Discoveries!

A dear friend and her daughter were visiting us. We managed to visit some places in Kolkata that I had not seen in my almost six years stay here, including the Mallick Ghat flower bazaar. (I had not heard of this either). We were quite fascinated by this large area on the banks of the Hooghly, where there were loads and loads of flowers, especially marigolds, in what seemed like a huge sabzi mandi, except that there were beautiful flowers instead of vegetables. An ancient looking building opening onto the river was found to be a ladies bathing ghat. I could imagine ladies from wealthy families being brought here in their carriages, attended to by maidservants while they took a dip in the river and came back into the domed, tiled and partitioned building to change their dripping clothes before they rode off again in their vehicles. Despite the heat, the humidity and the squishy leaves and debris underfoot, it was a great place to visit.