JOURNEY OF A PANIPURI SELLER - RAJU

 

Name: Raju

 

Age: 20 years

 

Meet Raju a young boy who hails from Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh he says that it is the most beautiful place in the world. He is the seller of India’s most favourite snack yes you all guessed it right its Panipuri. He owns a Pani Puri stall. He likes Goa and its citizens very much as 8 are of friendly nature. He came to Goa with his friend as he just wanted to be with his friend by his side and never had any intentions of starting a business here. Once his friend told him that they could start a panipuri business together and fetch some earn, hearing that Raju immediately agreed to it and trusted his friend on this decision.

He says that there are many panipuri sellers along his lane and mostly all of them are from Uttar Pradesh. He stays together with eight more people who belong to the same profession in a rented room. He opens his stall in the evening at 3 pm and stays up till 9pm. His stall is flooded with school going kids, slum dwellers and also migrant workers who dine upon his stall at night they lose their counts on plates but still leave with a satisfied smile on their face.

He sells all kinds of pani puris the sweet,  spicy, minty etc with a dash of potato and spice water mixture. Elders and children usually prefer the sweet ones. It is only during Holi festival he goes back to his native place inorder to celebrate it with his family and friends. He also mentions about the uniqueness of Holi in Jhansi as it is played here with natural colours and not the artificial ones. When he is in Goa he misses his family a lot especially his mother and his brothers. He expressed that when he starts missing his family, his friends here always try to make him happy and never let him feel homesick. He says he found another family here in Goa in form of his friends.

 

Source: Rahul  Kumar