Kolkata

From the plane, I got a nice view of Kolkata and the Hooghly river that meandering its way to the Bay of Bengal. The weather was just typically monsoon. I took a prepaid taxi to Vinay's house and then went for a stroll in the neighborhood. In the evening, I met him and his wife Ekta at Banana Leaf (a South Indian restaurant). Later I met Nitesh at Mocha's (my favorite Mumbai hang out) and after some food, we roamed the streets of Kolkata.

The next morning, I went to see the Victoria Memorial that contains a lot information about the British, Kolkata and the history of both. The park around the sight invited a lot of couples to hang out there and enjoy the nature.

Then I bought a ticket for the Planetarium and had a look at the night sky of Kolkata.

On my second day, I went to see the South Park Street Cemetery with Gabriella from Ecuador who I met at the Post office. There were a lot of British tombs dating back as far as 200 years. It was very quite and a lot of trees made it a lovely place.

Then I headed to the Sikkim House for my inner line permit for Sikkim by a hand pulled rickshaw - Kolkata is the only place where they are still in service. After some hassle and providing two pictures and copies of my passport & visa, I finally could pick it up in the evening.

Because of this, I nearly missed the Marble Palace - an outstanding piece of architecture and with an amazing atrium and collection of statues, vases and paintings. Unfortunately, it was not allowed to make pictures inside. Also for the entry a special permit was necessary from the tourist office. But to obtain that was no problem.

The final spot I visited was the Kali temple which I already tried to find the first day, but as it was off the main street, I could not find it in the darkness. Back home I packed my things and took a taxi to the train station. At 8:30 pm my train for Darjeeling departed.