While I’m Gone

Please attend:

Shirlyn’s (of The UnXpected fame) concert at the Esplanade (link) on the 28th of July

The Indignation events (calendar here – no, I’m not reading this year as 1. I’m not here 2. I haven’t written poetry in ages). Have a happy pride month for me.

Back to the dispatches.

I got out of the train at Howrah at 7am this morning, after a marathon 35 hours. The 35 hours didn’t go along too badly – since all you do on a train is eat and sleep and go to the toilet, those activities suited me just fine. This time, as the only foreigner on the train, other passengers scarcely gave me a second look. For the most part I spent my time chatting to a beautiful Orissan woman working as a programmer in Bangalore (sounds like a fantasy come true), on the finer points of similarities and differences between Oriya and Bengali and Assamese, on marriage (yes), on how I eat my chapati and dal the proper way and eat nimki and bhujjia as “travel snacks”. The rest of my time was spent reflecting. India does that to you, no matter how much you scoff at the whole new age soul searching business. I ended up with the conclusion: I needed a shower.

It has come to that point. Where stepping out into Howrah, the porters don’t really seem to give a damn about my presence anymore (unlike the past, when ants to a honey cake might be a good reference). After I clean up in my hotel room, go downstairs intending to have breakfast, see a “flood” and the only thing I do is pull up my pants, put my belongings into a ziploc, and walk to the side of the road to wait for bus number 46. I see 2 other East Asian girls – probably Taiwanese – and they look absolutely shocked and appalled by what they’ve gotten themselves into by coming to Calcutta. I just smile to myself, keep on walking, board bus 46, pay 7 rupees without asking what the fare is, and get off at Ultadanga to catch a shared auto (5 rupees! The least I’ve had to pay for autos!). Everybody speaks Bengali to me and I try to reply. It’s almost as if I’ve just blended into this place. Or as if they think I’m Nepali.

By the way, my liveblogging has come to a standstill. As I’ve taken my Karnataka-based mobile out of Karnataka and into West Bengal (and Assam next week), I now suddenly find myself unable to use GPRS, despite prior assurance from Airtel representatives that it would work. So that’s the real big sucker about Cal.

Otherwise… I’m eating way too much here. This afternoon I was seized with the sudden urge to eat Chinese stirfry: just anything, everything really, with black bean sauce (xi chap). I found a fairly accurate rendition of black bean sliced fish (Rs 109), though the suspiciously named “lime and pepper chicken soup” (which isn’t very Chinese), wound up tasting like a bit of tom yam goong and a bit of pho ga. With a pot of jasmine tea in hand (you have to tell them not to add sugar: this is India, land of the sweet), I could’ve sworn I was at home. Dinner will be PeterCat’s terrific chelo kebab, and supper, Kusum Mansion’s chicken egg katti roll.

Going
Bus 46 to Salt Lake: Rs 7
Auto to City Centre Shopping Complex: Rs 5

Coming back
Taxi: Rs 160

I’m taking the bus from now on.

P.S. If you need to contact me for anything, email, or ask my family or Z for my Indian number.