Bangalore's Mall Culture!

THE MARKET

...is awash with rotten apples which go unnoticed to most consumers...most of us look forward to THE Sunday, and when its here, we waste half the day sleeping late (which topsy turvies the biological clock and metabolism...wow! what a dumb thing to do...), and one third of the other half, we waste inside a supermarket....especially if you walk into one of those noisy Big Bazaars...I compare the confusion to what probably chickens feel when they are crammed into cages inside factory farms! Loudspeakers babbling away about last minutes discounts...and frantic mothers trying to parallely manage crying kids and shopping carts @ same time...! and you'll find the local boys loitering inside...passing comments at so-called babes....!

The experience becomes worse when you are more aware of the air inside...its cluttered with thoughts, thoughts, thoughts...all thoughts of confused, weekend-starved professionals...who end up buying junk in that confused state of mind...and the air inside is stiffling! You know that when you step outside........

Personally I feel the shopping mall culture is killing off the good old Bangalore....and another chain of "environment and health" side-effects are on the way because of these malls, the same way that IT has done to Bangalore in the past!

The reasons most people go to malls:

1) Because suddenly you have nothing better to do...

2) You want to meet your friend, at a mall...and once you meet him/her, you both are clueless what to do

3) If your friend is same sex, and you are straight then you'll both stare away at the opposite sex...this is similar to what we have done when we are at home...stare away blindly at the TV..while eating, while studying, while entertaining guests, sometimes even just to fall asleep!!

4) If your friend is same sex, and you both are gays/lesbians, you'll stare at the same sex...LOL

5) If your friend is opposite sex, then you'll do either of the following:

     a)  You are "just friends" with her, so she'll point out all the so-called hot guys, and you'll point out all the so-called hot girls

     b)  You "friend" is your girl friend?? Oops...then you'll probably peek glances at the babe who just passed by...a subconscious fantasy will probably make you take a second peep!

6) You want to shop for yourself....apparel...food products...home needs...and in the process you will take home one or more plastic bags which you will dispose irresponsibly! You will fight for your currency change with the autorickshaw wala who drops you home, but you will not fight for the planet nor educate the rest of the zombie shoppers who are also taking plastic bags by the dozens!!

7) You want to eat at McDonald's (or KFC if your love towards your own body and environment is lost!) and feel good about all the goo that's going into your delicate system. And if you are one of those fast-food young mothers who use toilet papers (yuck!), then you will definitely pump your little child's system with generous doses of unhealthy McVeggies, McChicken...I promise you that your child has higher chances of:

        a)  getting early puberty
        b)  becoming dumber and dumber at studies
        c)  becoming more aggressive with age
        d)  getting chronic diseases: including gastritis, obesity (most common), heart diseases, sleep apnea, respiratory problems, Type 2 diabetes and worst of all, WEAKENED IMMUNITY!

If you tell me, "Oh, but I just take my son/daughter to eat junk "once in a while"."

I tell you, Every weekend is NOT "once in a while"!

Real communication has become passe, with more and more malls, and their fast food joints spreading like cholera...in fact most conversations nowadays are very focussed....on MONEY or GRATIFICATION. Gratification includes DOING NAUGHTY THINGS ON BED!

Definitions are also changing:


X    Love for this funny cult of people is not love any more. It is "making love".


X    Contributing to the planet means building software for foreign monopolies, that become cash cows for the already-rich foreign tycoons.

X    As children, we played with toys, now most of you have stopped playing with toys...and started playing with human emotions

X    Doing a random act of karmic kindness means helping the beggar woman (who will in turn give the money to her drunkard husband)


X    Music means loud, metal, anti-Christ bands who exhibit suppressed emotional imbalances at rock shows, and invite a couple of alcohol brands as well to heighten the short-term madness


X    Quality time with parents means dragging them to the nearest mall to buy you that latest watch or jewellery or gadget.

Bangalore and its mall culture (includes fast food, rock bands, smoky pubs) are drugging the minds of promising youth...

...Software code is more poetic than Rabindranath Tagore's poetry

...Bloody Mary and McDowell's is more refreshing than healthy herbal juices

...Junk food is more gratifying than home-made organic food

...Singing about heartbreaks (followed by getting drunk) is more soothing than spending time meditating or helping someone

...Urban Agriculture means Farmville on facebook

...Higher grades in high school mean a promising engineer or doctor or lawyer (as if we don't have enough unemployable ones already)

What is the purpose of your life? 

To get into IIT? To get out of IIT? To get into Infosys? To get out of Infosys? To get married and create a generation of fast-food dependant children? To leave a huge property behind that has your younger generations spilling blood over?

Is the purpose of your life to struggle?

Is the purpose of your life to:

• lose  health working for a foreign MNC?
• lose self-esteem by becoming a successfully "placed" MBA?
• lose the priceless wealth of Vedic scientific knowledge that has survived millenniums, and inspired scientists and world leaders since the times of Archimedes?
• lose the spirituality that has held together the magnanimity of the Indian civilization: the most prosperous, the oldest and the most welcoming of all civilizations?

If you want to break the chain, and do something worthy of becoming a legend...start with something very simple. And the simplest thing is to love yourself more, enrol for an Art of Living YES!+ workshop, do good to this planet, and care for more and more people around you. You will live a regret-free life that will inspire many lives around you.