My strands of American Childhood

I was born and brought up in central Calcutta, schooled in central Calcutta, but then grew up to become the core Bengali who had an American childhood!

Originally published at https://www.quotidiantales.com on October 1, 2022.

We Bengalis know the characteristics etched in someone from central Calcutta. Her strings are pulled from both ends. She owns the traits of the more settled in old North Calcutta while desirous for the contemporary South Kolkata (Eastern Kolkata wasn’t so prominent then.)

We still lived in our hundred-year-old rented homes with 20-inch deep walls and cut-glass floors. But, we went to the top schools in the city. We religiously fed the street dogs, cats, and cows but reluctantly swapped our indoor plants for lack of water.

Though I have been a Central Calcuttan all my childhood, I was never pulled by either of these strings. I held on to an American fiber that tugged me on and off! My mom’s best neighborhood pal was an American lady! Well, I know you could expect someone of British descent at that location and era, but an American was bizarre. Further sumptuous was that she made my mom her best friend. An ordinary Hindu woman now had an American bestie!

Whatever is going on in your mind now, I can vouch that she is not a story. She was real, and she was our firm backrest! When my grandfather was ill, or when my brother had a nasty…