Varanasi Pictures

Kolkata Pictures

Day 2 / 3

Spent most of the day in Kolkata seeing the British Imperialism sites and hiding from the sun. It was so hot even the Indian were complaining. They begged for water instead of money.

The streets are full of activity as the nights cool off. I watched a card game a group of men were playing on the street. I'm hoping someone (John dear) can find me the rules. At first it looked like Black Jack. Each player had one card face up and one face down. However, these cards didn't change from hand to hand. Instead, each player was dealt 4 cards which was followed by exclamations of disgust, and maybe bidding. Then 4 more cards were dealt and play ensued. It seemed to be a trump/ trick oriented game, but I didn't get to watch much because guys were starting to give me the eye. Women aren't on the streets after dark.

Over all the stares here haven't been too bad. Much like you get being a punk in Calgary. I forgot what that's like and it makes me feel young again.

I take back any complaints about security and sexual segregation. When you have exceptionally bizarre men following you around train stations it's good to know you have somewhere you can retreat too safely. (My fault, I shouldn't gawk. But even among hundreds of Indians sleeping, playing, etc this one stood out).

Safeway to gawk - from inside a train. Spent most of day 3 dozing and watching the sites from the train bed. Much like spending Sunday afternoon in bed with cartoons. Feeling more rested and healthy again.

Finally in Varanasi, hooked up with the guide from my hotel (didn't know I was getting a guide - don't know yet what this is gonna cost me) and saw the closing day ceremony and started shopping. Guide says I got good deal. Have to stop shopping or I'll need to buy more luggage.

My 19:10 train leaving Kolkata was 7.5 hours late leaving Kolkata and arrived 9 hours late to Varanasi. This has seriously made me re-think the my schedule and I decided to cancel the back to back night trains in and out of Khajuraho. If anything went wrong it would totally screw my other connections / plans. Slightly sad but even bad days in India are amazing!

Culture Shock Review

How shocked am I ? A little. The city looks like it's in the middle of a war zone - crumbling and dirty. I've always wondered about construction of things like roads - what's under the pavement. Here there's no wondering because you can see three layers - gravel, sand, bricks, stone pavers.

How smelly is it? Some, but no worse than the Venice canals. I Don't know why people make so much of the smell.

How expense /cheap is it? Breakfast cost me 20 cents, lunch (street vendor) 70 cents, 1L bottle water 60 cents, dinner $3.00 (good sit down restaurant full of Indians), 45 minute taxi ride from airport $4.50, extra 1/2 day at hotel to checkout at 6pm $30 (good hotel tho).

How hot is it? I have no idea but way hotter then I like.

How's the food? Hotter then I'd like and there's no yogurt to cut the heat. White rice, white flour. The bread is amazing.

The poor? Yes, people don't live by western standards and seem to be very poor, but I saw fewer beggars in all of today than if I were walk from my place to downtown in Calgary. I have read that you can tell the real beggars from the fakes easily. The real beggars have no where to keep their stuff and have it with them on the street. By that standard I saw no beggars today - no even the maimed limbs. Can that be?

Most surprising? The architecture. Every building seems to be built in a different style - and like with the roads, you can see layers on most of them.

Kolkata

Although I was most looking forward to Kolkata and the Kalighat temple over everything on my trip, I had originally planned to be in Kolkata 5 days into my trip. I was warned that it was the least safe, and most diffiuclt place to go so I thought I might need a westernized, warm up city. But since I was sick and left 5 days later then expect, I'm here first.

The Kalighat temple is supposed to be a mad house and since I was up at 3 am anyway I decided to do this first light, this morning. Out the door, find a taxi, down to the temple, blessed, fleeced, marked with a red dot (not in that order).

My taxi driver was delighted to have an early fare and offered to give me a driving tour while the city was mostly sleeping. I got a basic look at all the major tourist sites and good geographic orientation. He bought me chai, found me breakfast and gave me my first Indian price negotiation.

Getting Here

Getting here was a nightmare. 20+ hrs of fly time in 36 hours. Never again.

Airports are fairly civilized but there's a lot of passport and ticket checks. Check to get into the building, check to move from one area to the other, the usual check at security (sex segregated), check when leaving building - no re-entry (damn lucky I hit the ATM before I left the building).

Connectivity

Well it looks like free wifi means free if you have an Indian phone number. I could get an Indian phone number but it would cost me $200CND. I'm too cheap pay that much for a tiny screen just so everyone can follow me easier. This means that I won't be able upload pictures - not that I took any.

First Stop - Kolkata

The capital of West Bengal, Kolkata (or Calcutta as it was known in the West) was long the base of operations for the East India Company and eventually became the capital of British India.

Kolkata is a huge city. It is the third most populous city in India with about 14.6 million people.

Bev is keen to see Kalighat temple. According to the legend, when Lord Shiva’s wife Parvati’s body was cut up, her right toes fell here. Rebuilt in 1809, this is an important shrine of Hindu Shakti worship. The temple is in the southern part of the city.

Kolkata retains remnants of its British Imperial past in the form of large buildings, notably, the Victoria Memorial Hall, St Paul's Cathedral, Fort William, and the former home of the British Viceroys now the National Library.




More information about the sights in Kolkata can be found here:

http://wikitravel.org/en/Kolkata