Happy Durga Puja!!!

Excuse my lack of blogging the last few days. I must admit, my social calendar was quite booked up.

Ahhh, I like saying that.

Right now it's wonderful, amazing, exciting Durga Puja in Kolkata! Durga Puja is an annual festival that is done big and BIG by Kolkatans. The festival is four days long featuring amazing pandals--large temple like displays created by various neighborhoods or organizations. The festival culminates with the statues of the Gods that are displayed in the pandals being thrown into the Hooghly River. Traffic has been non existant since the start of the festival and all the locals seem so relaxed and happy. The pandal-hopping doesn't start until 10 or so at night and goes until the early morning hours. Imagine all the glitz and cheesy wonder of a neighborhoods Christmas lights displays meets the hoopla of The Fourth of July on a boardwalk at the beach. That's Durga Puja.

The first night of Durga Puja we had a very unusual but insanely fun night. By chance we made friends with a man, Raja, who works in the travel agency across the street from our hotel. He insisted our group go out with him and his family when we asked him what to do for Durga Puja. We were surprised at his offer--and slightly skeptical. Random offers of 'free' tour guides in India often come hand-in-hand with a hearty scam. He turned out to be the sweetest man...with 8 kids! And! His wife had to work that night. I think he's thought process was he saw us and saw four pairs of empty hands willing to hold on to little kids at the carnival. We walked for hours with Raja and his adorable children, ages 15 down to 3. Most of the night it seemed like the kids were watching us. The little 10 year old girl was holding my hand and lecturing me about not talking to strangers. I took her advice.

The pandals were gorgeous. We must have seen at least 2 dozen of them by the end of the night. I was in awe of all the colors and textures.


And get this... we even rode some of the rides with the kids at the carnival area of the festival which was a total, utter insanity. First, ferris wheel in India = rickety spinning wheel of metal, without seat belts, likely held together by bobby pins. Second, riding said ride with tiny little screaming kids only adds to the madness of the experience. Were carnival rides in India with random children the smartest activity we could have chosen? Perhaps not. Was that night the most fun I've had yet in India. Yessss...yes it was.


By 2am the little ones were asleep on our shoulders and we took a taxi back to our neighborhood.



As if that first night weren't enough--Durga Puja Day #2 was AWESOME.

Back home I have an amazing friend named Maddy who has an amazing boyfriend named Dhruv. Dhruv has family in Kolkata they put me in contact with. Last night we went out with Dhruv's cousins pandal-hopping and such. They. Are. SOOO. Cool.

It was so much fun being shown around by locals who were so nice and pretty much the same age as us. First, they picked us up from our hotel in a car...an air conditioned car! And they insisted on introducing us to a bunch of theirs friends. We got to see an entirely new part of town, one that is much more residential. It was so nice. They showed us traditional foods to eat. We talked about music. We compare schools. They gave us tons of tips of what to see while we are here. And we even finished the night with a stop at their favorite chai place. We have plans to hang out with them again tonight. I'm so excited. Thank you, Maddy for setting up our rendezvous. Thank you, Dhruv for having rad cousins!!!