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Hello All Visitors, Friends and Bangalore Wallas,

Greetings from the “ Bangalore Walla”, from Bangalore last updated on : 6th March 2004

Interview Times Of India, Bangalore Times, 6th March 2004 .
Of late I have had some bad experiences of files not appearing on the net from my pages although they are physically present on the site. This has happened after the Yahoo - Geocities merger and updates. I am trying to reload these files. If you do find a files that is not coming up from a link, please send me a mail I also have been out of circulation for quite a while having lost all my data and both my systems because someone sent me the CIH virus. I have not recovered as yet, and slowly putting together a copy of all the data I have on the net (more than 150 pages and 600 photos), so you can understand what I am going through, and if I do not answer your mails as I presently do not have mail access to internet. If I do reply, it may be 'block' replies so please forgive me, but I have no liberties, and use a friend's internet access, also please put 'content' when you send mail or I will delete without even opening, you will understand why. Please accept my apologies, Ronnie.

This Home Page of Bangalore Walla has been up for more than two and half (24th October 1996) years, and the files just kept adding to the original files such as , Places of Bangalore City, Music by the Musicians of Bangalore City, Bangalore City in the 1920’s , Climate of Bangalore City, not to leave out the “Garden City” called Bangalore!! There came a stage that it was difficult to find what was available on the Home Page, as it was so fluid in updates, and additions, that even I got left behind!! Then I sat down one day and decided to take stock and make an “Index” of what was available on this Home Page and the “Others” that are linked to it in support or addition by data or pictures. So now to be more accessible to the viewers, the categories so far have been mainly aimed at the Home, Family, Kids, Scholars, Religious. Travellers, basically People who want something on Bangalore, not just Bangalore City, but the evolution of the City during the Colonial days. There was hardly anything before that period that related to a “City”, a Fort and a small satellite of settlements around it. Scattered on my Home Page of Bangalore Walla, there are over 600 photographs of Bangalore and Around, you would just have to browse through the links of my “Other” pages, there are there for you to discover a little at a time, inviting you to re-visit when you want a new adventure in Bangalore. By the way, Bangalore is situated in the South of India, and is the capital of the Indian State of Karnataka. It lies between Madras (Chennai) to the East and Bombay (Mumbai) to the West. It is known as the "Garden City" of India, as well as the "Pensioner's Paradise" of India. Ask anyone who has been to India will tell you that all roads lead to Bangalore! It's not only the City of Bangalore that stands out, it is her People.

Looking back on the year and half, the structure of the Home page included information on India and Indian Culture through a short summary put up for the “50th. Year of Independence ”, this covered the early times of the country, till the British Colonial days, which left behind the Anglo-Indians, which brought about a unique Anglo-Indian system of Education, which was earlier affiliated to the Senior Cambridge University, now a similar education set up is run from Delhi, governed by the Indian School Certificate, conducted for the Anglo-Indian Schools. This has been updated to the “Plus 2”, or “Twelfth Standard” equivalent to the Pre University Course (PUC) for Colleges. The Colleges in Bangalore, Undergraduate as well as Professional (Engineering & Medical) are affiliated to the Bangalore University which has a variety of courses for the College students, and some of them lately tend to be more practical and industrial oriented, keeping with the times.

There are many Parks in the City of Bangalore, where in the evenings you would find the older generation chatting on the benches, children or kids as some call them playing with each other, running through the flowers. Talking about flowers and gardens, there are beautifully kept parks with colourful flower beds, people also have their own gardens, the larger area of greenery is found at Lalbagh and Cubbon Park. Children and Kids have to be encouraged to enjoy the beauty of flowers and gardens. New BDA (Bangalore Development Authority, now it's called the Bangalore Mahanagar Palike BMP) layouts have a park set aside for the residents, but because of the poor rainfall, many of them are rather dry. Bangalore City has one of the finest gardens in India and is known as “Garden City” apart from “Pensioner’s Paradise”. You will not find “circles” with their Grecian pots of ferns in the middle, now it’s all cross-roads, and nobody has the time to enjoy anything anymore. Lots of roads have become “one-way” sometimes beneficial, sometimes done without a proper plan thus squeezing a quite road or street into a inferno of cacophony discord by unkempt traffic suddenly feeling trapped by these cold steel barriers put across roads. Now the latest trend in Bangalore is 'fly-overs' and cutting trees to accomodate them. There no proper plan as to how the traffic is distributed when they come off these fly-overs, the side roads are still made one-way in residential areas and the traffic cannot bleed off the congestion.

The Home Page having a Colonial background, there is bound to be a collection of Churches. There are many different periods of architecture that are created in stone to arches, domes, depending on the European leaning, British, French, Italian or perhaps even Portuguese. Churches belonged to various denominations, and there was always the sense of independence between the Christians of different upbringing. Strange, Christians in a foreign land jousting for some benefit from the Rajas, finally all coming to one level at the time of Independence of India. Families of Catholics and Protestants grew up together and they did marry, but that was frowned on by Society. The Society we have today was not the same in the old days where everything was measured and then only operated upon. Homes were open to one and all, and there was always some togetherness between the children who played, grew up, went to war, some returned, some did not, but that is the tragedy of human ideology. A man must die to allow another to live. Sickness in the old days was like a mist that crept over the land at night, cholera, diphtheria, malaria were common, and children if they survived their teens were killed at times by the war. The First World War was the worst, and it left many children orphaned, apart from being so from sickness. Orphanages were found in several places in Bangalore, and some survive even today, but these even are being pulled down to make way for commercial complexes that are profit making, after all what are a few orphans going to do to defend their very existence? Cemeteries are spread around Bangalore City, depending upon the settlements of the colonies, and pensioners. There are War Graves, Monuments, Memorials, and plaques found in Churches.

Apart from the Christian memories of Colonial Bangalore, the older settlers were Hindus and Muslims, and there are also some beautiful Temples and Mosques embedded in the crowded areas of the city where the population converged. Around Bangalore, there are also some fantastic carved Temples that displayed such art, especially in the time when the progress of man was still in it’s infancy. You can browse through these temples which you can find in the index below. Hindus, Muslims and Christians have all lived in Bangalore in peaceful harmony all these years, of course there has been instances of mischief that has caused some hurt to the quiet loving people of Bangalore.

I hope you have a great time at my Home Page, do let me know what you feel, and what you felt needs to be improved. Any suggestions would be welcome. If you have something of interest of old Bangalore, and you feel that it will add to what I have put down, please do not hesitate to send me a mail. There may be some old books or photographs that you may have, please try and share them with others through this Home Page, after all, many a good source was hidden till the termites and water got to it and it was too late to do anything about it. Sometimes, the next generation are not interested in what was kept in the attic and throws the lot out. Please think of all the people it could bring joy and memories to by your sharing. We did lose lots of good material when the Moore Market was burnt down years ago in Madras (Chennai). In Bangalore, I did go around and meet a few of the “collectors”, but they were unwilling to share thinking that I was out to make a buck, and calmed up when I broached the subject about old material. I have been going around Bangalore taking photographs of old buildings for the Memories of Bangalore, it is indeed a hugh task, if you would like to share in this effort, please let me know.

Anyhow, I hope you have had the patience to go through this ambling of mine, it will however give you a brief of my thoughts. These pointers below are being updated from time to time, so if you dont find someting today, it may be up a little later! And still if you dont find it, then please let me know I'll do something about it, also appreciate if you find any of the links not working or something that needs to be added, it's important that they are fixed or added, ofcourse this Home Page on Bangalore is more aligned to the Colonial Theme and beyond into the Past, not so more the future, but there are lots of "today's happenings" so as not to be left too far into the distant!. In the excitement of telling you all about Bangalore, I forgot to tell you to drop in at the MAIN HOME PAGE to log your visit and return back here. Please do, Your Visit Counts! Thanks, Ronnie. YOUR COMMENTS PLEASE

Cheers and God Bless, have a Great Time, sorry for the rambling on...

Ronnie Johnson

Bangalore City Bangalore Walla's Home Page : What's NEW or Updated :

Better Check it, you never know if there were changes since you last visited, I try to keep the information on Bangalore fluid, forgive me, but then I sometimes slip and miss this Page too!

Bangalore City : Down Memory Lane:


Bangalore City : Education:

Some Schools & Colleges of Bangalore City :

When the British came into Bangalore around the begining of the 1800's, some of the families of the Officers and Troops moved along with them. The children needed to be educated and most of them at that time were taught to read or write at home. Gradually, when some of the Christian Missionaries (English, French and Amercians) and Religious Orders came to administer to the sick and the souls of the people and the Garrison, they opened up some of the schools and gradually colleges, and so Bangalore does boast of some of the old Colonial schools and colleges and the atmosphere is still prevailing as the buildings hold the spirit of the ancestors that walked the corridors of them. Church patronage was also stretched out to Catholic and to some extent Protestant educational institutions that were predominately for Europeans and Eurasians, as well as the local residents (known as 'Natives'). These schools for boys were in all cases under clergy management, and taught by professors belonging to the religious orders or congregations, assisted by lay-masters. The girls' schools are for tht most part under Sisters of different religious congregations. In many of the schools non-christian pupils were freely admitted and in a few of them they formrd the overwhelming majority. Some of the newer schools and colleges have shot up in the last quarter centuary, and so one finds quite a collection of so called 'educational institutions', spotted in all corners of Bangalore. I have just noted a few of the schools that are around the Cantonment, but there are plenty of the schools that existed in the 'good old days' which are worth a mention. You may find some of them in the "infophil.com" collection of Alumni of Bangalore City. You are most welcome to suggest and send me details of schools of the 'Pre - Post Colonial era", and I will try and find some place for them if possible. YOUR COMMENTS PLEASE

Bangalore City : Sports :


Bangalore City : Organisations : Social & Charity


Bangalore City : Anglo-Indians or Anglo Indians

When did the Anglo-Indians come to Bangalore is not quite clear, but it definately was early in the 1800's, because we find that many of the people who lived in those days are remembered by plaques on Church walls, and since those Churches are quite old, then their existence would probably be earlier or around the same period. However, they were in abundance in Calcutta, Meerut, Poona (Pune), Bombay (Mumbai), Madras (Tamilnadu), Cochin (Kochi) long before they came to Bangalore. But as I am no expert on Anglo-Indians, perhaps you could visit the Anglo-Home Page and go through links that would give you a better insight.


Bangalore City : Christian :

Christianity came to India with the arrival of St. Thomas at Cranganore on the Malabar coast, who went on to Mylapore near Madras, and where he suffered death by martyrdom at San Thome. Christianity came to Karnataka around the 14th Centuary and specific to Anekal with the arrival of the Dominicans, and at the begining of the 16th Centuary there were around 900 Catholics there. The Jesuits entered the scene around 1700. However, in Bangalore, the oldest Church is St. Mary's Basilica in Shivajinagar which dates back to 1685. The original was a chapel with a thatched roof called 'Karikal - Mada Kovil' or 'Arogya Matha Kovil'. Abbe Dubois writes that there were around 1000 Catholics in Bangalore in 1803, and most of them Europeans. The first Protestant Mission in Karnataka started in the Bangalore District around 1820, and was called the London Missionary Society. It started by establishing boarding houses and orphanages for boys and girls. A Theological College was started in 1910. Histories of some of the Churches along with recent photographs will take you through time. St. Mary's Basilica is one of the best known Churches that has seen lots of Faith-building and Miracles, now a modern Church of the 'Infant Jesus' in a slum of Viveknagar is also deemed to be a center for pilgrims for thanksgiving and requests for blessings. Although these Churches are Catholic, people of all denominations and religions visit them piously, and receive blessings from God. It is a strange point to note that the nationality of the Catholic Church in India was the nationality of her Clergy. Amoung the European Ministers, a very small percent were Irish, a still smaller were English descent. The rest were members of various religious orders from Italy, Spain, France, Holland, Belgium and Germany. In Bangalore, the best known were the French from the Paris Foreign Mission. YOUR COMMENTS PLEASE


Bangalore City Protestant (CSI) & Other Denominations:


Bangalore City : References :


Bangalore City : Miscellaneous :


Bangalore City : Links :


Bangalore City : Other Links :

RESEARCHERS & GENEALOGY RESOURCES

(Updated: 26 September 2003: Your Suggestions and Comments are requested, please send to: e-mail :

ronniejohnson@hotmail.com : (or) ronniejohnson@vsnl.net )


Thought for the Day: Prayer of St. Francis. Lord, make us instruments of your Peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow Love, Where there is injury, Pardon; Where there is discord, Union; Where there is doubt, Faith; Where there is despair, Hope; Where there is darkness, Light; Where there is sadness, Joy; for your mercy and for your truth's sake.

Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted; to understand than to be understood; to love than to be loved; for it is by forgetting self that one finds it, it is by forgiving that one is forgiven, it is by dying that one awakens to eternal life. Amen.


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Bangalorewalla's "Tips to the Traveller" to Bangalore

Should you want to send any material, be it photographs, articles, letters, you can either send the same through e-mail above or s-mail : Ronnie Johnson, 5/3 King's Street, Richmond Town, Bangalore 560025, India. All material is Copywrite 1998 to Ronald Johnson, however you may write to the owner address above if you want to use any material for any publication. Photographs that have been put on this page are of low resolution due to compression and Net view advantage. All originals are available except where 'courtesy' is mentioned.

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