There are holidays, & 'holy' days, 'wholeness' days & 'holla-out-loud' days, honeymoons & heavenly hiatus &, of course, your good old fashion, run-of-the-mill, rest & relaxation, sexy vacation. All imply some form of respite, intermission, suspension of duty & recess from the ravishes of everyday life, perhaps even some perfumed-pamper & a little extra five-star-sparkle thrown into the crystal clear waters.
The Hooghly River
I do not travel to INDIA for any of the aforementioned, ney, I tell you, I go there to be: propelled, pummelled, shaken about, spun around, smacked sideways, stunned, stupefied, confounded, confronted, crushed, affronted, assuaged, jolted, jarred, scarred, stared-at, serenaded-to, thwacked-on (by ricocheting spit-balls!) bumped-into, blessed & blithely bothered. In short, I go to experience the full gamut of human experience, of life 'Unfiltered'....a 'Walk of Life', which starts for some, & ends for others, in Kolkata.
The push & pull of industry
Negotiating the space
Kolkata, that City of questionable 'Joy', that evokes more Dickensian drudgery, than Dalrymple delight, more 'Mother-House' affliction, than multi-fusion menu & more begging black-holes than a quantum-physics symposium. That she is ALL this, and more, makes her so frustratingly fascinating & likeable, people flock to her Hooghly-shores, not to escape the minutiae of life, but to face it.....head on & unapologetically.
The wall of fancy-pants pundits
Tottering trams & tired buildings
Herbaceous road-side vendors
Peaceful Buddhist Shala
Ever wonder where your hair/shaving brushes come from?
The finest goat manes!
Bow Barracks
Old Russian Theatre
Spicy street
Old Portuguese Cathedral, 1799
Bubbly bidi (cigarette) stall &
jolly Bengali belly!
jolly Bengali belly!
Vanity Fair!
Mirza Ghalib (Freeschool) Street
Mirza Ghalib (Freeschool) Street
Dakshineswar Temple
Namaste your Majesty!
The royal residence under renovation
Armenian Church, 1707
Snack time
Puppy-Love
Hindu wedding preparation
100 year-old Chinese tea shop
So, Ok there are also scuzzy dogs & stench-filled drains, pesky touts & clambering charlatans, roving eyes & ridiculous poverty, not to mention a swelling, swarm of 22 million sonorous souls all vying for that same cup of chai...but there's a story for ALL of that &, if you're interested & willing to rise above otherwise preconceived notions, relatively privileged lives & necessary sanitary proclivities, able to stomach the sensory intensity & digest the inescapable iniquities......you might just get a far more gratifying & graceful picture of this grand & life-giving megalopolitan.
The poor
The industrious
The hungry
The iconic
Don't expect though, to see a beautiful city.....if anything, she is a shambolic mess of snazzy new cars, overwhelmed infrastructure, whiteness cream, dreams, fumes & aspiration. Kolkata tests & beckons you to forage for her 'beauty', weed it out, blow off the refuse, paint it a new colour, reinterpret the concept, pack it away.........then carry it in your heart, veins & lungs, for a lifetime.
**************************************************
#All Writing & Photography by Rani.C (Char)
If comments box below does not appear, move cursor along pink bar to reveal the 'comments tab'...I love to hear from you all!