Kolkata aka: Calcutta

When I was a teenager, I dreamt of traveling to Calcutta. For awhile, I had a Bengali penfriend named Sanjay Churiwal with whom I corresponded for about a year and, later, exchanged letters with S. Banerjee, who I met in DumDum airport upon my arrival in Calcutta in 1999 – and with whom I traveled in northern India for about 2/3 months.

I was in Calcutta for about three weeks – waiting for my friend to finish some exams. The first night, I stayed in an itty bitty room right on Sudder Street, and still recall its coffinesque bed…and the grafitti on the walls – concrete walls that captured the midsummer heat and converted it to a fine, damp steam that made it nearly impossible to sleep there.

The next day, I moved to a small hotel on nearby Free School Street, which provided an interesting view (fourth floor) of the bustling road below. Finally, my friend found me a fantastic room down a little alley off Sudder…I’ll never forget its sparkling black & white floor tiles, fantastic HUGE private bathroom, and lovely toilet.

A good toilet in a cheap Indian hotel is a godsend.

While in Calcutta, we strolled around the Maidan (their version of Central Park), watched a movie (VERY cool experience to watch an Indian flick in an Indian movie theater), and ate pizza (Flury’s) & Chinese almost exclusively, except for the time he invited me to his & his Mother’s flat. THAT was interesting. I think his Mom felt threatened by me because, although she was gracious, I think she suspected I would steal her son away from some nice Indian girl she had in mind : D (she was right to be concerned at the time but he is still single as of now). I also had my hair dyed jet black by some east Asian women in a little salon.

And did you know that Calcutta has a subway system?

One of the more curious things to see in Calcutta is its Portuguese church.

And I personally felt that taking a train out of Howrah station was one of the highlights of my entire trip to India.

_{(I would have more photos, except I made my trip in the pre-digital era of photography…you know, we had to conserve film. :P)}

Very Friendly City. Here peoples are always ready to help others to find what they want. I remember, we were going to some relatives place and don’t know the place very well as we were new to the city, so we asked nearby walker to just tell us the way. He not only told us the way but also took us to the place.

“mneh… mneh… monday. wednesday” – gopal

Cheap and best…..staying and eating won’t going to cost too much on you rpocket.

this is the place where i was born and have been living in since the last 17 years.i consider myself very lucky to have been born in this place as the people here are just fantastic.so if u thinking of visiting dis place sure do as it will change ur life just as it has changed mine.

Loved the blend of the old and the new…..

Best people in world , emotions has meaning and my birthplace

British merchants (oops, East India Company, Babu Saheb, Angrez, Farangi) sought permission to trade with India, and in the style of Julius Ceaser, they went, they saw and they captured this city, Calcutta and the entire India (in a process that spread for almost four centuries).

You get great food here. Eat a lot.. but dont just keep eating.. go to some places also.. there are many good places around.

-Vijju

Visit me at http://vijju.net/

Not long ago I saw ten of my friends off to India, the next couple of days I couldn’t escape my own encounter 2 years before with the country that is so much. Western food became bland again, I started burning sandalwood in my room, I longed to walk the streets of the City of Joy once more and haggle with the sly-dog street salesmen.
But most of all I longed to play once more with the children in the Mother Theresa’s orphanage in Howrah. I’m not a religious man, and I’ve never been one to be on any crusade, but when these kids with such beautiful smiles lined up to use my legs as a slide my heart exploded. And when one of them smiled at me through tears as we left that day, she wouldn’t have realised she’d changed my life. Every kid I saw on the street for the rest of the trip, every kid I’ve seen on T.V with flies on their face since I got home, every kid I’ve entertained with jokes and games on camps, every man and woman I’ve read about struggling against the odds of survival, they’ve all hit me like a bullet with the spirit of that child who I will never meet again.
It’s not like it was just this poignant poetic moment when she smiled, with rays of light or music blasting, it wasn’t even that single moment that has driven me to do all I can with my life to see to it that everyone has a chance at a life of freedom, joy, and HEALTH. It was all the stuff before she smiled and all the stuff after that was just as important in shaping how I see my place in this crazy enchanting world, but it’s her smile which I go back to when I get confused about what I’m doing with my life.
Everyday has something in it to change your life for the better, you just have to be open to it, my experience in Kolkata helped to bash away the ambiguity of this life so that i could be open to be changed everyday by life. So go there to search and be open, you probably won’t find what you are looking for (hopefully you’ll find a hotel though), and it might take a while after you get home to realise Kolkata has changed your life.