Gastronomica

How did it all begin?

What I have previously done in life has nothing to do with Gastronomica. I was almost always working independently because I never liked the idea of being answerable to someone. I only had a boss until I was 19, while I still went to school in the mornings and worked in the afternoons as a metal worker, making things such as tables and chairs. My boss was a mad genius, artistic, eclectic, smart, incredibly spiritual, possessing such finesse, and he opened up the world to me in a certain way. He exposed me to a reality that was new to me. In hindsight he felt like an Aurovilian. 

I eventually opened my own metal workshop and then a gym, and competed professionally in kickboxing. I would also take cooking classes in the evenings or cook with my family on weekends, for food has always been a passion.

How did you find out about Auroville? 

I first came to Auroville in 2001 when I was 21, to visit some Aurovilian friends. After coming here, I thought I would never come back to India because I didn’t like it and thought everything was too dirty. Then, three years later, I sold the gym and came back to India for three months to learn massage in Kerala, with a teacher who didn’t speak a word of English. As I didn’t speak a word of English at the time, everything was communicated through massage and gestures. 

After India, I spent some time giving massages in Barcelona, by the beach. Doing that all day was physically exhausting, so I decided to look for some work in a restaurant. I showed up at a few restaurants dressed in white Indian clothes with an orange scarf, and they told me that I should come back with a CV, which I did not have.

I eventually found a restaurant which took me in because the chef was an Italian man who was in love with India, and he appointed me the first chef after 20 days of intensive 12-hours shifts, during which time I learnt how to run a high-paced kitchen for a 90-seater restaurant in the centre of Barcelona. I was running the place like a professional chef without ever having done that before, making fresh pasta and dishes every day for lunch and dinner.

I eventually went back to Italy to the metal workshop, and also worked at a bed and breakfast, learning how to prepare food for bigger events.

What was the turning point? 

I had a wakeup call when I realised that I felt stuck in Italy. That led me back to Auroville for a visit in 2008. I bought half a container worth of Maroma, Auroshikha and ceramic products to resell in Southern Spain, after leaving my life in Italy once again. It was only in 2013 that I came back to India, looking at the possibility of settling here. I had been working in Tenerife, in the spas of luxury hotels, and I felt that I needed to do something more with my life.

So, in 2014, at the age of 33, I went to the Ashram and asked the divine, ‘What am I to do?’

And I got an answer. I asked and something just came, while sitting there, something very real, exactly in that moment. The question was, since I felt like my life in Europe was being wasted, should I come to live in Auroville or not? I got the answer, like an epiphany. It was very clear, I had to come here. 

I sold everything and moved to Auroville. Here I began giving massages again in Quiet. I did this for three years as a volunteer, at which point I felt again I wasn’t building anything for my future here, since I was slowly spending all my savings.

So with some friends at Joy Guest House, we opened a bistro café. We spent 7 months and 9 lakhs working on that. Then we opened it for only three months because some Aurovilians did not agree with the project and with the fact that we took cash from non-Aurovilians. We lost so much money, and I wondered why fellow Aurovilians would want to stop a new activity and initiative. The eatery we created was a tourist spot, it was a small scale, lunch time spot, with fresh handmade Italian food.

Struggling because of my debts, I started working for weddings outside of Auroville (through my Auroville unit), and made enough money to buy a pasta machine from Italy. That is when I started making pasta. When I started, all my friends told me I was crazy and that the pasta project would not work. So I found no support from my friends in Auroville, or from Auroville generally. 

Working in Auroville for a maintenance is simply not sustainable when you have a family of five to support, so to grow my unit I started going to Indian cities to give free pasta, just to spread the name and story.

Why did you start making pasta, what was the vision? 

I remembered being surprised when I first came to India that there was no good local pasta available, so I felt like pasta could be a good business, and that along with 5-10 other Aurovilians we could build something together. But working with Aurovilians is complicated. Some people who came to work in the kitchen either always had a meeting they had to attend, or some family matters, and they ended up working about 4 hours a day while expecting a full maintenance.

Then I started making take-away Italian food and pasta-making became secondary. We only started making some profit after one and a half years of non-stop work, during which time I had to keep working outside Auroville and asking for financial support from my family in Italy.

And then just before and during COVID, with just a few ammas and friends working together, we finally flourished. We were the only take-away restaurant, and it was not unusual to see 30 people queueing outside for their focaccia and lasagna lunches. It also became an unexpected Italian meeting spot.

What other challenges have you encountered?

Some people here are under the impression that we use Auroville’s name to market our products. But when I go to sell pasta in bigger cities, most people have not heard about Auroville: we forget that we are not the centre of the world.

What is the future for Gastronomica? 

I am actually planning to leave Gastronomica to someone and start something outside of Auroville. The possibilities are limitless. I could run a restaurant in any city without having to invest my own money because there are many investors ready to set up such businesses. 

After all of the struggles here, I don’t want to share so much anymore, because people seem to want you to share with them when you are successful, but the moment you need help they disappear.

Also, people don’t understand how challenging it is to work in an environment like this, how many physical, technical and practical difficulties constantly come up. Sometimes the rented building and kitchen require so much maintenance that we have to use all of our profits and take loans on top of that, just to repair everything.

Although I would like to be Aurovilian in all the meanings of the word, it is just not sustainable for me right now and for many other Aurovilians with similar experiences. It’s not the way to go forward.

So you don’t see a way of bringing into Auroville a new business model or innovative way of working? 

No, because every time I’ve brought in something new, people have just come to take as much as possible from me. It would be completely different if there were the infrastructure within Auroville to accommodate these kinds of units. I’ve invested all of my savings from Europe to set up the kitchen and to rent the space, because nothing is available within Auroville. New ideas and businesses should not be stopped; instead, young Aurovilians should be encouraged when they try to build a business.

So I’m looking for a big change. I do not feel like I am in my element in the kitchen anymore, as if something were not going in the right direction. That is why I would be happy for other people to take on Gastronomica and create something new, but I would need them to show me what they can do. However, Aurovilians come with great expectations. After two days they ask me what kind of position and maintenance they will be getting. They have great ideas, but no ability to see things through.

At the beginning, Gastronomica was a sort of spiritual project for me, I wanted a collective approach, but now this project has just become a life challenge. I don’t see the spiritual aspect of it anymore.

What do you mean?

When I came to Auroville, I felt that if we work together, we can - without depending on each other - support each other and grow together, and the community can grow through that. If we all work well, we will have time to both work and develop ourselves spiritually,

But our daily reality here is a life challenge, and that is not interesting to me. If I wanted that, I could go out and face the life challenges anywhere. I came here to face higher, more spiritual challenges and to work on those. Realistically, I do not want to end up having no resources 10 years down the line, having invested all of my money in a house that is not mine, and that I have not received any financial support for repairing (because it’s by the sea and might be gone with erosion soon). All of this is too much of a challenge: I cannot focus on anything other than basic needs.

Also, people judge the little success we have had by saying we run after money, but they don’t see the years of struggle and investment that go into creating something from scratch, working long shifts day in and day out, constantly struggling with endless unpredictable technical problems. There are rules here that do not make sense in the reality of our world today, and that limits us.

I do feel grateful for certain things, such as the schools of Auroville. I’m so happy that my children can get this education. The problem is that we are not in a closed-off ashram, we are not renouncing the world. In some ways, we are obliged to live like in the outside world. We are here, open to the world, and the world is running at such an increased pace of development that we are unable to keep up with that, or match that momentum in our own way. And the Auroville system is such that after spending years here, unless one has external resources one can simply never leave or go anywhere.

I go twice a week to the Ashram and twice a week to the Matrimandir. I’m surprised not to see many Aurovilians at either place. It seems to me that only a few truly focus on doing some spiritual work or change. I do not see a practical spiritual or work commitment. I’ve been wanting to truly work spiritually, and at the same time work in business, but for both things I don’t find a collective commitment that would allow us to grow and work together. 

Auroville should be sustainable for everyone, regardless of their financial status. But it is not. You can only sustain yourself here when you are earning money.