My Article for KolkataMirror.com (ToI website)

KOLKATA TALKING - BEYOND BORDERS

Kolkata is a Shangri La

It’s funny to discover that people here do not know Kolkata has its pubs, and bands and a Park street

Posted On Wednesday, February 10, 2010

By- Subhajit Roy Chowdhury

Subhajit Roy Chowdhury

I stay in Cardiff, the capital of Wales, 200 kilometres from London. When you first come abroad you are really excited. The images that fill your head are usually glances from Hollywood films and lines from the old Brit rock numbers. I was planning for this for quite a while, being no exception. However staying here is quite a different picture. Adjusting to the no-comfort life is a struggle. Only if you are loaded with cash, can you adjust well and can forget about these worries. Kolkata is a Shangri La. A proper cosmopolitan city. Maybe because I grew up in Kolkata, I could adjust with the UK faster as a lot of things here are similar, the road names, the architecture, the multiculturalism, the pubs and the steaks. Though in £1 you get a steak in good old Oly-pub, it costs at least £8 here in Cardiff and even more in London.

I used to cook in Kolkata. Usually it was pasta and bacon, which I quite like. I did not understand the value of proper home food till I left. Man, now I know, how great my maid servant is. Household jobs are tiring and I agree that women are goddesses because they do it so well. But I like shopping here. One literally gets everything here down to the least common spice.

I am a musician and been playing for almost a decade now, and leaving it for a year was difficult. I miss the head rush of a show and the crowd of Kolkata. I don’t get to play here at all cause my research is too time consuming and I also work for Sky TV which takes up my free time.

We know Kolkata bears the shades of British architecture. Out of all the cities in India only Kolkata I guess is truly a 'British City'. It’s funny to discover that people here do not know Kolkata has its pubs, and bands and a Park street. I realised back home we are more tolerant about other cultures and religion and I always think Kolkata is higher on the scale on this one compared to other cities. UK is multicultural on the top. But it has an underbelly which is not so open as it usually looks.

When I eat out alone sometimes, or when I hear bands play or when I see something exciting, I feel most nostalgic but alas! I can’t share it with others. I do miss my city; I do miss Kolkata.

(As told to Annesh Bilas Thakur)