Fondly called the City of Nawabs, Lucknow has a rich cultural heritage. It retains its old-world charm while embracing modernity seamlessly. The cultural heritage of this capital city of Uttar Pradesh displays a tremendous influence of the Mughal era.
Perhaps this explains why you’ll almost always find a Mughal touch oozing royal splendor in everything you find in this city – right from its music and dance forms to itsdelectable cuisine,conversation language, and much more. Let’s take a closer peep into Lucknow’s culture.
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People and Language
The people of this city are extremely courteous. Most will use words like “Janab” and “Pehle App” to show ample respect to others while staying close to the elegance of their city’s erstwhile languages.
Abuses and bad language aren’t thrown as frequently as you may find in some other places. It’s perhaps because this land of the Nawabs still retains some of their high living standards, which is displayed in their use of language to date.
Though Lucknow’s official language is Urdu, Hindi is widely used and is the most common language here. Other languages spoken by people in the city are Awadhi, Bhojpuri, Koeli,Koshali, and Braj.
Cuisine
Thecuisine of the city boasts of a royal touch. Some modern takes on the erstwhile royal cosine could still be found in the city, which take a high degree of flair and finesse to cook.
Some noted dishes of Lucknow’s elaborate cuisine are kebabs, kormas, warqi parathas, roomali rotis, nahari-kulchas, sheermal, and zarda. The city is famous for its wide variety of kebabs like shami kebabs, kakori kebabs, seekhkebabs, boti kebabs, and a lot more.
Festivals, music, and art
Lucknow is a vibrant city with a spiritual essence. From Holi, Eid, Diwali, and Christmas to Lucknow Festival and VrindavanSharadotsav, it celebrates them all and then some more with a lot of pomp and fervor. Lucknow is also popular globally for its melodious classical and folk music.
When it comes to the dance forms, the Lucknow Gharana that has been inspired by Kathak,has its own patrons. The locals are also known for their artistic skills, which are evident in their handmadeLucknowi embroidered bed sheets and sarees.
Work culture
From tourism and textiles (especially Chikan embroidery) to automotive, aeronautics, distillery chemicals, machine tools, IT, and furniture, the city’s economy is driven by multiple industries. With the rapid growth of Lucknow’s IT sector and the rise of the gig economy, a lot of coworking spaces in Lucknow have come up in the last few years.
These spaces are doing a commendable job in offering a flexible and cost-effective way to work while also giving the local startups much-needed guidance and support via access to angel investors and VCs, networking, collaboration, mentoring, and a lot more.
From freelancers and independent consultants to work-from-home professionals, these coworking spaces have emerged as the go-to solution for everyone looking to work efficiently with minimal distraction with some added benefits like easy access to workshops, industry-expert interviews, libraries, and collective brainstorming,among others.
