Guru Kripa Fast Food

Lower Bazar is a busy place, and Shop Number 78 is right in the middle of it. If you know Shimla, you know how these roads are, always going up or down. Our shop is on the Lower Bazar Road where it’s always crowded with locals buying their daily groceries. In the winters, it gets quite cold and we have to bundle up in heavy sweaters just to stay warm while we work. The fog rolls in sometimes and you can barely see the shop across the street. We’ve been here for a long time, and the wooden floors still creak when you walk on them. It’s just a fast food place, so people are always in and out quickly. They grab something hot to eat because of the chilly weather. We don’t have much space for people to sit and linger, so it’s usually quite a fast-paced environment. The stairs leading up from the main road are a bit steep, but everyone here is used to climbing. We start early to get the stove going and prep the ingredients. The smell of cooking fills the small space and drifts out onto the street. It’s a lot of hard work, especially when the tourist season starts and the town gets even more packed. But mostly, it’s just us and the local shopkeepers talking about the weather or the price of goods. We just keep the burner going and serve the people who walk through the door.