“Our Coffee Shop - Pit Stop” “Karma Kitchen” and “An Experiment in Generosity”

The Pit Stop would probably be one of my most frequently visited locations on the campus (apart from the lake side, golf course and the amphitheatre) Perhaps the need for that extra dose of caffeine once you are a part of any seat of higher education is what draws your mind there. Heated debates and smart discussions along with the relaxed I-have-nothing-to-do-feeling is something acts as to motivator to draw one towards the coffee shop.

I guess that the fate of the Pit Stop will be decided once the sessions begin, however the Karma Kitchen on Telegraph Avenue, Berkeley, California, is a place which has already made a name for reasons worth sharing.

Popularly called as ‘experiment in generosity’, this place is much unlike the traditional restaurants where you eat, pay and just walk off. Karma Kitchen, developed by Viral and Pavi Mehta along the lines of Seva Café in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, offers the traditional Indian ‘thali’ every Saturday evening. I agree that there is nothing too unusual in that. What really sets this place apart from the rest is that people from different nationalities, eat together and don’t pay for the food. Karma Kitchen is managed by a group of ten volunteers each week who manage the show and the profile of volunteers includes senior citizens, Harvard graduates, CEO’s and even students from the University of California.

The get-together each week usually ends up with making new friends or helping the volunteers in some way or the other. The donations which this place receives are equally intriguing such as a couple from an Organic Fruit Farm dropping a crate of peaches, an editor of an arts magazine stacking up his books on the activity table, leaving behind a packet of handmade greeting and postcards or even singing a song for the chefs, Vshnuji and Kamalji.

Karma Kitchen is a lot more than just a place to hog. It brings several other memories to my mind including Indian Coffee House at College Street, Kolkata, the several restaurants at the IIT Kharagpur campus named as “Eggies”, “Veggies”, “Cheddis”, etc and many more similar places where a foodie like me would always be present.
I have high hopes from our Pit Stop not in terms of what they would be offering. Just waiting for my first date with that place and I am sure that I would be able to find enough reasons to keep returning to it.