Visiting Kolkata during Durga puja is a bliss, as the city blooms into colors to show off its beauty. Our two week trip treasured so many memories of the city ...from fast metros to hand pulled rikshaws, energetic days to tiresome nights, quiet moments to awful sounds, serene surroundings to polluted playgrounds and whatnot...
Hats off to the city for preserving its tradition and culture. We had the honor of riding traditional tanga (horse cart) on the busy roads near Victoria memorial. The royal feeling of riding on high-seated tanga by sitting next to tangawallah, listening to the rhythm of stomping horses and enjoying the fresh breeze dashing into sweated face is priceless :-). And kids had fun riding, touching and feeding horses up close.
That's the only evening we had a relaxing time in the city. Rest of the nights were tiresome with great enthu to visit as many pandals as we can to take a glimpse of Durga Maa in different avatars, amazing art work and beautifully decorated pandals. And now, 5 days of hard work compressed into 12 minutes of video clip :-).
This post will be incomplete without mention of my favorite Bengali sweet Rasagulla. It's my favorite, not because it's filled with sweetness, but coz of its kindness to let others squeeze out the extra sweetness as per their taste buds. I would say customized sweet dish for the complicated tongue. Here are some pics of the shop that satisfied our jihva.
More later....
Hope you all had a Great Dasara this year!!
Hats off to the city for preserving its tradition and culture. We had the honor of riding traditional tanga (horse cart) on the busy roads near Victoria memorial. The royal feeling of riding on high-seated tanga by sitting next to tangawallah, listening to the rhythm of stomping horses and enjoying the fresh breeze dashing into sweated face is priceless :-). And kids had fun riding, touching and feeding horses up close.
For the first time in my life, I saw hand pulled rikshaws. Wondered how the poor hand-pulled rikshaw men can compete with fast-moving metros, auto rikshaws and cycle rikshaws....but seems they have their own territory...absolutely no auto-rikshaws and cycle-rikshaws surrounding them. I must say, the city has its own flavor of keeping old traditions even in this fast age.
Wanted to feel Maa Ganga close to our hearts, so boarded cruise on Ganges river in Babughat.
Live orchestra, with old melodies soothing the mind, and new item songs rocking the bodies was awesome.
Had perfect evening enjoying the cooling effect of mother's lap with pictures taken from day light to night light capturing the "City of Bridges". Well, could capture only two bridges - Howrah bridge and Vidyasagar setu aka Second Hooghly bridge.
And the following pictures remind me of songs written on the beautiful relationship between naav and nadiya... and there are some panchis in the first picture to beautify the song further :-)
That's the only evening we had a relaxing time in the city. Rest of the nights were tiresome with great enthu to visit as many pandals as we can to take a glimpse of Durga Maa in different avatars, amazing art work and beautifully decorated pandals. And now, 5 days of hard work compressed into 12 minutes of video clip :-).
This post will be incomplete without mention of my favorite Bengali sweet Rasagulla. It's my favorite, not because it's filled with sweetness, but coz of its kindness to let others squeeze out the extra sweetness as per their taste buds. I would say customized sweet dish for the complicated tongue. Here are some pics of the shop that satisfied our jihva.
More later....
Hope you all had a Great Dasara this year!!
