Shree Bekaner Namkeen Bhandar

You can find us at Shop No 5 in Tripolia Bazar, right along Ghee Walon ka Rasta. It’s a very tight spot in the middle of Johari Bazar. If you know the area, you know how crowded it gets with people shopping for jewelry and clothes. We are tucked in there with our big bags of snacks. We spend the whole day weighing out sev and bhujia into paper packets. The smell of oil and spices is everywhere. It’s a small shop, so we have to stack the boxes all the way to the ceiling. Sometimes it feels like the walls are closing in when there are five or six customers all trying to talk at once. We get the spices from the market nearby and mix them ourselves. My father started this and now I’m the one behind the counter most days. We don't have a sign that lights up or anything fancy. Just the name painted above the door. People come here because they’ve been coming here for twenty years. We have to keep an eye on the jars to make sure they stay full. By the time we close the metal shutters at night, our hands are covered in salt and yellow spice. We just go home, rest, and do the same thing tomorrow. It’s a busy life in a busy market, and that’s just how we like to keep it.