Reflections on Kolkata

You exit the cool of your air-conditioned room into the sauna hot and humid air of Kolkata, gather in the shade and then board two 4x4 vehicles to your next destination. The guard opens the compound gates and you merge into the chaos of taxi’s, buses, trams, motorbikes, cycles, auto’s, rickshaws of several different varieties, and delivery trucks. The families living on the pavement outside the compound wave and shout “uncle, baby-milk” as you drive into the maelstrom.

Auto’s – LPG powered three wheel transport

You head down the road, avoiding traffic coming in the wrong direction, pedestrians crossing on all sides, already starting to sweat from the heat even though the air-conditioning is doing its best. Out of the window it seems there are people everywhere, the roads are crammed with small, open, shop-fronts the size of garden sheds with similar businesses lined up together in different areas of the city; motorcycles spares and repair shop leak oil and smother grease onto the pavement itself crammed with people selling hot food and tea. Occasionally you pass a larger building, a shadow of its former glory, covered in black mould and soot, paint peeling off, often with trees and vines covering the exterior. People crouch half-naked in the street washing themselves at a tap at the edge of the road, or the dirty water from a burst water pipe as motorcycles - laden with father, mother, daughter, baby and produce - zoom perilously close to the mass of other vehicles and all the while the incessant sound of thousands of horns, saying ‘I am here, watch out for me.’

You pass through a surreal almost post-apocalypse landscape of old and decaying buildings, brightly painted government buildings – often in the deep-red and pale-yellow of the old East India Company – countless unfinished projects that seemingly lie abandoned. The detritus of human occupation is everywhere, rubbish litters the streets or decays in piles next to the side of the road, grime and dirt covers everything, and what seems like piles of rubbish neatly stacked against walls actually marks the presence of a street family who don’t have the means to build a shelter on the pavement.

The shops start to change, the beggars and street families disappear, the traffic starts to obey the traffic signals, and construction seems to be less unfinished and more work-in-progress. You notice a KFC, a music shop, a MacDonald’s, and lovely avenues of small trees line the pavements, smartly dressed 20-something Indians in western clothing and designer sunglasses exit their expensive cars and enter the air-conditioned western-style shops and coffee houses. You are in the wealthier part of town a haven for the high-caste, the educated and the rich (often an attribute of the same person), but still the cacophony of horn’s, the grime, the dust, the detritus.

You arrive at your destination and exit the heat and sweat of the vehicle back into the extraordinary heat of Kolkata, greeted by the head of today’s mission project and his staff. Taken into a grimy room, in a grimy building you sit in plastic garden chairs and aim for those situated under the many ceiling fans that will provide some respite from the heat, hoping that the air will dry off some of the sweat that runs down your face, back and legs. Someone gives you a glass of cool Pepsi and a small biscuit to welcome and refresh you.

People then start to tell you about the amazing work they are doing in Kolkata or in the villages around it; stories of thousands of conversions and hundreds of villages coming to faith; the need for more workers in the plentiful harvest; the faithful reliance and belief in the power of prayer. You are asked to give a word or to pray for those present and are whisked off to see day-schools and boarding schools where you sing and act out silly sketches for the children, and where they dance and sing in return.

Or maybe your meeting takes you out of the traffic of Kolkata onto dusty road’s that lead to the interior and past the throat searing stench of the tanners. The volume of traffic decreases but it is still nightmarishly scary as the taxis are replaced by trucks, the beautiful painting and decorations on the front obscured by dust and detritus. You speed past more unfinished projects, and skirt along the side of heavily polluted canal’s full of rubbish that spills into the canal from fly-tipping on the bank, or out of the back of someone’s house. Small industry’s pour their toxic waste-products, tipped with foam, into the waters turning it inky-black, dark-blue or a strange green. Water snakes pick their way through the detritus and occasionally children and adults search for fish in the waters from the bank or a small, rickety canoe. The trees become more numerous and tropical combining with fields of rice to provide an agricultural landscape. Refreshment shacks, small settlements, businesses, and men urinating at the side of the street in full view of passers-by. We drive through villages with scarcely enough room for our vehicle, crammed with people buying all kinds of foods and products from vendors on the side of the road, vehicles coming in the opposite direction and pedestrians seemingly unaware of the dangers of traffic. Arriving at your destination you exit the vehicle and walk into the village with its many bamboo walled and thatched houses, making your way through the cool of the shade from coconut palms to the centre of the village. You find a patch of ground where you encourage the local children to play games and sports, they join in – nervously at first and then exuberantly – and are joined by their mothers and fathers and other adults of the village. Your team sings a song, performs a sketch, you share a testimony – all translated by a member of the mission organisation you happen to be working with – and a local pastor finishes this off with a word from God and call for a response. You meet the village elders, say your goodbyes and return to your vehicle sweaty and exhausted in the knowledge that a dozen people have come to Christ and that a house church will be starting in that village.

You return through the Kolkata traffic to the safety of the compound, the gate opens whilst the street-families shout “uncle, baby-milk.” You exit the vehicle dishevelled and sweaty but not ready to consign yourself to the small room you share with your friend. In a small group you head out of the compound and stop and talk to the street-family, maybe sharing some food or giving them baby-milk you have recently bought at the supermarket, doubting in your head that they will use this for the twins Peter and Paul, or if they will sell it back to a shop and use the money for alcohol. The twins in filthy vests and no underwear clamour around you asking for food and sit on your lap as you rest on your haunches. You say your goodbyes and make your way past the sleeping dogs – covered in scars and running sores with masses of hair missing, constantly pestered by flies – getting ready to put in a swift kick if the dog should exhibit any sign of aggression knowing that a bite from one of these could result in rabies or any other disease that could see you admitted to one of the filthy, dilapidated hospitals of which there are plenty in Kolkata. The smells begin to assault your senses as you walk past trees where men and dogs have urinated or worse, past the wooden shacks selling spicy, aromatic food, past open drains of filthy water, or fragrant flowers growing from the wall of a former residence, itself now fully succumbed to the decay of Kolkata. And always the incessant sound of the traffic which you pick your way through, not gingerly now but aggressively like a local, watching both ways as drives do not always conform to the correct direction of the traffic. The heat, humidity, sun, smells and noise continue to offend your senses until you dive into the oasis that is an air-conditioned shopping mall, you browse past all the brightly coloured stalls selling everything from children’s clothes to watches and women’s underwear. You make your purchases, amazed at how ridiculously cheap it is for you, but how incredibly expensive it would be for someone on the average wage of 50 Rupees per day, equivalent to £62.5p.

On the walk back to the compound you take Park Street and stop off at the Supermarket to buy cold cans of coke and luxuries like chocolate and cashew nuts, you put the purchases in your rucksack so as not to attract the attention of the beggars. You walk past the street vendors now busy from the afternoon trade; rows of smartly-dressed businessman sit on a low wall eating rice and dhal with their hands as the owner buzzes around them refilling cups, delivering plates of food and taking money. His charcoal stove burns red hot, the smells and heat of his business add to the heat and smells you are already experiencing. You walk past rows of trucks and taxi’s with their drivers asleep with doors open, past the Mazda car showroom with its sparkling glass windows, protected behind a low wrought-iron, dilapidated fence where security guards patrol the forecourt and man a gate-house. Past the pretty Circular Road Baptist Church with its tall pale-yellow columns and green shrubs that spill out foliage through the fence.

You are back at the compound, you bang on the door and the security guard lets you in and gives you your room key and making your way through the compound with its tall trees, garden and lawn, the sound of the traffic somewhat quietened by the high walls but replaced by the cries of the dozens of hooded crows that call the compounds trees home. You enter the slight cooler accommodation block and make your way up the two flights of stairs and into the air-conditioned heaven of your room. The heat has taken its toll so you put of fresh clothes, close the curtains and lay on the bed, listening to the sound of the air-conditioning, babies occasionally crying in the homes that can be seen from your window. You lay there, exhausted by the heat, trying to process all that you have seen and heard that day to share at the group reflection time this evening. Will you ever come back to this grimy, dilapidated, smelly, unfinished, hot and humid city that is so full of life, but life often lived on the edge of death? Will you ever get to work with the amazing pastors, ministers and Christian in this enigmatic place, where there is a great sense of hope in God and the gospel and a harvest that is ripe? It is 3 o’clock, the hottest time of the day, the thermometer hits its peak and you drift off to sleep with all these thoughts in your head.