A day trip to Janapada Loka and Channapatna

Having spent most of our summer vacations at home; and not seeing any scope for a bigger holiday trip, me and my effervescent kids were longing for atleast a day trip. Having been done with most of the famous picnic spots in and around Bangalore, I was looking for a different experience this time. So, I started exploring the places for a day visit around Bangalore which would be safe for me and the kids.

The first place that immediately appealed me was Channapatna, the land of toys. This small city is world famous for its wooden toys. From Google baba's list of the places to visit near Channapatna, Bharath Art and Crafts and Janapada loka particularly interested me. This video from ChillyStudio helped me conclude on these two places. We got a really good driver from a driver service agency. I've shared their visiting card for the benefit of the moms like me who already have so much on their plates that they don't want to get into the tadious task of navigating through the traffic clogged roads of Bangalore towards the end of the post. 

The itininary of our trip was Bangalore-Janapada Loka-Channapatna-Bangalore

We left Bangalore around 8am. and reached Janapada Loka, an art museaum in Ramanagara, around 9.20am. We first had a stumptous breakfast at Kamat Lokaruchi which is a very famous eatery just next to Janapada Loka. The word lokaruchi means the taste of the land. This place is known for authentic karnataka dishes, pleasant surroundings and clean rest room facilities. 

Janapada Loka is a place dedicated to village folk arts of Karnataka. It's lush green campus is established on a land of 15-acres and contains multiple museums housing numerous village artefacts related to the literature, music, dance, festivals, crafts and overall lifestyle. This calm and serene place also provides a platform for rural musicians and artisans to showcase and market their art. Here are a few highlights of the place:

As we entered Janapada Loka we were greeted by a flock of swans. Walking down the road, we feasted our eyes on the lifelike statues depicting numerous folk arts of Karnataka like Veeragase, Koravanji and Jaggalige etc. As we toured around Janapada Loka we visited:

1. Lokamatha Mandira which exhibits a variety of rural household items and agricultural tools
2. Loka Mahal which showcases around 5000 folk artefacts including dolls, scultures, ornaments, 500 year old puppets, pretend toys and fabrics etc.
3. Chitra Kuteera, which introduces us to Mr. H. L. Nage Gowda; the man behind this place and different folk art forms through several snapshots
4. Doddamane, a replica of a big traditional village house 
5. village hut models, where visitors are allowed to enter and experience their ambience. Spending some time inside the huts was a really special experience for the kids. 

Janapada Loka gave kids a chance to learn about and experience the rural life. We also discussed some of the aspects of the olden days' lifestyle, how some of the things have evolved over a period of time and how they have changed our lives. 

The true highlight of the visit was a couple of songs sung specially for us by Mr. Mallayya, an employee of Janapada Loka and a folk artist whose family has been into folk music for many generations. The full of life kannada folk songs that he sang in an orotund voice were mesmerizing even for a non-kannadiga person like me. With Mr. Mallayya's permission, I'm sharing the recording of one of the songs.

Unfortunately the urbanization has taken a toll on the livelihood of the folk artists like Mr. Mallayya. He said that he has performed in many big cities of India along with his troupe in the past. But now the glorious days are gone. If any one likes his art and would like to give him an opportunity to present it, you can contact him on +91-9242063593. Please note that he can converse only in Kannada. 

Janapada Loka also hosts a library and a couple of spaces dedicated to ancient stone sculptures as well rural vocations. But with our hearts content and brains loaded with so much knowledge, we decided to skip those and visit them the next time on weekend when the place hosts a variety of exhibitions, workshops and folk shows. 

A fact worth noting is that the idea behind this place was conceived by H. L. Nage Gowda, a civil servant by profession and a folklorist by passion. After his retirement, he collected funds and the artefacts to be displayed in the museum with the help of his family and friends. He used his retirement funds as a contribution. Isn't that inspirational? 

 The Janapada Loka campus also has a nice play area where the kids played. We spent some time taking a stroll around the small lake in it and spotted some pet rabbits further down the lane. Thoroughly content with our visit to Janapada Loka, we started our journey towards Channapatna, the land of toys. 

In Channapatna, we first visited Bharath Toy factory where their lady supervisor walked us through the process of making toys from raw wood, lacquer and organic colors blow-by-blow. Here are some of the interesting facts that we got to learn about the same:

1. The toys are made using ivory or beetroot wood
2. It takes a few weeks for the wooden logs to dry up and get ready for further processing 
3. For coloring the toys, the bars of colors are made using lacquer and organic colors 
4. Particular types of leaves are used for polishing the colored toys 

Here's a video illustrating the toy manufactoring process:

The manufacturing of the spare parts takes place here. The final assembly and sales happens here. We visited both the units. Kids were really thrilled to see the wooden toy making process and 'Bharath toys and craft' allowed them to observe it free of cost. Rare in today's highly commercialized world na? They also helped the kids paint their own toys for a small fee. The happiness I could see on the kids' faces was priceless.  We would be really thankful to the factory for this memorable experience. Here is the snapshot of the toys the kids painted.

Following the factory visit, we quickly had our lunch and visited Hana toys and crafts studio. It was around 3 pm in the afternoon and the showroom was closed but one of their employees was kind to show us around the workshop which is situated just behind the showroom. There very a variety of very reasonably priced toys there. The same toys cost almost the double in the emporiums lined up along the sides of the highway. Here are some of the toys that we bought from the two places.

 

With our bags full of toys and the heart full of joy we started our return journey and reached Bangalore in around 1.5 hours. 

This memorable one day trip was worthwhile in multiple ways. First of all it gave us the much needed break away from the hussle bussle of the city. It was full of learning. It gave us a chance to enjoy the  authentic south Indian food. And the whole trip hardly cost us 2000 including the food and the transport (not counting the price of toys). The best thing was that it was totally safe for visiting just with kids. In fact, people were very cooperative. Hope the blog has got you excited enough to visit Janapada Loka and Channapatna either solo or with the family! That said, bye for now and see you again soon...