Bharat General Store

Down in Sheoganj Halwai Bazar, life moves at its own pace. Bharat General Store is tucked away among the sweet shops and other vendors. You can usually smell the frying snacks from the neighbors while you're working here. We stock the basic things like rice, lentils, oil, and spices. The shop is old and the wooden shelves have been here for a long time. It’s a narrow space, so when we have more than three people inside, it starts to feel very full. We spend a lot of our time weighing out goods and putting them into paper bags for the customers. Most of the people who shop here are neighbors we have known for years. They come in for their daily groceries and we talk about the local news or the weather. It’s not the kind of place where you’ll find anything modern or high-tech. We still use a manual scale for some things and write our accounts in a thick notebook. Halwai Bazar is a tight-knit community and we feel like a part of the landscape here. The mornings are for restocking and the evenings are usually the busiest when people are getting ingredients for dinner. We just keep the door open and wait for whoever comes by next. It’s steady work and we are happy to be doing it in such a familiar place.