where Hindus have created their dead for generations. Now, a modern electrical crematorium has tasks of the place of traditional wood piras.
The city of SERAMPORE, home of approximately 2000 people, is prior to the capital of Western Bengal of Kolkata for a few centuries has been governed by the Danes and the British. The city was a Danish commercial agreement called Frederiksnagore from 1755 to 1845, to the British tok, remaining until independence in 1947.
Once, the carriages driven by horses transported European officers and their families along the streets. Today, bustle bustling bycotos, electric and cars rickshaws. European -style buildings are together with the high apartment complexes built in more recent decades.
Local Restoration Activist Mohit Rabadip explains that the tea store has an important position in the cultural history of SERAMPORE. RANADIP is a member of the SERAMPORE Patrimony Restoration Initiative, a local body led by Citizens dedicated to preserving and promoting the inheritance of the city.
“ADDA and for culture are still very relevant in the [Chatra] The town and perhaps that is why the tea store is still so popular, “he says.
In Western Bengal, for culture it refers freely to a neighborhood or location, defined by a strong sense of community. Each for has its place of adsent: the corner of a street, park or, in fact, a tea store. Adda is a beloved hobby that is exclusive to West Bengal. Marshly different from the mere little talk or chat, it is better described as an informal group conversation that is long, fluid and relaxed in nature. A cup of cha -invariably joins thesis meetings together.
In the neighborhood of Chatra, Naresh Shome’s Tea Shop, a focal point for this Adda tradition, attracting people from all areas of life to converge and share daily experiences about smoking tea cups.
Prashanto and his colleagues, Karthick and Amal, talked about the removal gas cylinders that had to deliver until the end of the day. Some came alone for fast tea. The client who spent the event was more relaxed, as Kar Anima, who came with his daughter to catch up with his brother.
The condition of the Western Bengal connection with tea is also deep. About 600 km north of SERAMPORE, the root tea industry in Darjeeling hills in the mid -nineteenth century duration of the British raj. The first commercial tea gardens were established in Darjeeling and its surroundings. Darjeeling emerald green tea farms still produce part of the world’s most extent tea.
At approximately 6 PM, as the event is established, Ashok returns from its administrative work. Using an olive green t -shirt, he takes care of asiciar, continuing the daily rhythm of the store.
Ashok is the son -in -law or Lakhirani Roophhi, the owner of the building. He has been in charge of the store since Shome’s death.
“Today Ashish da (brother) gave me 400 rupees ($ 4.65) as revenue of the day,” says Ashok, while poureding tea into clay cups. He says he has never faced any problem with customers who do not pay; Without fail, they always leave the right amount for tea in the cash or return later to pay what we.
“We sell around 200 cups most days““Hello, he adds.
‘An interrogation sign in the future’
“I love tea with masla (mixture of spices) made by Ashok da,” says Anima, 50, who has a leg client for years. “If Kolkata has a cafeteria where people meet for a time and quality address, well, this tea store is our humble equivalent.”
Anima used to come with her father as a child and remember Shome. Now, sometimes visit with your family. “The tea store remains a lasting symbol of tradition, community life and love for tea. Every morning and afternoon, people are attracted not only for tea, but for a deep sense of belonging and shared history,” says Anima.
At 9 PM, Ashok pours the last tea leaf for the four removable customers and prepares to call it one day.
In recent years, he has begun to worry about the future of his iconic store.
“I doubt if the youngest generation carries out this precious legacy of trust. There are very few visitors of the youngest generation that come and participate in the tea store,” he says.
His son, says Ashok, is an engineer and has not shown much interest in the store.
Ranadip Restoration activist shares his Conerns: “The youngest generation is so busy that it has little time for the address, which seriously puts an interrogation sign in the future of the store like this.”
Despite the uncertain future of the store, Ashok has the hope that others will take a step forward to preserve it, as the previous generations have done. “I choose to stay optimistic that the store will continue its legacy, as it has done for many years,” says Ashok.