Grace & Pills 'extended holiday' What we be mostly doin - innum

Oh Calcutta

where oh where to begin with this wonderful jewel of india? how about the beginning...

we arrived, for once, at our destination on time, thats right you read correctly, the train was on time (which for an indian train is a miracle) and as it was the last stop it was all change. we headed outside the 'pre-paid' taxi booth, there are very very few rickshaws in calcutta but a million 1950's style yellow taxis. after consulting the made up chart in his head, and a hell of a lot of shouting by various cabbies, a bit of price negotiation by me, the controller said it would be some extortionate price that i cannot remember now, ultimately though we found ourselves in the back of one of the jalopies headed for our hotel - the sunflower guest house in the fashionable park st area of the city. obviously this being a fairly well known hotel on a fairly big road near some pretty big landmarks, the cabbie to us straight there with only the 3 changes of direction and 4 stops for advice from other cabbies, in the end i had to direct him using the map in our rough guide book... the knowledge indeed.

Anyway, check in. obviously it being quite early (7.45am in the morning) everybody, and mean everybody at the hotel was asleep, most of them on matresses in the lobby area. No worries says the boy, you can wait in the communal lounge area while i arouse the necessary persons. Coincidentally just at that point, 2 other people arrived at the hotel who had been on the same train as us and having the same problems at the taxi booth, at least we had a bit of company in the lounge. The couple in question were called Christian and Anna, and were both from hamburg in Germany. they were delightful folk, who were only holidaying for a couple of weeks and had recently been to Bhutan, and were only back in Calcutta to fly home the next day. we chewed the fat with them for quite a while before we realised that it was now nearly 10 o'clock and we still hadn't checked in! eventually the hotel staff managed to wake up and the long dull process of checking in to an Indian hotel could begin... half an hour later (yes thats right) i had selected the 600 RS room from the 3 on offer (400 (too small), 1000 (too expensive), 600 (just right goldilocks)), filled in the 3 books and 2 forms and so we could finally get in get a shower and think about getting some breakfast.

Grace and Anna had arranged to meet up for dinner that evening should our hunt for cricket tickets to that nights IPL game be unsuccessful, so with 2 options for that evenings entertainment we headed off to the area of eden gardens via a cafe for some brekkie. fully satisfied with cheese toasties we found ourselves in the burning midday sun with a small crowd of ticket hunters trying to work out where we could get said tickets. There seemed to be a hastily built but official looking set of booths with a few queues forming at the front of them, these queues however were not moving and the small 'windows' (that is the 4 inch square hole cut into the plywood frontage) only periodically opened before closing again to mystified looks from those next inline. Never the less my British spirit too over and I did what any Englishman does best and joined the back of the queue in polite fashion. it took about 10 mins of baking in the heat for grace to decide to try a different tack and approach another booth and basically knock until somebody appeared, I on the other hand remained stoically queuing where i was too panicked to move less I lose my place. I was chatting to an Australian fellow (or is that fella when deal with the antipodeans?) who was also after a ticket when a call came across the field from the next booth... grace had managed to rouse somebody and 3 tickets were ready and waiting for us and Ross (the Aussie) if we were quick, and boy were we quick. unfortunately all the cheap seats had gone and so we had to fork out 1200rs each for more expensive ones, no matter we were going to the cricket and i was very excited!

I cant really remember what transpired that afternoon until we were ready to go out that evening, who cares though we were going to the cricket! we first went to see Christian and Anna in their room to tell them that we were indeed IPL bound and so had to forfeit dinner, we were however going out for a few drinks for an hour or so beforehand and invited them to join us. over that hour though the 2 of them were actually off to buy some medical treatment for a kid they had found with malaria at the hospital they had been bypassing - his mother said he had been diagnosed but treatment was too expensive - she was not asking them for aid at all, quite the contrary infact, she was just understandably upset and so they just volunteered it because 1, they were financially able and 2, wanted too.... and they were unbelievably lovely people. Big up to Christian and Anna of shell oil company in hamburg - top chaps!

anyway back to the evenings fun, we started with a few drinks at a bar that i cant remember the name of, it had a lovely leafy garden and loads of green fairy lights, it was most tranquil. After the warm up beer we went on a most un-tranquil walk to the stadium, it was about 25 mins walk on a clear day, however it probably took us over an hour and a half due to the immense crowds, firstly at the market and then on the approach to the stadium itself. during this walk an Indian man decided to take us under his wing and basically guide us to the gate (tbh it was fairly easy to find), on the way there loads of mad indians just kept coming up to us with crazy looks in their eyes shaking my hand and telling us cricket was their religion, before heading of with an inevitable KKR chant! the atmosphere was electric, the crowds were wild and the whole place had a brilliant buzz about it - i LOVED it and we were not even in the ground yet! we eventually found our way to the gate and shook our new mates hand, he then asked grace if he could kiss her on the cheek! it was so funny, grace let him and it was like his best day ever, he then shook my hand again to show no impoliteness was meant and disappeared into the night laughing like brian blessed. how very surreal.

Into the stadium we got, and too our only disappointment of the night - no booze on sale. mind you that is probably a good thing in hindsight as the crowd really didn't need anything to whip them up anymore, there were guys with painted gold and purple faces (the Kolkata Knightriders colours), people on chairs dancing like Britney spears (and thats just the boys), dancing girls, fireworks, a DJ building everyone up into a frenzy and 2 slightly bewildered english people right in the middle loving it agog. We found our mate Ross though who was sat 4 or 5 rows behind us for some reason, he had got himself a replica jersey for the event which was so small he had to cut the sleeves off to get into it, he looked like a slightly gay(er) Aussie rules footballer. We thought about swapping seats with somebody so we could sit together but that idea was poo pooed by the reaction of the 'stewards' to another couple of guys in the wrong seats - all i will say is it was a bit too rough for me.

The game itself was a ripper, loads of sixes from the home teams batsmen (which bought out the dancing girls and more music), a top innings from local fave sourav ganguly and a decent score to defend. when it was KKR's turn to bowl, plenty of wickets and spectacular catching. By the 2nd innings the crowd were going nuts, we had also acquired some 'mental even by indian standards' blokes right in front of us, who were dancing so spectacularly every one within 25 rows were watching both them for the outrageous moves, and us for our reactions which i am sure gave them as much amusement! The wickets kept falling though and each one was accompanied by much dancing and high tens from our mates. honestly they were a cross between male strippers and teenage kids out of fame or something (or is that glee these days?). A big win for the KKR sent everyone home happy and us away with some amazing memories, what a day!!     


Day 2 in Calcutta (kolkata to the bengalis who campaign for name change - calcutta to me and 80% of the residents) started later than normal and was a bit slow due to the heat, it touched 43 degrees apparently that day. We ambled about the fashionable park street district, had massive cookies in a cool bookshop called oxfords, mosied into a delicate little cakery for some brunch and generally took the pace slower. it was most delightful. Our afternoon plan was to go to the asiatic society headquarters, which incase you dont know is like a kind of library/depositary/store of ancient books, manuscripts and other fascinating paraphernalia. Us being Dozy 'backpackers' though we just thought you could amble up and take a browse... oh no! It turns out the place is basically used for research purposes for learned academic types and you had to have a definite reason for being there disturbing the ancient tomes. First we were directed to the first floor to see the head of admissions in his office for an 'interview', next it was off to the research library for a separate signing in, before finally to another office for a quick check of all info so far, all very berocratic all very Indian. Long story short, we blagged our way in, checked out some cool old texts and olde medical text books from the 1800's (amazing drawings) and then had a quick look about the library before hot footing it out of there. Most weird.

The day, although lazy was not going to end that way, oh no. We decided to head out to Sourav's bar (owned by last nights cricketing hero), I felt a bit weird going in as it was dead posh and there was me in me flip flops and shorts (on the advice of our friend Rose i had neglected to bring any jeans as she said i wouldnt need them and they would take up valuable space in my bag.... calcutta is a place where jeans are defo required, more later).  this being a Thursday, the place was fairly empty, there were only a couple of others in there, it was also very bloody expensive, we had 2 coronas and a cocktail each and it was like 25 quid! we did however meet up with Raj and Sam, 2 indian guys having a good old time, raj it turned out was a recent graduate of the London school of economics and was taking over the familys hotel empire (no idea how big this empire was), Sam was the DJ and raj's mate. As it was a bit quiet and expensivo, they decided to show us a decent place where the fashionable young hipsters of calcutta go on a thursday night. So a quick taxi ride and we decended into a underground bar where we could 'rock out' and play a few games of pool. Sam it seems knows everybody worth knowing in calcutta, he was a very popular chap around town and a bit of a hit with the ladies (I suspect Grace too fancied him!). Again i felt a bit under-dressed but Sam said i should not worry as I was white and could therefore get in pretty much anywhere - this made me feel a touch uneasy. Still a good night was had by all and it was the wee hours by the time we got to bed that night... calcutta was becoming one of my fave places to be.

The Previous late night meant another late morning... after an indian breakfast of uttapams and dosas (look it up) we went for a bit of a walk along park street, passed the museum (we were told it was rubbish) to a place called the south street cemetery, which is basically the resting place of the great and the good of Calcutta in the 18th and 19th centuries. we pottered about the graves for a few hours and Grace found some interesting ones that could be old descendants, she took down the details and asked the sweet old man who tended the office for all the info on the buried personages, one for some internet when we get home.

A fascinating time was then spent at the Calcutta exhibition in the Victoria memorial ( a spectacular place in its own right), the exhibition was a kind of history of Calcutta. it was really interesting and opened my eyes and changed my opinion of the British's time in the country. when we think of empire we always get bogged down in the negative and the terrible end that we had in India. this exhibition made me see things differently, it also made me feel proud of what Britain gave India, the road we set her on and the way in which she has grown into the country we see today. It was also plain to see how much the Indians have grown with a kind of special place for the British, they acknowledge the good things we did there (introduction of the medical science and colleges, the railway, the arts, commerce, and mass education of the young to name a few) without focusing to unhealthily on the bad. I also think that calcutta see's itself as the spiritual home and capital of india (not in a religious sense) but in the new sense of the New India. it was most eyeopening exhibition.

Anyhoo enough of the monologue, back to the adventure...

Saturday came and went with a lot of walking and exploring, a bit of 'fishal bizniz' like booking tickets and internet bloggery. We did have a really really good Chinese meal that night in a posh restaurant (again how I would have loved those jeans...!), we even treated ourselves to a gin a tonic or 2, lovely! Sunday morning was spent at a shopping mall looking at jeans, didn't buy any as they were a bit pricey and we'd blown the budget on Calcutta's nightlife! we had a quiet evening in with a few treats as it was our last night in this wonderful city and we had a plane to catch in the morning... kerrala bound in the deep south, bring it on!