Sleeping Beauty

The writer of this article is currently running on 8 hours of sleep. 8 hours of sleep in some 40 hours. Deadlines, unusualness, festivities and airport waiting lounges have kept him away from one of his favorite things, slumber.

Sitting at a café on Park Street, the door opens and a group of excited school students walk in. Their uniforms were once mine. The faces though unfamiliar are easy to relate to. I see someone I grew up with in every one of them. The corner table is taken. The laughter echoes. The order is simple, the pooling of resources to make sure there’s enough to cover the bill.

While driving from the airport through the city, there’s remarkable change. Drifting between then and now, the route to where my grandparents used to reside is marked by tiny bulbs on balconies. As if it was decorated for my homecoming. How easy it is to navigate through Calcutta (Kolkata), eleven years after moving away. Yet, the distance between then and now feels like yesterday and today. Where old houses have been broken down and made into buildings and malls, the eye registers the new and the head restores the old.

Back in the café a side-plate breaks. The attention falls on a young college going couple. Their thick accounting books almost taking up the entire table. There’s a break from conversation on almost every table, it’s time to walk out of Flurry’s. The chicken sandwich and cold coffee almost as good as I remember it to be.

The line outside Peter Cat for lunch on a Monday is abysmal, only some thirty people waiting. Of course that’s sarcasm making an appearance. I walk in to take a peep and say hello to one of the older managers and it’s easy to see what makes this city tick on its own time. The Bloody Mary’s are doing the rounds, the Chello Kebab on a bed of rice soaked in butter and accompanied by the fried egg are on several tables. The juicy tomato adding a shade of red to a sea of white! The waiters dressed in their uniforms (surely designed in the 1920s) are handing out bowls of chanachur to those drinking. They do so in their own sweet time. Today is Monday and not any single activity in this room will make you feel that it’s the beginning of the week. This is Calcutta. In my head Beethoven and Sigur Ros play together, forming a new symphony.

India is changing apparently. Some say it’s easy for all to see. There’s frantic activity in the capital, New Delhi, the domestic airport is being renovated, the metro rail is being extended, the pillars and stations are being painted, re-painted, unpainted and road-works are in progress in almost every major intersection. Two weeks ago, I was in Bombay and the new high-rise buildings look so good. Almost makes you want to work twice as hard to get a home there, to look into the sea and sky. Here in Calcutta, it is how you left it. Or is it?

This city is the sleeping giant among the metros, waiting to wake up and then there will be no stopping. The question is – when will Calcutta wake up? With the city once again becoming a sporting powerhouse – Kolkata Knight Riders and the new football franchise Atletico de Kolkata, there is a huge sense of belonging once again among sports fans and business folks alike. The surge of sponsors is a recent development according to those involved with the teams. I find myself interacting with several optimistic people on this trip home. I left the city eleven years ago but the city never left me.

Over the past few years, Calcutta and Bengal as a state has witnessed and encountered unpleasant episodes that will go down in the history books but in times to come there will be much to be happy about. Yes, there will be stories of uprisings in the universities, there’s a movement to stand up for what is right. Calcutta has for years suffered brain drain, a city with probably the finest schooling structure but with only a handful of universities or colleges to match the talent that comes out of the high schools. With more business opportunities there will come a time where prodigal sons and daughters will return. Hope, that’s all we have today. Tomorrow we will have more.

My conversations with people on this trip have painted a very bright picture. A Calcutta that I had dreamt of is in the process of becoming a reality. We must keep faith, we must invest and we must return. Strong and honest governance, better universities and employment are three areas which will enhance the chances of growth in this beautiful city, once the capital of the Raj.

The sleeping beauty will surprise you in the near future. Wait and watch.

(Arjun Puri was born and raised in Kolkata, back when it was still called Calcutta. As a young child he spent time in Mumbai, Chennai and Bengaluru – before their names changed. His last long-term home was London, and he fully expects it to call itself something else soon. Arjun graduated from the University of St Andrews in 2007 and worked as a banker for 5 years, before he realised it was not for him. Arjun now lives in Delhi and works in the education sector. He loves books, sport, people and travel -- and most of all, Leyla, his German Shepherd.)