Get Ready to Be ‘Bengaluru-ed’

By popagandhi | Published: 2 November, 2006

Just simply doesn’t have the same impact as “being Bangalored”.

One of my favourite cities, Bangalore, is “changing its name”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6107082.stm to Bengaluru, its name in the local Kannada language. The folks in Bangalore have had enough of being named after boiled beans (that’s what Bangalore means), after what, centuries?

What I want to know:
# Does this have anything to do with Kannada pride?
# Maybe the nationalists want to change their names so that Americans will have even more difficulty saying “I got Bengaluru-ed’? _Bengaloo… what?_
# Is anyone ever going to start using its new name? Because I’m still waiting for Kolkata to stop being called Calcutta, and for Mumbai to stop being called Bombay, and maybe I will switch to the new ‘nationalistic’ names when taxi drivers in these cities stop throwing me blank looks when faced with ‘Rustom Sidhwa St’, ‘Ho Chi Minh Sarani’, etc, when saying “Gunbow Street” or “Free School Street” takes me where I want to be. Until then, travellers, start drawing your tables of new names versus old names for yet another Indian city?

Well I guess the Karnataka government could have done worse. Imagine if Bangalore got its name changed to _Benda Kaal Ooru_ (the original name). If you want to revert to tradition, why don’t you just go all out? I guess I’ll be buying my ticket to Bengaluru next. Oh Bangalore, “I hardly knew ya”:http://popagandhi.com/338/home-is-wherever-you-beat-customs/.

The ever observant Z: “Aiyah, Bangalore and Bengaluru.. same thing, when pronounced by Chinese people.” :)

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  • Dave
    I thought bengalooru ment the town where the bengal bean comes from.

    Anyways Bangalore will always be a bean town !
  • Hey Adri,

    No more Jetstar to Bangalore? Damn. Where do I get my discount tickets now?
  • Sudha,

    Much like Singapore comes from Singha/Simha pura, Bangalore comes Benga-lu-ru, which is an abbreviation of Benda kalu uru. In Kannada, that is literally "boiled-beans city". "Pura" in Sanskrit is the same word as "Uru" in Kannada.
  • interesting. Bangalore means boiled beans? can you tell me in which language?
  • Chin, Air Deccan is indeed based out of Bangalore.

    Part of the reason why their flights get delayed is because they have very quick turnaround times, to save on ground parking fees. This also means that if there's a delay anywhere, the rest of the day's schedule for that plane is affected. The Bangalore-Bombay-Bangalore flight, for example, flies to Delhi in the morning, and back again after the Bombay trip. This means that if Delhi airport is having bad weather -- which is pretty much every day through the winter -- the Bombay flights are affected.
  • chin
    hmmm, i found tht Deccan is based in Banglore.Also since it is morning the flights at tht time arent late usually.
    Otherwise i have heard of horror stories from deccan passengers who have been stranded for 6-7 hrs at the airport only to be told tht flight has been cancelled.

    Why is Tiger so bad??
  • Haha. Yes, I remember that fondly about the Bangalore airport. I had a flight to catch at 4.30am. I was told I NEED to check in and all by 1 something — I found out later that it's cos international immigration counters close by 1.30 :P or 2. :P Then went in, had nothing to do except drink a lot of Coffee Day lattes, there was only 1 gate, so while at 5am the 1 gate was still boarding the Bangalore-LA and Bangalore-Chicago and Bangalore-Mumbai passengers... so... oh well.

    Anyway, Air Deccan is fine actually. Kingfisher is pretty expensive and they practise Indian/non-Indian discriminatory pricing. Deccan was only late by 30 minutes (which seemed more to do with Guwahati airport than the airline). After flying Biman Bangladesh twice in that week before I flew Deccan, I was pretty happy with Deccan. Plus I got to fly Guwahati - Kolkata for 900 rupees, or $40 something including taxes. An AC train would have cos the same and taken about 23 hours more.

    Jetstar is going to stop flying to Bangalore from January... but I hear Tiger is stepping in to India and Sri Lanka. Goa, Calcutta, etc etc. Great routes to fly but bloody hell I hate Tiger so much.

    Next time you're caught in Bangalore airport in that circumstance, get clearance to leave and go to the carpark area. There's a 24 hour Coffee Day with some seats, can grab a smoke and a pick-me-up there.

    Toa Payoh or Yishun interchange may do better than Bangalore airport, but Yishun sure doesn't make me as happy as Bangalore does!
  • chin
    Hi,
    I made this trip to Mumbai from Singapore.
    Trying to be a budget traveller, I made a JetStar Asia booking to Bangalore(bengaluru) and then booked myself on to 'bangaluru mumbai' flight on Kingfisher.(I should have booked Deccan airways if I wanted to really be a budget traveller...but no 'panga' with deccan).
    The jet star flight landed at 3:00 morning and the kingfisher flight was at 7:00. We had no place to sit for the time till about 5.30. A fellow passenger who was flying to Cochin kept on muttering "This is the silicon valley on India!!..pathetic".

    Anyways the whole journey was completed well within 400 sgd, and on time.
    Really think that changing names is fine, but changing some things at bangaluru airport would be fine.
    Sometimes I think the Toa Payoh/Yishun bus interchanges will get more points.
  • Yeah, I thought the Bengal association was weird. I would have thought local pride would prevent it from being called 'a place named bengal'... oh well.
  • It's "Bengalooru", not "Bengaluru". In Kannada, that literally translates to "A place named Bengal". No kidding!

    And it's not official yet. They merely announced official intention.
  • Yeah I guess after Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai, the Kannadigas (as they are called) were feeling the heat. Hence "Bengalooru". Sucks, no?
  • Isn't Kannada somewhere in Ammerika ?
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