the Kolkata experience

- The second time that everyone around me is eyeing me without discreet because of my physical difference. The first time was in Algeria. Except that this time the boys aren't murmuring or screaming "Chinoise" to my face. And except that this time sellers and service workers of all types are trying to get more rupees out of me. Uhm, I'm probably biased. They try to do that to everyone inexperienced, Indians and non-Indians alike.

- Surprisingly low number of non South Asians on the street. First count: first day, 2 East Asian looking persons. Second count: second day, while roaming around the downtown area, some East Asians, some whites.

- Rickshaw, bus, tram, metro, auto, auto, rickshaw: that's how i got around the first day. I think i've put my butt on every single kind of public transport here. And one reason why you shouldn't expose too much of your flesh here is that it IS crowded, well except on the rickshaw.

In one of these auto-rickshaws, about 1.2 m in width, I once found myself with 1 high school boy plus 5 full-sized Indian adults, by which I mean people whose body girth is 1.5 to 2.5 times bigger than mine.

- Coming here after having retrained myself in Vietnam for + 2 months, I was still in total shock at the driving mentality. Autos dodge to the right, sway back to the left. The drivers here can certainly compete with their Algerian or Vietnamese counterparts; and I suspect that they'd win. Sometimes you find, only a few meters in front of your auto, hundreds of vehicles all rushing toward you. Another time, the back edge of a huge bus only half a span from your thigh.
Another scenario: inside a tunnel, cramped with cars and autos and buses, all within a few milimeters from each other, ALL HONKING, for no reasons, just like a fashion thing to do.