Pujo!
The weekend was one big flurry of activities. This was one of the rare years when I managed to get together with a group of my friends and go enjoy the Durga Pujas - the all-time favorite festival of every Bong. After checking out all the available options, Kansihka-Ranjita-her parents-Snigdha and I decided to pick Kallol.
Saturday began at a leisurely pace, and got a kick start from a wonderful home-cooked brunch at Kanishka-Ranjita's place. Nothing like a good meal to make me happy. Specially when followed by a half-hour siesta. Then we all headed out, transportation courtesy Lahiri-Bhagwan, and reached Kallol just as their dinner was starting. We had to do some justice to the mangsho, inspite of being pretty full. And fried papad (with chutney).
Met Sulipi Kundu at Kallol - the last time we met was when Vivek Sahay-Sutapa and I had driven over to Long Island a couple of years back. Kallol has a good reputation that way - I get to meet at least a few people who I don't meet on a daily, or even annual, basis. My LLR senior, Somdeep Dutta was also there. Snigdha, of course, had a whole bandwagon of friends and acquaintances she had to say hello to. I am more than happy to have met my school friend from years back!
Kallol had several strong points. Of course, there's the Mangsho. And Khichudi. And the papad bhaja and chutney, with rossogolla. Well, the food in general - you get the idea. If you go towards the end, they may run out of sweets, but they are more than generous with the extra mutton curry. That apart, they had performances by Srikanta Acharya and Indrani Sen. Unfortunately, we did not make it to either. We did make it to a very funny Natok on Sunday evening, called "Honeymoon".
Snigdha and I also managed to get to a Garba/Dandia meet somewhere in Elizabeth on Saturday evening. Mind boggling scale of things. Have never seen so many people so decked up in their finest silks and lehengas in one place. The dance part was utter chaos, since every pro had his/her own little jiggy wiggy, but then it was nice to sit on the stadium seats and soak in the culture in the air.
BTW - Anandautsav.com is an excellent website to make you nostalgic about Pujas in Calcutta. And they have this supercool animation about Durga and Mahishashur as well: