Durga Puja, the biggest festival in Bengal starts today. A myriad of weblinks allow us to enjoy the massive festival in Bengal, sitting from the comforts of our home thousands of miles away. I was chatting with my cousin who is in graduate school in Malaysia. This is his first year away from Kolkata during the Pujas. And he is missing the five Fs- festivities, food, fun, friends and family. He asked me about my plans for the Pujas- I answered truthfully- not much. After 12 years away from the city, my state is that of stoic acceptance- the inevitable- I won't be in my city for the Pujas. It doesn't mean that I don't miss the Pujas and don't yearn to be in the city during the festivities- its just a tad more difficult to justify taking a month long break during the middle of a semester, especially with the festive season in the US creeping up so close when work will inevitably have to take a break.
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| Photo Courtesy: Wikipedia; Bagbazar Sarbajanin |
However, what surprised me is the second part of my answer. I told him that it wasn't really the Pujas that I was missing- I was missing my city! I was missing Kolkata. For the last decade and some change, Kolkata has not been "home". Home meant where my parents lived. With time this definition of home had mutated. Now work dictated where home would be- as a result home was sometimes Bombay, sometimes California and sometimes Utah. So the gorgeous sunshine in California, the drive by Queen's Necklace in Bombay or the gorgeous fall colors followed by the snow blanket in the Rockies dominated the "home" stories. Experiences of vacations are heavily inundated with words such as Vegas, New York, the pacific coast highway and the Grand Canyon or Disneyland.
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| Fall Colors in Utah; Photo Credit: Mystic Michki |
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But these days, the heart yearns to go back to the city which has been a witness to a lot of important chapters in life and to relish the experiences the city has to offer. The heart desires to take the road not taken in a known city and am I spoilt for choices! A walk by the Victoria Memorial early morning, a steaming hot cuppa of chai, a visit to Kumartoli- the place where the Idols are made, fresh off the oven samosas from one of the numerous vendors, eateries in Baker's lane in Central Calcutta, a quiet evening boat ride down the Ganges, dissecting the narrow bylanes of North Calcutta, staring at the impressive Howrah Bridge as thousands of commuters cross over the Ganges.
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| Victoria Memorial, Kolkata; Photo Courtesy: Colin Mather |
I have not been to the city in the past three years. I hear from everyone how shopping malls have sprung up in every corner of the city. Cafes rule the hearts of the young ones in the city. Traffic progresses at a snail's pace with pedestrians, cars, buses, autorickshaws, cycles. But isn't there more to Kolkata than malls, cafes and fancy restaurants?
My memories of the city remind me of a very different Kolkata. And today when I stand, walk or drive through streets of a city exactly on the other side of the globe sometimes the wind brings back that scent of my city. The waft of the mountain fires burning somewhere during early fall reminds me of "dhuno-r gandho" (powdered incense) during the pujas. Every year I have this same feeling...may be its just how fall is everywhere...but the mind triggers only memories of Kolkata, surprising! And there are so many of them: waking up early morning to see
Shiuli (coral jasmine) strewn all over the the front porch of our ancestral home; cousins from all over pouring in to celebrate Kali pujo (Diwali or the festival of lights) together; distributing fire crackers; loud applause as one of the
tubri's reach dazzling heights; piling on to a "van rickshaw" to go get the Idol; dipping into the not so cold water of the pond to immerse the Idol at the end of the puja; making sure everyone who did not want to get wet are drenched; dancing down the road to the beats of a dhak; the amriti and the feast that awaits after bhai phonta (a festival to celebrate the brothers); the playful and sometimes not so playful bickering with the aunts about who was going to take responsibility of decorating the "phonta-r thala"; making sure bunches of
Cynodon dactylon or durba were already on the plate. These memories are mine and they make me who I am today.
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| The "Bhai Phonta-r Thala"; Photo Credit: Mystic Michki |
I am told that these days its too crowded during the festive season. Many take off during the this festive season and get away from Kolkata. I stumble. It seems that there are too many parallel worlds going on. People who are there, they don't like it...people who are away, want it...!
