Padmalaya General Store

If you walk down Giri Market Road toward the Gatebazar post office in Berhampur, you will find us near the main bus stand. It is a very noisy part of Ganjam district because the buses are always honking and the conductors are shouting for passengers. Padmalaya General Store is a typical local shop. We sell all sorts of things that people need for their daily lives, like soap, oil, flour, and matches. The shelves are packed tight, and sometimes things fall off when we are trying to reach for something at the back. We have been at this location for a long time, and the building shows its age with the cracked paint and the old wooden counter. It gets very crowded in the evenings when people are coming home from work and stop by to pick up supplies. We don't have a computerized billing system or anything like that; we just write everything down in a notebook and use a small calculator. My hands are usually busy grabbing items and bagging them up for the customers. The floor gets muddy during the monsoon season because people walk in straight from the wet street. It’s a lot of work to keep the place clean and organized, but we do our best. We don't spend money on advertising or anything fancy. People just know we are here by the bus stand if they need a quick bit of shopping before they head home on the bus.