Varun Metal

Varun Metal has been based in Shapar for a good bit now. Our spot is in Veraval, quite close to the station highway, which is handy for moving materials back and forth. It’s an industrial neighborhood, so you don’t see many trees, just a lot of sheds and warehouses made of corrugated iron. Inside our place, it usually smells like cold iron and oil. We have stacks of metal everywhere and sometimes it is hard to find a clear path to walk through the back. The highway noise is a constant backdrop to everything we do here. Sometimes we have to shout over the sound of the passing trailers just to be heard across the shop floor. We keep a small office space for the paperwork, but most of the real work happens out where the materials are kept. The desk is usually covered in receipts and half-finished cups of tea. We don’t have a big sign or anything flashy, just the name on the gate so people know they’ve found the right place. It gets quite cold in the mornings during winter, and the metal feels like ice until the sun has been up for a few hours. We just focus on the daily tasks of sorting and moving what needs to be moved. It is a straightforward life here in Shapar, just keeping the business going and dealing with the everyday problems as they come up. It’s a dusty place but it’s where we get the job done every single day without fail.