Tag: Kolkata

Kolkata – Durga Puja Festival!

Four Years ago… The First time we visited Kolkata for a Bengali wedding….In the heart of kolkata Park Street. We spent two days doing the most obvious kolkata things… Having the Kolkata Paan, Puchka and visiting the tourist attraction like Victoria museum besides attending the Punjabi- Bengali wedding… we visited Flurys one of the oldest Cafes in Kolkata almost 100 years old today.
To visiting a Chinese restaurant and having Indian Chinese since … Hakka Noodles we’re first discovered here in Kolkata. We also had the Rolls from Kusum .. Kolkata is popularly known for their Rolls!
While we had meals! How could we miss out on the desserts… Misthi Doi from Balaram Mullick one of the oldest sweet shop now has multiple outlets across kolkata. To having the Nolen Gur Ice cream & Paan ice cream from Pabrai to enjoying an Bengali-French meal at 6th Ballygunge restaurant.
Four years later…
We tried most of these things again … But visited places that we had missed Peter Cat & Mocambo known for their Chelo Kebab & Crab meat In Mustard Sauce & Pork Nuggets Both of these places are owned by the same owners, have same interiors but both offer a different menu… Besides the regular meal break we took.. we visited the Roastery House Cafe in Hindustan Park… A cafe done in an old bungalow with mustard colour walls and simple interiors.. Any place we visited Kolkata without booking we had a waiting for about forty minutes… but, Wait!
We did not just Eat & Sleep.
We also attended grand Bengali ceremony Durga Puja! One day we toured across the city visiting Durga Puja Pandal, that were beautifully designed keeping a theme & idea behind and with such creativity and deadlines…From Library, to the lockdown life to Football & Bollywood were some of the pandal we visited.
You keep wondering why isn’t Kolkata visited by Tourist or why don’t people from other states come here!! And why don’t travel magazines promote Kolkata as a destination… why just Rajasthan, Goa, Mumbai and Bangalore?
The visit couldn’t be more kolkata, when we met the Superstar of Bengali Cinema Parambrata Chatterjee who is a very popular face in Bengali Cinema and someone who acted in a Bollywood movie Kahaani! The film made me first want to visit Kolkata….

So Yes! I believe I have been lucky to have seen Kolkata like a local both times!!

Durga puja Pandal

Public Trans!!

Public Transport

How important is the public transport   facilities?

Living in metro city and traveling to other Metro cities in india like Delhi,Bangalore,Chennai,Kolkata,Ahmedabad,Pune

and to Global metro cities like  London,Paris,New York.I have found that The most important  part of living remains the public transport.

Imagine how easy! you find it travelling from one point to another,Without worrying about where would I park,The timing of parking at “No Parking” Zone to day when one could park at the “No Parking “ Zone. To worrying about the fuel tank,Whether its Half Full,Half empty or reaching the E mark.

To worrying about getting a parking space.

Mind you Even in NYC! You have to wait to get one parking lot for your car.

Worrying about the servicing cost for your vecihiles.

Wouldn’t you like to be chauffered around in a car of your choice everyday! To not worrying about Starting your car and taking a rickshaw to the station for longer journeys.

But,Only if this could be improved in the other metro cities of our country, would it be easier to travel around and have the traffic flow smoothly too. Why can’t buses in our country run on the routes with an assigned timetable. A.C buses could be priced reasonably to encourage people to use them.

Why are cities like london and new York a breeze to move around. And Guess  What. Most of  these cities citizen  don’t even own a single car. All they use is Buses,Train,Metro,Subways to commute around.

Then why can’t this be done here in our country?

Fatafati(Amazing) Kolkata!!

Kolkata-Harvested Yesterday (Kal-Yesterday,Kata-Harvested)The moment we landed,at the airport Walked into the baggage claim belt. I realised The airport is Big!!

Started our journey towards our hotel.

The airport Architecture is very internationally appealing. Kolkata version of The Big Ben too Came on our way and then we realised kolkata is a Big city!! It’s the 2nd largest city in India after New Delhi in terms of the space.

The next thing that I relearned was it was also the capital of our country once.

It’s the 1st city to have had the metro compared to the other metro cities.It’s been there for 2 decades. 

Kolkata can also boast about having the 1st underground metro railway system in the country.And the oldest Running electric tram system in Asia and being the only city  in the country to have a tram network since1902.

Cricket’s 3rd largest stadium in the world is in kolkata.

The oldest Polo club in the world resides here.

The 1st golf club outside UK was established in 1829 at  The royal Calcutta golf club.

Football salt lake stadium is the 2nd largest stadium in the world and it’s here in kolkata and No wonder football is so big!!

The Die hard foodie too,Can relish and satisfy there hunger ego by  tasting delicious food and sweets famous world wide

Indian Chinese cuisine which originated almost 100 years ago  and The only Chinatown in India is in kolkata.

Satyajit Ray-The 1st oscar winner in the country 

The landmark Howrah bridge one of the largest Cantilever bridges in the world.And the largest one in the country.

No wonder,They have the intellectual ego and work on their own pace.