Although in 1996, the city of Madras was renamed as Chennai, Madras is an emotion for many people here. On August 22, 1639, the East India Company purchased the town of Madrasapattinam from the local kings and expanded and developed it into the modern-day Chennai. Commemorating this day, Madras day is celebrated every year and recently the celebrations run the whole month. Many events that bring out the true flavour of Madras are conducted throughout the city that includes music, dance, arts, heritage walks, lectures etc…
Goethe-Institut/Max Mueller Bhavan’s journey in Madras began in 1960. Over these 60 and more years we have worked from various buildings and along with varied partners from all fields to promote the local and global culture, language, and heritage of both the countries.
As our tribute to Madras, Goethe-Institut has come up with a city walk project this year that highlights the hidden stories, the local history and culture of three prominent areas in the then Madras. Three experts in organizing city walks were identified and they in turn were asked to mentor a group of young people to design, develop and implement these walks.
Ms. Nivedita Louis, Author, Social & Feminist Historian and Activist has curated the Hidden Treasures of Washermanpet walk. Ms. Sathyapriya and Ms. Sasikala do this walk in Tamil and Ms. Dhanashree does it in English.
Mr. Ramanujar Moulana, Cyclist, Author, Chronicler of Heritage Sites has curated the Global presence in George Town walk. Ms. Manasveni does this walk in English.
Ms. Thirupurasundari Sevvel, Heritage Conservationist, Author, Researcher has curated the Aminjikarai: Explore the new and the old walk. Ms. Vaishnavi and Ms. Jagadashree do the walk in English.
The project started in November 2022, with an objective to open the walks to the public during Madras Month Celebrations of 2023. The mentors selected interns from colleges, with a background in History, literature and a passion in exploring local stories. Incidentally it became a girls’ group of interns who with their mentors worked to implement the walks under the aegis of Goethe-Institut Chennai.
These 3 diverse walks in three varied localities were offered to the public on seven different dates in the month of August. There was a huge response to these walks and more than 200 people took part in them.
In the Month of September, the walks were done on five different dates and more than 100 people took part in it. There was one walk in George Town specially done for the school students of our partner school also, wherein 20 German learning kids explored the global heritage and presence in the George Town area.
October is seeing active participation too. On two dates, two walks are already done, and two more walks are scheduled. We plan to continue these walks till December 2023.
In all our walks, we have had a good mixture of young and old people, people from the same locality to those from far off places exploring the walk. One thing that stood out from the feedbacks is that they were all surprised to hear how much rich heritage and stories these places have and how many of them are unaware about it. Local food from the vendors was highly appreciated for it was not only a refreshing break during the walk, but it was also an opportunity to taste something different and yummy.
Learning from the experience of these three walks implemented this year, we are now gearing up to discover new localities and stories for the next year.
