The fifth month into my exile and when anyone asks what I miss most about Calcutta I always say the same thing, public transport. That I miss the chaos, that I miss the rush of other bodies, that Europe is so empty that it only reflects my loneliness.
But that's only the surface of it: here's what I really miss. I miss conductor dadu calling me babu. I miss the office hours' homegoing kaku's launching into a debate when I ask what's the fastest way to get to a place from my stop. I miss the lady in the auto who was worried because she kept her son waiting and ended up telling me about her whole life when I tried to reassure her with other, faster options - how she spent her childhood in Calcutta, how she had to move to Siliguri after her marriage. What has changed and what hasn't. What she remembers and what she forgets. Roadside tea, book fairs, the sunset by the river painting a lover gold, poetry, but what I miss most are the simple things, I miss dada ticket ta korben? But it isn't even that, not really. And I laugh because I promised myself I wouldn't let my nostalgia create a nonexistent country but how do I explain Calcutta? How do I explain this love to someone who has never loved this city as I have? What words do I have for what it means to love a city, to love it so much you want to leave it over and over and over only to know the loneliness of being away from it. To know the joy of coming back.
