Visit to Kolkata, India
Trip Start
Jul 01, 2005
1
6
18
Trip End
Oct 01, 2007
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Kolkata,
India
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
KOLKATA, INDIA A 30-MINUTE FLIGHT FROM DHAKA, BANGLADESH
All was India before 1947, so it was interesting to visit part of the Bengali culture that is now India.
Kolkata, a city like no other, where people live in amazing closeness, yet manage to make it work. In Kolkata, you see people on the streets; doing all the things necessary to live day-by-day; eating, sleeping, washing (self and cloths), going to the bathroom, shaving, buying, selling, fixing things, recycling stuff, walking, socializing, going places, sitting, laying and anything else one can think of.
A city of old - old buildings (much older than we see in Bangladesh). Memorials and monuments, a remarkable river that weaves through and serves the city like blood through a vein, over drawn with remarkable bridges on of which carries thousands more people than it does cars.
Ah, cars, yes! Not many mind you for the number of people, but effective - vintage British Ambassadors (likely 50's model) reproduced by the thousands and serve as taxies. Otherwise the choices are 3-wheeled baby taxies, British left-over electric trolleys that move through streets slower than walk pace, or barefooted men-pulled rickshaws.
Walking.. walking through the markets takes sureness of foot, firmness of resolve (not to get help from someone you don't want help from to do something you don't want done.), sharpness of eye (to avoid rickshaw, people or baby taxi going and coming seemingly from all four directions at once, cows, chickens, children, low hanging things, holes in sidewalk, protruding things); everything competing for the same precious space.
Yet the people have a certain joy about them, not what you might think reading this description. Yes there are sad, sad sights, sights like I've never seen in any other city before. Kolkata, maybe intriguing for all the wrong reasons, yet still intriguing....... and with great beauty if you look close enough.
India is more religiously diverse than is Bangladesh; many more Hindus and a smathering of many other groups. We visited Ed and Twila Miller, friends of ours who do the MCC Country Representative job there similar to our jobs here in Bangladesh. So we swapped stories and encouraged each other. India is a large place and Kolkata one small corner. This visit makes me want to see more.
J
