Day 53 (Kolkata)

So today I finally lost my mind and track of time and locations. I thought we were on the way to Maldah when in fact we were on the way to Kolkata for a one nighter before flying to Bangkok. I think the copious amounts of rum drunk last night had rotted my memory too much :)

We had a long drive day with pretty much everyone suffering from hangover or tiredness from the birthday celebrations the night before so the sleeper bus was such a blessing. I got on, selected a bottom bunk in the middle of the bus and tucked myself into my sleeping bag for pretty much the whole day.

I was surprised by how bustling Kolkata was as we pulled in as I had a preconception about what it would be like. I expected it to be really dirty, smelly, overcrowded and broken down, but the side of the city we saw was nothing like that. Our hotel seemed to be in a pretty good location with a main shopping street less than 5 minutes walk away that had a McDonalds that helped to feed all the hangovers. After we'd eaten we wandered around a little bit and found a net cafe to check in with things back home, before visiting a chemist to find some ointment for one of the girls. Trying to explain what we were looking for to the indian pharmacist was one of the funniest moments in the past few weeks...hilarious with the miming and pointing and slow speech.

For photos from Kolkata click here.