Kolkata (Calcutta), India Travel Blogs

Tea, politics and a step back in time...
Apr 8, 2008 (19 photos)

... onto the back. We headed off to Siliguri then NJP train station where I was due to pick up my overnight train to Kolkata at 20:00.   Arrived with minimal complication, and even though the weather had been slowly heating up as we headed down ...

Culture Shock, India Style
Dec 22, 2003

... this mindset by another traveller on the plane, Greg, who we decided to share a cab with to the main travelers hub in Kolkata, Sudder Street. He was meeting woman at the airport who had arranged a train ticket for him to meet with his girlfriend in Delhi ...

Bangladesh to India...On a cycle rickshaw
May 1, 2008

... days, a fellow volunteer and myself peddled a Bangladehi "vhan" across a third of southern Bangladesh, and into India to our final destination, Calcutta. We purchased a vhan which is a three wheeled cycle with a wooden flatbed commonly used in rural ...

Bangladesh to India...On a cycle rickshaw
May 1, 2008 (10 photos)

... days, a fellow volunteer and myself peddled a Bangladeshi "vhan" across a third of southern Bangladesh, and into India to our final destination, Calcutta. We purchased a vhan which is a three wheeled cycle with a wooden flatbed commonly used in rural ...

Send in the clowns....
Oct 25, 2007 (21 photos)

... the whole time but to her credit stayed for the whole meal - Fiona, you'd have loved this place!! So tonight we leave Calcutta and head for Varanasi. I'm afraid we can't upload any photos to go with this entry just yet (the internet here is very limited ...

Welcome to Kolkata!
Mar 16, 2008 (8 photos)

... ) and wandered around a bit of the lobby and grounds before setting off into the rush and bustle of the streets of Kolkata.  Was approached by multitudes of store owners, beggers and touts wanting my business...I was polite then firm and able to ...

Kolkata - The Bakshi family - Part 2
Dec 6, 2008 (10 photos)

... off via a private helicopter to his luxury hotel.  One does ask the question of why Maradonna has visited India, let alone Kolkata, in a nation dominated by cricket and very few recognised football stadiums?!?!  Still, it didn't stop the city ...

dropping anchor
Nov 22, 2007 (8 photos)

... the taxi ride. on the subway platform i met an older indian man who is a professor of chemistry at a university in calcutta. after a brief but pleasant conversation while we waited for the subway he seemed to decide that getting me to sudder st. safely ...

Welcome to India
Feb 26, 2005 (3 photos)

... to grab their goodies - quite a sight at 2 am. We were already apprehensive about what to expect in India after hearing so much. When we arrived in Kolkata at 2:30 am the sites and smells (stench) were beyond what we had ever imagined. Each (crumbling ...

Kolkata...what a great City!
May 10, 2008 (1 photos)

After yet another night-train this time in AC 3-tier, we arrived in Kolkata. The capital of West Bengal was surprisingly clean and nice and we found it much more attractive than Delhi. A great city full of energy and charm. We recommend: - Sunflower ...

Commie Kolkata
Oct 15, 2008 (50 photos)

... the longest running democratically elected communist state in the world !!! And now back to the story.   Kolkata   Yes we are both here, back in India for the fourth time. Actually, it was good to be back, this time without the after effects ...

Mother Teresa and Rickshaws
Jun 6, 2009 (22 photos)

... with some sort of live metal band.  The best part of getting to the club was the rickshaw race.  Calcutta is the last place in India in which you can be pulled by around in human powered rickshaw   Some speculate if its morally acceptable to ...

India baby!
Dec 2, 2007 (19 photos)

... for the novelty. This turned into a more unique experience than we had expected as it was the 3rd day of the India Pakistan test here in Calcutta at Eden gardens and as the match had just finished the fans were all returning home. And how do they ...

Back to Calcutta
Jan 26, 2004

... and didn't fly right back to Calcutta but rather farther north to Imphal for an intermediate stop. We thought we'd arrive in Calcutta in early afternoon and have much of the afternoon to do some more sightseeing and videotaping. But by the time we ...

Kolkata Part 2!
Dec 6, 2008

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BBD Bagh
Feb 12, 2008

... a service seemed to be finishing, though it turned out to be a monthly meeting of all the heads of the Church of Northern India (united Protestant church organisation). As we passed, a cassocked man asked us where we were from and blah blah, and it turns ...

India is great...
Feb 18, 2008

... ja noch, wenn ich mal fuer laengere Zeit an einem Ort bin. Auch ansonsten war mein Eindruck bisher sehr positiv. Kolkata ist eine vergleichsweise wohlhabende Stadt, die Armut ist also, speziell im Stadtzentrum, nicht so praesent wie in anderen Gegenden ...

Kolkata
Feb 10, 2009 (19 photos)

After a 15 and a half hour train journey yesterday we finally arrived in Kolkata! While in India we've been to Amritsar, Delhi, Agra and Varanasi. It is impossible to describe the amazing-ness of India! The Taj Mahal is just stunning, and the most peaceful ...

One of India's Lessons in Pure Unfettered Devotion
Jan 8, 2009 (10 photos)

... the main road to Ruby Hospital - everyone marvels about what a quiet spot it is, how it could even exist, in teeming Kolkata (population, 15+ million). Young boys at the threshold of manhood are always playing ball in the wide and dusty, bumpy road as you ...

We just feel it in our toes: wet, wet, wet.
Jul 7, 2007

... amusing but admirable Asiatic Society, where bureaucracy and paper pushing pushed their limits. We have also sampled some of Kolkata's non-Colonial hangover sights: a crap Bollywood comedy - we made a wrong choice, but it proved a necessary ...

A Bengali/Punjab (Sikh) Wedding
Jan 14, 2009 (19 photos)

... formal reception (Nasim and Shivi's reception was at the Tollygunge Club, the most prestigious, Colonial era private club in Kolkata). Saturday morning, was the festive and informal Mehendi party at the oldest golf club/course in the world outside of ...

6 MONTH TRAVEL ANNIVERSARY IN KOLKATA, INDIA !!
Apr 8, 2008 (25 photos)

... drives the same car (white for personal cars and yellow for cabs, but we found this only to be true in Kolkata); cows WERE everywhere, eating the scraps off of garbage in the streets; children were being bathed in the gutters; crows attached ...

Mother Teresa in Calcutta
Sep 14, 2008 (7 photos)

I had the great privilege of attending mass and taking communion at the Mother Teresa Hospice in Calcutta.  It was very poignant to be in the same room with probably 120 men, all dressed in comfortable and matching bed cloths, lying in various ...

How Can I Call Them Poor? Photo Essay
Nov 22, 2007 (13 photos)

... I am allowed to weave into one travelogue entry do not do justice to my experience at the LDLM Medical Clinics at Kolkata's slums. Here is my technically challenged attempt at a photo essay: These were taken at one of the two medical clinics or ...

Kolkata Missive 1
Nov 16, 2007 (5 photos)

... usually around nine.  I sleep under a mosquito net at Baba's insistence.  Apparently there is a strain of deadly malaria in Kolkata.  The problemmatic mosquitos attack late into the night, so Baba assures me I will be asolutely safe if I use the mosquito ...

A Teaching and A Revelation
Feb 18, 2009

Sunday, Feb 15, 2009. The Teaching Tonight I went over to Baba's for a visit. As my time to leave Kolkata draws near, I am feeling sad. I am painfully aware of how often I have related to Baba in very ordinary, everyday, one-dimensional consciousness ...

Being a tourist
Dec 14, 2008

... because of Mumbai? I don't know, but I don't think so. Mumbai is something like the 900th terrorist attack in India this year, and Kolkata is a city known for its political protests. The museum was great, but oh so dilapidated. It needs a good clean, ...

Eighth Update -- Kolkata
Jul 24, 2007 (5 photos)

    I arrived in Kolkata today. I'm happy I came here -- so far I've seen an exciting hustle & bustle of business, history, poverty, dirt, and streets. I've been collecting the thoughts below for a while now; this is more a compilation ...

Of Scorpions, Tigers & Snakes -- and Trust in God
Jan 18, 2008 (4 photos)

Tonight was a special night for me. It had the quiet, informal feel of a relaxed family night at the ashram. Baba had been traveling since Jan. 5th and had an intense, very productive program schedule the entire time. When I arrived this evening at ...

12 March - Kolkata (Calcutta)
Mar 14, 2008 (9 photos)

... . Our 6 week warm-up in Thailand, it seems, did little to prepare us for our first taste of India.  Fresh off the plane. Kolkata presents a continuous chain of challenges to the senses and to one's conditioned view of what is life.  The only ...