R K Mava Bhandar

You can find R K Mava Bhandar right in the middle of Bhadbhuja Ghati, over in Chokhla Bazar. It’s a very old part of the city and the streets are quite narrow. We spend our days standing over big iron vats, stirring milk until it thickens into mava. The heat from the furnaces is intense, especially in the middle of May. We get through a lot of wood and coal to keep the fires going. Our floors are usually a bit damp from all the cleaning we do. We supply a lot of the local sweet shops around here, especially when there’s a festival coming up. During Diwali, we barely have time to sit down because everyone wants fresh mava for their homemade treats. It’s a messy job, and our clothes usually smell like cooked milk by the time we close up. The shop is small and filled with the sound of the scrapers hitting the bottom of the pans. We don’t have much in the way of decoration, just the necessities for the work. People know us for the way the mava turns out when we make it right here on the spot. It’s a traditional way of doing things and we haven't changed much over the years. We just keep the fires burning and the milk moving through the process every single day. The sweat on our brows is just part of the daily routine. We take a break when the milk delivery is late.