West Bengal – a Tale of Two Cities

Well we have now returned back to India after a brief, but beautiful, trip to Bangladesh.  The 24 hour journey from Sylhet involved a minibus to the border, a taxi to Shillong, a “just caught in time” air-conditioned bus to Siliguri, and a private jeep to Darjeeling.  All so that we could be the only guests in a 60-room hotel which was somewhat like an large, old hotel in the Scottish Highlands.  Despite being the only guests, we did have the pleasure of a mouse in the room.  A table for two was an experience….

Darjeeling is a hill town, like Simla, with which it shares some similarities – a pedestrianised Mall and British-style buildings, but is not quite so smart.  It’s 2.000 metres up from the plains below and at this time of year sits in the clouds, obscuring the views of Kanchenjunga, the world’s third highest mountain; but fortunately we had seen it previously on the flight from Bhutan to Khatmandu.  But with some nice coffee shops and restaurants, it was a nice place to chill out after the more rustic, and hard to travel around, Bangladesh.

It’s biggest claim to fame, after tea, is the toy train.  Unlike Simla, they run tourist trains with steam engines from the 1950s.  It also travels alongside the houses and shops, sometimes within inches, and crosses the road from side to side without any warning to the passing vehicles and pedestrians except for its constant whistle.  We had a good couple of hours going to Ghum and back and visiting the related museum.

After passing miles of tea plantations previously, we finally got to see one up close.  The Happy Tea Estate is close to the town and is one of the oldest, organic tea producers in the area.  Despite its name, Darjeeling only produces 1% of the tea in India.  The process of producing tea is actually very simple and only takes 36 to 48 hours depending largely on the weather i.e. heat and humidity.  Basically, it is picked (the fresh tips only), allowed to wither in hot and cold air, rolled to start releasing the flavour, dried out, cut and finally graded into four levels of fineness.  Black, white and green tea only differ by which combination of these processes is applied.

After our stay in Darjeeling, we headed 250 miles south by bus to Kolkata, formerly Calcutta; the second, and very different city in West Bengal.  This is one of India’s great cities, and the former capital until the Second World War.

This was initially the stepping off point for our trip to the Sunderbans Tiger Reserve.  We spent a few hours in a minibus from Kolkata before arriving at the furthest point by road on the largest delta in the world.  We then jumped on a riverboat and headed out into the mangrove swamps before we arrived at a lovely eco-village and our mud hut for the evening.

We had a great time in the village, despite being bitten by lots of insects beating the mosquito nets and insect repellant.  The food was cooked by the local villagers and we were entertained by four locals singing Bengali folk songs whilst an electric storm was going off around us.  Entertained was a relative term as much of the music consisted of very high-pitched wailing by one of the two singers.

The second day was spent with ten hours on the boat before returning to Kolkata by minibus.  After passing beyond the nylon nets which stop the tigers swimming across to the inhabited islands, we were right in tiger country.  They are notoriously difficult to spot from the boat, usually one sighting a month, but the variety of birds and other animals is great.  After about eight hours without a “big spot” the guide suddenly stood up and gestured for the driver to stop the boat.  In front of us was an enormous 15 foot saltwater crocodile sitting on the muddy bank.  It watched us for a while before racing into the water and watching us from afar.  It was a very exciting end to a great trip.

Back in Kolkata we did treat ourselves to a nice hotel again, as we haven’t done so for a month or so.  This allowed us to explore the beautiful city.  A few days before when we arrived it was partially submerged by two days of rain, but fortunately was now clear again.  We travelled where we could on the metro as it was five rupees, or six pence, a journey, but taxis and rickshaws were fairly cheap too.

The highlight is the huge, marble Victoria Monument by the Hooghly River.  This white building was completed in 1911 as a memorial to Queen Victoria who died ten years before.  Nearby is the Maidan, which is a large park where people got to play cricket and stroll etc., and which actually looks like Richmond Park.  There was also the extremely odd Marble Palace, built in 1835 for the maharajah and which contains the most extraordinary artefacts from a Rubens painting to a collection of parrots and cockatoos.

We explored some of the bars and restaurants in Park Street with two young guys from the UK we had met on the Sunderbans trip, and who were having a holiday in India before embarking on PhDs in biotech.  It was interesting to hear their perspectives on India too.   Tom headed back to the UK and Tim on to Bangladesh, while we headed for the enormous Howrah Station on our way onwards back towards Delhi as we near the end of our time in India.  One thing is for sure, we will be returning to Kolkata, a great alternative stopover if travelling further beyond India.

(See more pictures under the “India” tab.)