As a family, we have grown to be a great fan of the Westin in Kolkata. The people there are the biggest reason. The facilities are great and we have gotten to know so many of the folks working there.

Chef Rubai is way up on that list of folks who know how to make your stay very enjoyable. She has cooked up some unbelievable specials for Sharmila, myself and our families over the last couple of years.

This trip was no exception either. It was great to catch up with her.

If you folks ever visit Westin in Kolkata, look her up. She will make some memorable dishes for you!

I did my last two years of high school (eleventh and twelfth grade) in a residential school. I got a chance to meet Mukti there. He was in the same hostel (dorm) as I was. I remember him as the quiet and kind person around. Always very helpful.

I had lost touch with him for a very long time till I chanced upon one of his work of art. In my house, I am not the one who understands art – yet, even to me, his work of art that I saw was outstanding. (If any one of you want, you can check out his Facebook page “Muktiram Maiti Indian Artist). I have talked to him a few times over the lat few years once I got hold of his phone number (and needless to say, his birthday).

Yesterday, I got the opportunity to catch up with him in his office in West Bengal Bangla Academy. Surrounded by piles of paperwork stacked up on a couple of tables and the traditional Kolkata office style almirahs along the wall, I sat with him to get to know his life journey.

Drawing and painting was his passion. Is his passion. Will be his passion. He has given up everything in life to pursue his one love in life. Mukti explained to me how his teachers in Ramakrishna Mission encouraged him to pursue art and how he came under the influence of some of the most well known contemporary artists in Bengal. And then branched off on his own and created his unique style. (You will see the effect of the bright colors and then the bold lines – that he has created for himself). Mixed media is his choice of medium of expression.

My wife is an artist too. But I had to hear his story to understand how we have access to so many resources that Mukti does not. For us, to buy a canvas means a simple trip to the store – hopefully with a 50% off coupon. Mukti has to “cure” the raw canvas he buys for over four to five years to season them for painting.

I saw some of his paintings. Again, I am no expert. But this guy would have reached great heights if he was in a country like where I live.

For all that, he did not care all that. He said he does not want fame or money. He just wants to fulfill what he was born for.

We came out and had a cup of coffee from a nearby shop. I had a spirited discussion with him on why I thought exposure is important. For any profession. Particularly artists.

My sense of art is limited to “drawing” my salary. But a few years back, I had decided to build a website for Sharmila to display her gallery of paintings. Which is where she refers all the galleries to today.

I am so inspired by Mukti’s art, I am thinking of opening up a website gallery for him. What do you think?

(P.S. I have attached a couple of snippets from his paintings. But you can see in his Facebook page as referred above)

No trip to Durgapur is ever complete without spending a few minutes with Utsab. He is the only son of Baisakhi – my friend from early school days. Baisakhi also has another connection with us thru my sister. She, her two twin siblings and my sister were/are all singers. In fact, they learnt music from the same teacher at one stage of their lives.

Utsab and I have the weirdest topics that we chat about. First and foremost there are the cars. He is an incredible walking and talking encyclopedia of cars. And I barely know which side of the car to sit in to drive it. But I am amazed by his understanding of the mechanical aspects of how an engine works, the differences between the types of cars and details that only an aficionado can master.

From there we move on to other topics. Last time I remember we had talked about his favorite subjects. Baisakhi was not at home. Utsab had not even gotten up from bed. He continued to lay in his bed and I sat next to him and kept chatting. This time the topic was about an animated Robotics game that he is coding. In fact he showed me some of his code on his computer.

I pulled together the sum total of programming knowledge I have gathered over the years and asked “Are there any bugs?” 🙂 It looked like a scripting language to me. He let me know that it was based on Java. This guy has just gotten into his teenage years only a couple of years back. And he is already doing computer programming. I have seen this in US too – kids coding at a very early age. At that age, if you had told me “Java”, the first thing I would have said is “motorcycle” (folks from my era will know what I am referring to).

As you can see from the picture, I responded with the one technology trick I know – how to control my phone camera from my watch. For all that, Baisakhi wrote back later saying “Utsab thinks you are a superhero”.

As long as he has no undue expectations that I will go around slaying villains wily nilly in the streets of Durgapur, I can live with it!!

Impressionable, young minds, I tell you.

I arrived in Bengal about a couple of days after the Kali Pujo festival. While in Durgapur, I realized that some of the festivities were still going on. That brought back nostalgic memories from three and a half decades back. Went to the old neighborhood I used to live in to see if any of the Pujos were still going on. I am glad I did. While all the local set ups were being brought down, the neighborhoods were all lit up still with all sorts of colorful lights. And there were those occasional firecrackers bursting from different houses which reminded me of what I used to enjoy most about Kali Pujo.

Met the only guy – about ten years my junior – who still lives in the neighborhood. And then decided to go to the house we used to live in. I got to know the folks who live there a few years back. They knew us though. Their two daughters – Antara and Sanchari – were both my mom’s students in the local elementary school. Also, I believe my brother taught Sanchari math in her high school days.

The best part was realizing that Antara was visiting her parents with her husband and her young kid – Chiku, I believe they call him (the kid, not the husband). When I walked in, while everybody was excited (at least they put a smile on), Chiku was in a cranky mood. He had just gotten up from afternoon nap and was still coming to terms with the new evening. After a few minutes of exchanging pleasantries among the adults and Chiku clinging on to his dad, I asked him “Wanna play ball?”

Something stirred in him. He stopped doing whatever it is that he was doing, kept looking at me as if he was trying to trigger some memories and then gave a smile and asked his grandmother to get him his ball. And then the two of us played together for some time. He would not even let me go. So I took him for a walk to the main road to check out all the bright lights.

Eventually, I had to take leave. You can see in the picture that he was the least interested in the picture. That was cutting in to his ball time.

Here is another of those “intersection point” stories. There was a reason Chiku remembered something when I said “Wanna play ball”. You see Antara – who moved into our neighborhood in Durgapur (in fact the same house as ours) about 25 years back – now lives in the US. Coincidentally, a few months back, she moved from North Carolina to Atlanta. In fact, her house is very close to where we live.

I had gone to visit her right after they moved in. That day too Chiku was cranky after getting up from his afternoon nap. I remember picking up a ball from the floor and asking him “Wanna play ball?”. For whatever reason, that earned his trust and we played ball for quite some time that afternoon. That is what he must have remembered!

I think his memory cells for ever will associate me with afternoon naps, crankiness and a ball!!

I guess it is my brother’s turn to teach him math now!!!