Bajarang Cement Depo

Operating the cement depo here in RBI Layout 3 keeps us busy from the early morning hours. The shop is located right on Puttenahalli Main Road, so it stays noisy with all the traffic heading towards the 7th Phase. Most of our days start with unloading large trucks that arrive with fresh stacks of heavy bags. It is grey and dusty work, and you can definitely feel it in your clothes and skin by the end of the shift. We have piles of cement bags stacked up high against the back walls. There is not much room for anything else in this space. People from around Sachin and the nearby apartment buildings stop by when they are doing small home repairs or building a new garden wall. We handle all the heavy lifting ourselves. It is quite hard on the back, moving fifty-kilo bags one by one all day long. My shirt always has that distinct cement smell on it. We keep a small wooden desk in the corner for the daily paperwork and the telephone. Sometimes the heavy rain makes things very difficult because we have to make sure every single bag stays bone dry. Wet cement is just a total waste of money and effort. We know most of the local contractors around this part of town by their first names. They pull up in their small tempos and we get to loading them up. It is just us and the bags, day in and day out.