Ma:

Disclaimer: Social observations on my part, especially those pertaining to other communities, may be arbitrary and not totally informed. However, I am going by observations of peoples in different settings.

She had/has extraordinary courage and heroism. She spoke the Kolkata Bangla even before she came to Kolkata/Calcutta. Calcutta in the 50's must have been so elegant. Not like it is today, full of noise and impossible bustle. I strain and strain and strain to look for beauty, elegance, redemption. I find very little. Except the old architectural remnants. Oh, they give me a thrill. Middle class and upper middle  class households (upper middle class). Houses with poignant, sad, wistful expressions. Some of them like Subrata Mitra's house, which bravely boasts the Subrata Mitra Archvies, is almost in a state of desuetude. Pitiable, even ugly.  I remember going to that house in my very late teens. Dada (cousin) was close to Subrata Mitra.

Many on Sarat Bose Road, still. Old elegant houses, with so many stories beneath their facades. So many. Of lives lived, of sacrifices made. Especially by women whose husbands may have taken mistresses, who groomed and governed their children to become leaders of society. Old world, faded elegance, often. Succeeding generations have not been able to keep up the social and economic elevation of former times, achieved (attained) by grandfathers and great grand fathers. Perhaps they were doctors, public sector engineers, lawyers, advocates, judges. Lot of law in upper middle class Bengali families.

 On Sarat Bose Road,where it starts from opposite Minto Park, there is an interesting melange of new, commercial , non Bengali, business and enterprise. Lots of it. One can take the SAT and TOEFL exams there. Laser optical surgery.

Gujarati/Marwari clubs. Hindustan Club, I think it is called. Went there one day on the invite of a very dear friend.

One feels one is in a different world when one walks into one of these. All communities living together, but really so different. Even the smell of the food one walks into, is so different. I have no problem with vegetarian food, eating it a great deal of the time. But food is culture, ethics, life-style, philosophy. With it comes, ingrained or rigid or  open--minded or inclusive or exclusive, experimental or conservative mind sets.

I wonder how the different communites of Kolkata feel towards each other. Gujarati/ Marwari/ Parsi/ Bengali/ Punjabi/ Bihari peoples, who are all the peoples of Kolkata. Some foreigners, too. From the consulates, the multinatinal corporations, and the multinational hotel top management, such as the Hyatt.

 The Gujaratis and Marwaris have a great deal of money. Lots and lots of it. Their women folk wear diamonds. But many of them (say, above 60, range) are still not part of the 21st century in terms of thinking along 'modern' (open-minded, acceptance of plural and multiple possibilities) lines. They seem to live in narrow worlds. Where nothing but cooking and clothing and children and other people's lives matter. Not my generation, though. Although, I am close to sixty myself. Will be 58 in November. But I will still keep to the age bar that i have mentioned.

And young, highly educated, enterprising Marwari, Gujarati and Punjabi women, are often into business, their own firms and shops. Not as much as Bengali women in the professions.