CALCUTTA

I have visited many Indian cities but the one that fascinated me the most is Calcutta for various reasons. First of all it has the appearance of a capital and in fact it was for 138 years from 1773 to 1811, secondly because despite being very chaotic it fills you with a thousand visions that remain with you like an adventure film. It has colossal colonial palaces built by the English or later copied by the Indians, the large white marble palace dedicated to Queen Victoria with a majestic hall and a green park all around, a huge cricket stadium and a large lawn where goats can be seen grazing on the edges and young Indians playing cricket. There are an infinite number of markets, little shops, sellers of everything, a riot of colors and then Hindu temples, Islamic mosques, Catholic churches and Jain temples. Of course Mother Teresa's monastery and her tomb which I struggled to find after walking for a couple of hours. Never ask an Indian the way. If he understands you or doesn't understand you, if he knows it or doesn't know it, he will shake his head for a minute and then tell you to continue ten minutes later and it will be two hours, but I didn't want to take a rickshaw, after reading "the city of joy" and after seeing couples of fat Indians being carried by a skinny cyclist, all sweaty and struggling. There is the famous and photographed Howrah iron bridge over the Hoolii River, a branch of the Ganges, one of the busiest in the world. A walk along the river, the Prinsep Gath and the Eden Gardens where couples and families meet and then the Kumartuli district of the sculptors of clay statues which represent gods and are used in temples or ceremonies. A beautiful white marble Jain temple. It is a religion that was born around 600 BC by Mahavira and differs from Buddhism in that this involves the cancellation of individuality while Janinism tends towards purification up to the change of personality, there are only two million followers while Buddhists between 350 and 550 million, Hindus around one billion, Muslims 1.8 billion and Christians 2.3 billion, but these are figures for the planet, not for India. However, in my opinion the most beautiful temples are the Jain ones like the one visited in Calcutta, all white, very elegant and clean, they give a sense of peace and serenity. You can visit the Flower Market which is very important because Hindus bring flowers to their temples. as at the beautiful Hindu temple dedicated to the goddess Kali Dakshineswar. There is the Maidan park, the lungs of Calcutta and Sudder street, the beating heart of Calcutta where I stayed. College street with many bookshops and the elegant Parker Street where it feels like being in the West. finally the beautiful botanical garden along the Hoogli river, It has everything, in fact it is a metropolis with 15 million inhabitants, the second largest in India after New Delhi and before Bombay. In Calcutta you eat dosa, a lentil snack with coconut chutney (sweet and sour sauce), puri, hot and puffy fried bread, chapati, a flatbread that is dipped in a series of spicy sauces, lots of rice that you eat with your hands dipping it with various sauces, chicken with curry or chicken marinated with spices and yogurt. We drink sugar cane juice, lots of tea with milk and salted lime juice.