Finding Firpo's

My first glimpse of West Bengal was the ponds and rice paddies outside of Kolkata as the plane made its decent. The nearly full moon was reflected in the water. As we rode in the taxi on our way to the hotel (after standing in line at the pre-paid stand for 45 minutes, since the “taxis were insufficient”), I looked out at the rows of giant billboards that lined the roads, advertising soap, jewelry, insurance, and cell phone providers. They were all lit up with bright lights. It was like being in L.A. – in India.

The city seemed different from any other city I’ve been to India so far. The streets are wide. There are tidy intersections with four-way traffic and lights that people actually appear to obey. The sidewalks are wide, too, and are dotted with trees rather than shit. The air pollution smells like bus exhaust rather than sewage (yes, that’s an improvement). People sleep on these sidewalks under tattered blankets, instead of in squatter’s tents, which I suppose they aren’t allowed to build. There are no cows walking the streets, like there are in every other city and town we’ve been in.

When my grandfather arrived in Calcutta in sixty-five years ago, what did he see first? What did he think of this new place that was so completely different from his home state of Minnesota?

Grandpa was stationed in Calcutta in 1945. I don’t know all the details of his time here. If my memory serves me correctly, he had sailed from the other side of the world to clean guns for the army in India. He ended up getting sick with malaria and spent a lot of time in the hospital. It was obviously an exciting time for him, though, as he still speaks fondly of his army days.

An avid photographer who preferred to take pictures of people, he had taken a handful of photos of local landmarks. On a visit to see my relatives in Minnesota three years ago, I saw his photos for the first time. He went to retrieve the album from the sitting room, and it was clear how happy they made him: he stopped in the doorway, lost in the images of his travels. When I thought about places I wanted to go during this trip, I decided that I wanted to see the city that Grandpa had spent time in. My aunt sent me copies of his photos of Calcutta so that I could try to find the places he’d been and reproduce the pictures.

Since I had neglected to print out the photos before our flight, I drew sketches of them to carry with me. I wanted to take photos that were as close to my grandfather’s originals, so it wasn’t enough just to take a photo of the buildings he’d shot. I wanted the right angles, plus I knew having an idea of what the original buildings looked like would help me find places that didn’t exist anymore.

Firpo’s restaurant, for example. On the photo, Grandpa had written, “Best eating place.” An internet search told me that Firpo’s used to be one the more popular places for G.I. Joes and Janes to hang out, serving dishes that were familiar in the west (including beef, apparently), but that, at some point, the back portion of the building had burned down and the restaurant was never rebuilt. Further research, via the forums on IndiaMike, helped me learn that although the restaurant no longer exists, a market stands in its place, also called Firpo’s. Another similar location was the Red Cross Club, which also doesn’t exist anymore. Once again, with the help of the internet, I found a photo by another G.I., which helped me track down the street name and also that the building is near St. Andrew’s church.

Both places were actually pretty easy to find. Firpo’s Market was right where I was advised it would be, down the street from the Oberoi Grand Hotel. The building looks the way it did back in Grandpa’s day, but now it houses a row of shops aimed at tourists. Firpo’s itself is filled with individual shops and hawkers who followed us down the hall, imploring us to come look at their “pashmina” shawls.

The “Burra” Red Cross Club was also right where I thought it would be, though Danny had to help me see it amidst the trees that have grown up around it and the signs that have been hung up everywhere. He pointed out the awning that led out from the entrance, which I had drawn in my little sketch. The tree that was growing outside the club in Grandpa’s photo was now huge and joined by a number of other trees, which made it almost impossible to see the façade of the building.

He had also taken photos of the burning (crematory) ghats by the Hooghly River and one of the Jain temples located on the other side of the city. In his burning ghat photo, he managed to capture a funeral pyre burning in the foreground. Since his visit, a lot more has been built up around the area that he photographed, including a grassy memorial area and an industrial crematorium. A wall topped with barbed wire lined the street, so I couldn’t get as close as Grandpa did, but then I didn’t really want to, out of respect for the dead and their families. I did manage to photograph the same mandirs in the background as he did, as well as the billowing smoke.

We went to visit the Jain temple twice, and both days it was closed. By the second visit, I was fed up with taxi drivers who cheated us and frustrated that I couldn’t get close to the temple, and I just ended up crying in front of the guard at the gate. Danny and a little old local man convinced the guard to let us in for just a minute, so I could get my shot. Again, it wasn’t exactly the same as Grandpa’s, since I wasn’t allowed to get as close as he had been. But it was still clearly the temple he’d been to. Too bad I didn’t actually get a chance to explore it further.

He had also taken a picture of a street scene and a rooftop scene. I didn’t bother trying to find the exact street corner he’d stood on, instead just snapping current street scenes to illustrate how different things look now. I never did manage to take a rooftop photo, since I couldn’t figure out where I could get up that high to take the photo.

None of the photos I’ve posted here are the replicas of my grandfather’s pictures. I’m hoping to surprise him with a scrapbook of both of our photos, which I will post here in the future when it’s done (so check back sometime in February!).