Getting Below the Surface of Calcutta’s Rich Layers

(To open the embedded Facebook posts fully for the recipes and details, just click on the date/time under the heading Food and Travel Secrets.)

Everyone will tell you to visit the Victoria Memorial in Calcutta (Kolkata) and that is indeed a good thing to do. The building and grounds are impressive and it’s even more fun to enjoy it with out of town tourists on holiday.

But to really understand Calcutta you need to see it through the eyes of Manjit who has a passion to share the true and lesser known Calcutta. Manjit runs Calcutta Photo Tours and specialises in small group walking tours where he also helps you capture Calcutta beautifully with your camera and take a little piece home with you.

Multi-Cultural Heritage is Best Explored with Calcutta Photo Tours

Manjit’s most popular tour, Cultural Kaleidoscope, starts at a spot that a personal favourite a community reading room initiative. This art deco building is still a community hub and one spot favoured for the Bengali evening “adda” a common evening routine that is essentially a get together for a chat. 

Reading is a big theme in this tour and it’s fascinating too see newspapers pop up through the tour as they get delivered and read in an uncommonly diverse range of languages including a Cantonese one pager. 

Other themes in the tour that stood out for me were transport, shops and snacks. 

But essentially the tour is about the different communities that came to Calcutta to trade or for a new life, who have helped make it what it is today. 

My version of Majit’s wonderful narrative begins with the the Portuguese, Dutch and French who first came to trade. The Portuguese left behind Bandel cheese, a little like a smoked goats cheese, that I can still be bought in Calcutta today and I found served on the Oberoi Grand Hotel breakfast buffet. 

Then the English East India Company took over in the early 1700’s and established White Town around BBD Bagh and Black Town (for everyone else) in the surrounding area.

In between is where “Greytown” sprung up, populated by immigrants who came to make the most of the economic opportunities. 

First we explored Bow Army Barracks where the Anglo-Indian community can be found. I hear they throw a fabulous week long Christmas party that draws all religions and features a rock show a huge Housie game and Santa giving away gifts to 500 children. In between buildings sits a Buddhist Temple.

The Anglo-Indian community has need of bread bakers and undertakers!

Along the way we pass some gorgeous street scenes and fresh goat’s milk is delivered to your door! 

Then we get to the Muslim community where we found eateries feed immigrant workers staying close by, and shops selling the ingredients for Biriyani. Once this area also had the tanners and butchers who supplied leather and beef to English settlers and colonists.

Our chai stop is a special custom made cup of “builders tea” deftly prepared to order from separate pots of milk tea and water. 

Speaking of snacks, Manjit also treats us to his lifelong favourite snack of best ever, sand roasted peanuts and a lovely sample of curd (Mishti Doi) and Chhana desserts made from a cottage cheese, split using whey and then reduced to various stages and sweetened for Sandesh, Rasogulla, Kadam (soft rosagulla in the middle and a firmer more reduced Chhana preparation on the outside) so good!

But back to the tour and more  delightful transportation, shops and street scenes. 

The next community are the Chinese and this is where we found pork sausages been made using goat’s intestine for the sausage skins, a Chinese Temple and community room with that Cantonese daily one pager, and a morning market.

We also dropped by the Parsi Zoroastrian Fire Temple and met the staff having breakfast and visited the beautifully kept but now little used, Jewish Synagogue.

What a great tour, relaxed and delightful. What an amazing way to really get to know Calcutta!

Calcutta Photo Tours High Energy, Big Things Market Tour

Then for something completely different, Manjit offers an fantastic Mesmirizing Market Tour. This is where you really get into the fast paced and heavy action. 

It all happens early at the Fish Market, where porters carry heavy loads of fish and heated discussions can happen over prices.

But people still have plenty of time for photos…..

……and the backdrops are magnificent. 

A chai stop is essential…

…and the short walk to the 24 hour vegetable market is a treat in itself!

As Manjit says, the dramatic lighting creates an awesome photo.

And to witness the really heavy lifting porters is something truly special,

Just four men carry incredible loads inside the market from the trucks.

I loved it all, even the torrential monsoon rain!

Manjit can pick you up or you make your own way. Costs are found on the website and Manjit is easy to contact via email of Facebook messenger.

If you don’t see Calcutta through a Calcutta Photo Tour, you miss the best bits!

(To open the embedded Facebook posts fully for the recipes and details, just click on the date/time under Food and Travel Secrets.)