Offering some of the finest cakes, croissants and cold coffees in Kolkata, ‘Flurys’ is not to be missed. Situated at one of the many busy crossroads along Park Street, ‘Flurys’ is a little haven of art deco magnificence amongst the hustle and bustle of one of Kolkata’s busiest streets. Waiters look very dapper in their white aprons with candy floss pink ties, whilst the grand crystal chandelier hanging above the main dining area adds a little drama to the place. Having originally stayed in a hotel a five minute walk away, the word ‘Flurys’ will trigger the team to decide to a go for lunch at 3pm, or afternoon tea at 10am. Not only that, but we’ve also indulged in a box of take-away cakes: from butterscotch sponges to brownies.

So, when we waltzed in on the weekend we were expecting good things. In all our visits to ‘Flurys’ the service has never been particularly quick. Our gallons of cold coffee took a while to come and our mains were served at different times – if Andrew and Amelia had not ordered prawns that required the necessary treatment, group eating would have been very disjointed indeed. In terms of cuisine, the prawns were as delicious as they had been on our previous visit; however the vegetable lasagne was far too gloopy and seemed to be a cheese dish masquerading behind a more nutritional description. 

Nonetheless ‘Flurys’ must not be judged on lunch alone. If you’re looking for a cooked breakfast it does one of the best we’ve had here – providing that you eat around the chillies when swallowing your baked beans (I found that my saliva glands do not appreciate food that hot before 9.30am). However, if it’s scrumptious cakes you’re after this place is in a league of its own. The counter is full of row upon row of delectable delights – from pineapple sponges to lemon iced squares, chocolate swirls to almond slices, you are spoilt for choice. If these swirls and plaits of sugar aren’t enough for your sweet tooth I suggest you peruse their cake album to see such a selection of cake design, it makes most birthday cakes look bland. ‘Flurys’ – a definite must for the cake carnivore.

Megan

“I think India has the best tea in the world – so why look elsewhere?”

‘Dolly’s Tea Shop’ is a Kolkata institution. If you don’t find out about it through your guidebook then undoubtedly a local will very quickly enquire whether you’ve been to ‘Dolly’s’ and if not, why not? Tucked away in the corner of Dakshinapan Shopping Centre, ‘Dolly’s’ is a twenty year old island of chic calm in a city of movement. Old sepia tea boxes line the walls, whilst white handmade paper lanterns light up the small circular tables scattered below tumblers of tea leaves. Dolly herself is there most evenings and doesn’t think twice about greeting each guest and advising them on what tea would suit that particular visit. And Dolly knows. With forty years of experience as a tea taster, the accolade of being the first female tea taster in India and the first female tea auctioneer in the world under her belt, Dolly’s knowledge is extensive.

Set up after a year in Belgium working as a tea taster, Dolly Roy was determined to change the face of tea in Kolkata from a cheap drink to a chic sip. Unlike other tea shops take away here is refused – with Dolly maintaining that tea is there to be savoured, not slurped. Each tea receives the stamp of approval from Dolly herself. In order to maintain quality she insists on blind tasting, arguing that even the top Estates cannot guarantee to provide the best tea as tea is so subject to factors outside of the Estates’ control. Nevertheless all the tea is sourced from India, with Dolly being such a firm believer that India produces the best tea in the world that she has dedicated much of her career to promoting Indian tea abroad. Yes, the tea is wonderful (and my white tea was frankly the best I’ve ever tasted) but it’s not just the beverage that makes this boutique so special. What’s different about ‘Dolly’s’ is that it is a tea shop infused with the personal touch. Her all female staff have been there from the beginning and were each trained by Dolly personally. Locals call up for advice about what tea cures which ailment. More often than not, Dolly will have known her customers for years with it becoming apparent that they are friends more than purchasers. In addition Dolly is a fountain of knowledge for local school children who gravitate towards her shop when set with the annual tea assignment. Suffice to say, this matriarch is incredibly gracious with her time.  Dolly refuses to make this successful business into a franchise – for her, the shop, like the tea, is not about quantity, but pure quality.

‘Dolly’s Tea Shop’ can be found at Unit G62, Dakshinapan Shopping Centre, 2 Gariahat Road, Kolkata

 Megan

My first week in Kolkata I was a little surprised to hear a number of elderly women (not to mention the younger ones) remarking that clubbing was their favourite pastime and that Friday night (and Saturday night and Sunday night) wouldn’t be complete without visiting a club. The crew and I have already made forays to Soho, Tantra and a number of other Kolkata night spots and  so the thought of Grandma-esque characters bopping away to R&B into the small hours was a little perturbing; I couldn’t quite connect the two concepts.

I have Husna and Rahul to thank for relieving me from the burden of my imagination, for Kolkata does in fact have 2 club scenes: 1 is not dissimilar to that of London, New York or Mumbai and is filled with the usual collection of sweaty bodies and over-priced drinks, but the 2nd is a Raj relic seemingly peculiar to Kolkata.

Kolkata is filled with erstwhile Gentlemen’s clubs, golf clubs, and the like. The Tollygunge is perhaps the most famous, but the British Club at the High Commission, the Calcutta Club, the Press Club and so on still attract as much of a crowd as they did a century ago. Gin and Tonic on the verandah is the staple diet, and if you’re after french fries, mulligatawny soup or vegetable cutlets, the clubs are the place for you. Men meet for drinks and golf whilst families enjoy the sports facilities, pony rides and playgrounds. The entertainment facilities are important but people go to see and be seen as much as anything. There is no place in Kolkata better to network and do business than over a cold beer on a Saturday night at the club.

Sophie

There is a wonderful exercise of ‘cleansing’ the body that I believe most Indians partake in each and every day. I’m even going to put myself out on a limb and say that this wonderful act happens multiple times a day. It starts with a bracing of the body, an expelling of air, and then a resonating racking and sucking from deep within the darkest cavities of the body. Sophie and I are particularly sensitive to this ‘cleansing’ as it conjures a strong reaction from deep within our own bodies. It normally comes in the form of a disgusted glance and then a gagging reflex at the finale of the cleanse; the release of the toxins in the form of a thick gloop of mucus cast onto the footpath in front of us… or out of the taxi, or at the door to the hotel. Hocking is done without subtlety, without shame and with gay abandon. Cleanse on India!

Fashion is a funny thing in India; the majority of women wear saris or salwar kameez, in a wonderful array of colours and patterns. The men on the other hand, don’t stick to traditional dress; they look to have all bought the cast-offs from John Travolta’s wardrobe on the film Saturday Night Fever. Starting at the top, we can have shirt patterns that would put Jackson Pollock’s work to shame, but quite practical as they double as a light source in the event of a power cut. In terms of fabric, lets just say if we stitched a few together, we wouldn’t need the water slippery slide again. Moving down, the tiny synched waists neatly and very clearly display the posterior, which then gives way to a gradual widening of the leg and then ultimately, billowing bell-bottoms. Add to this Freddy Mercury’s moustache, and you have the look of around 96% of Kolkata’s male population. The plan now is to convince Andrew and Sam that this is the way forward for men’s fashion, and if they resist, then I’ll exercise my rights as wardrobe matron! Ha!

On a more serious note, we went to the Sisters of Charity – ‘Home For The Sick And Dying Destitute’s’. Knowing that I was going to be doing an interview at this particular charity of Mother Teresa’s, I tried to prepare myself for the inevitable unease of going to a home like this (the name doesn’t leave a lot to the imagination) and it was just as I had imagined. It was a fairly modest building from the outside, with various adults and children lining the steps to the home. Inside, all I could link it with, was a bulging wartime hospital ward minus the gunpowder. There were low stretcher beds occupying any and every available space; row upon row of emaciated, pallid and barely there human beings. What struck me however, was how immaculately clean the room was, how many volunteers and sisters there were tending to their every need, and how selflessly they gave their time and patience. Sister Glenda, who ran the operation, greeted us, and she wasn’t quite what I was expecting. She was a formidable woman who on meeting had an air of the ‘Trunchbull’ to her. However, after having a talk to her I was simply amazed and humbled by the lengths to which one person could go to aid another, a stranger. She has devoted her life, like many other nuns, to helping those who really had no other hope or prospects in front of them. The order will go out every day and collect those sick and dying individuals from the streets and bring them back to treat them, or often just comfort them in their last hours. They can have up to 10-30 new patients each day, with up to 20 passing away. After spending an hour in the home, you realise that there really must be some greater force that compels these women to get up every day of their life to go there. I was blown away. It was an incredibly humbling experience and the taxi ride home certainly was a quiet one.

Amelia

One of the most frustrating parts of travelling through India is the fact that the country loves bureaucracy. When I’ve been sorting filming permissions for Calcutta port this is understandable – I had to be sent between three different entrances and find an imaginary permission slip to get into the building, but it’s unsurprising that administrative tasks like this might not be straightforward (even though it turned out that I didn’t need to visit the port authorities afterall, and the River Police were very helpfull). Buying a train ticket in India, however, involved being sent to three different booths in the station, and the inevitable triplicate copies of the order form. So even travelling doesn’t escape the need for endless amounts of paperwork to be created. It’s much harder to understand, however, how when trying to go swimming at a hotel  we had to go to first an office, then be sent to speak to the manager, who then gave the office people permission to accept our money. The endless need for forms and slips is part of Indian culture, and at the end of the day some frustrating procedures are all part of the experience. Needless so say that’s much increased when trying to film a documentary!

Kashmir may have seemed like paradise to Jahangir, but then again he was never fortunate enough to set foot on the hallowed soils of Glenburn. If he had, then Kashmir would certainly have appeared but a pale imitation of the divine.

To get to Glenburn requires a certain amount of determination. The road from Darjeeling is not overly long but large parts of it happen to be missing. At least one waterfall crosses the road, the tarmac is often non-existent and the hairpin bends succeeded in putting one of our 4x4s into a ditch in broad daylight. Driving the final 8km takes 45 minutes. All I can say is that the destination is worth anything the journey could possibly throw at you.

Glenburn’s factory and ‘Burra Bungalow’ boutique hotel sit atop a hill overlooking a scene that would not have disgraced Lord of the Rings. At the bottom of the valley wind two rivers whilst the surrounding bluish-green hills morph into clouds and snow-topped peaks. Kanchenjunga, one of the world’s highest mountains, tops off the view spectacularly and quite literally left the crew breathless. For once it wasn’t the altitude.

We spent 2 days filming at Glenburn and will be heading back tomorrow for a last glance before we leave Darjeeling – the place just draws you back. Throughout the shoot we had the advantage of 3 camera assistants on loan from Bombay, which was great. Datta in particular amazed us, acting as a counter balance to Marlon’s camera when it was dangled above the river and ducking and diving through the tea bushes, keeping the pickers in touch. The day was scorching hot and the terrain pretty steep, so his help was much needed.

We had a number of shots to capture at Glenburn and so we split the crew into 2 units, maximising our ability to spread out across the tea estate. Sanjay, Glenburn’s charismatic young manager, led Faroukh, Mike, Amelia and I around the factory and introduced us to the different processes involved in making tea whilst Marlon and Barry roamed the estate in search of the perfect landscapes. As you’ll see from the India photo gallery they captured more than we could ever have hoped for.

The second day of the shoot was exhausting, difficult and, for those not in front of camera, absolutely hilarious. Amelia and I joined the women in the fields and attempted to learn to pick tea. The first thing that requires a mention is the steepness of the hillside. When you are standing on one the slope of a tea estate seems pretty much vertical. There are no paths between the bushes, the ground is covered in mulch so you can’t see what you’re treading on and then, when you’re least expecting it, you fall down a drainage ditch. You must then add to your imagined mix scorching sunshine, a pair of high heels, giant baskets that you balance on your forehead, and tea bushes where all the leaves, both desirable (2 leaves and a bud) and the undesirable look exactly the same. We were destined to fail from the very beginning, dropped our baskets, fell over repeatedly, dropped our tea and generally embarassed ourselves. The pickers, camera crew and onlookers loved it. When you see the footage and think we look so silly we must be faking it, I promise we were not. It is just very, very hard and the ladies of Glenburn have picking down to an art that I will never, ever master.

Sophie