Rapidly modernising Bengaluru has its quaint, pleasing, and diverting spots, but they require some tracking down. Some of the literary heritage is concealed because it is not so well known, such as the Mythic Society Library on Nrupathunga Road, or the Indira Priyadarshini Children’s Library off Cubbon Road that denies entry to adults. Some bits of history were simply flattened in the making of the new, glass-fronted city—for example, Prospect House, the residence of wildlife writer Kenneth Anderson, once stood in the spot now occupied by the Prestige Obelisk building on Kasturba Road.
There’s also the heritage of an intangible kind: people enacting culture through the ages, keeping the literary world alive. Think of cafes where writers meet and chat. Think of book signings, museum exhibitions, and other arty networking sites which a newcomer would not know about… till they know them.
Zac O’ Yeah in his favourite Majestic area of Bengaluru.
| Photo Credit:
BHAGYA PRAKASH
Writer and traveller Zac O’ Yeah is here to help the visitor looking to excavate the literary/cultural layers of the city. He has lent his voice to an app that takes users on a self-guided journey through the city’s legendary bookshops, concealed literary landmarks, and bustling cultural hotspots. The app is designed by avid traveller and longtime Bangalore resident Bhavana Jayanth, and her husband, Prathamesh Dhole, who are the co-founders of a startup called Tourific.
Also Read | Why Bengaluru badly needs a new governance approach
The Tourific app aims to be a bank of unique, curated tours that are personalised and flexible. For a nominal fee, you download a tour of your choice that you can pause and play at will, cutting out the hassle of group tours or tour guides. You can even complete the city tours over multiple days if you so wish. On the supply side, Jayanth encourages city enthusiasts to contribute tours to the platform and build up its repository of walks. Tourific currently carries 60 tours across 50 cities in 20 different countries.
Intimate and breezy storytelling
In 2024, Jayanth approached O’ Yeah, in his capacity as an expert on the literary side of Bengaluru, with the proposal to add a book-themed Bengaluru tour to the platform. “The pro of running my own startup is that I can sometimes do things just because I really want to,” said Jayanth. O’ Yeah immediately agreed. The tour, which went live on January 7, covers about 9 kilometres, with over 27 stops between the Avenue Road book market and Trinity Church at Trinity Circle.
O’ Yeah, who has a trilogy of crime capers set in one of Bengaluru’s landmark locations, Majestic, was himself a newcomer to the city 33 years ago. Recalling those days, he said, “One of the things that stood out with Bengaluru was that, unlike other great cities, it had no monuments: no pyramids, no Eiffel Tower. What it had was a lot of culture and civilisation, many bookstores… after one picked up a few books, there was always a pub nearby to sit and read them. So, Bengaluru’s heritage is more of the intangible kind—it’s about going to listen to Carnatic music, attending dance recitals, watching Kannada cinema, amateur plays, looking at fine art, and so on. There’s a lot on offer every day here.”
While the narration on Tourific makes many references to colonial-era Bengaluru and occasionally slips in reading recommendations, don’t look for literary history here. Instead, enjoy the intimate and breezy storytelling as O’ Yeah shares what he loves best about the tour-stops and waxes lyrical about markets and bookstores that stimulate his writing brain. The script is unpretentious, deftly blending contemporary culture, the tourist’s need to consume as they explore (food halts, pub halts and shops feature heavily) with bite-sized nuggets of history that make you go “Hmm, I didn’t know that.”
Tourific directs you to the literary connections of city hotspots like Hard Rock Cafe.
| Photo Credit:
By special arrangement
The tour is divided into short 2-10 minute long segments pertaining to each stop on the route that are easy to pause, play, and switch between. A handy map accompanies the list of stops. The narration is well-served by O’ Yeah’s experience in travel writing, and by the fact that he and Jayanth trialled the route for themselves. The directions are seamless, and interspersed with thoughtful tips on where to grab a bite or make a toilet pitstop. The quality of the audio leaves something to be desired, though.
Covering the city
Who is the app’s target audience? Bengaluru old-timers are likely to know much of the history and culture that O’ Yeah refers to, and are probably already well-acquainted with the bookshops and watering holes. So, tourists, or young people new to Bengaluru looking to get acquainted with the city are likely to find the app helpful.
Zac O’ Yeah at one of the stops on the walk.
| Photo Credit:
By special arrangement
As Tourific expands, it will be a challenge to imagine tours for the less walker-friendly fringes of the city, where footpaths have been taken over by Metro construction work. O’ Yeah admitted that traffic is a concern. “I’ve broken a leg while navigating Bengaluru by foot, but it hasn’t stopped me from trying to break more legs… Bengaluru remains walkable to an extent, though more could be done to stop scooties from taking over footpaths. In the walk I do warn users that they may get hit by a scooty on certain stretches where the traffic is like the Wild West,” he said.
Also Read | Lost in the Himalayas
But, what is a broken footpath to the curious? After all, bad roads and hectic traffic are a constant all over India, and Jayanth wants to bring the entire country alive on Tourific. It remains to be seen how the concept of a self-guided tour will pan out in cities where the heritage is more well-preserved and visible to the explorer’s eye, rendering the narration somewhat redundant.
Established local figures will likely play a key role in keeping the Tourific experience fresh. For now, Zac O’ Yeah, who is already thinking of a south Bengaluru walk, is happy to oblige.
Dakshayini Suresh is a feminist writer and educator based in Bengaluru.
