Amar Shohor.

My name may not be Johnny, but I’m one heck of a walker. And I also happen to have grown up in Calcutta. South Calcutta. Since upper kindergarten I was out on the streets alone, in a sense, when I was allowed to walk to my school, directly across the street, on my own. My two strong feet have been softened to the fields of plain city grass or playing field mud from the paras of Jadavpur; hardened to sun-burnt concrete streets or roughly paved sidewalks in the hidden little boulevards in Golf Green or Jodhpur Park, and shaped upon the very contours of the empty blazing afternoon roads. And slowly as my being grew and began to discover newer and newer things and emotions, to hope for love, to bid for goals, to form opinions and nutritious bonds, I ventured alone, or was led by strangers, to discover new niches and mysterious alleyways and other creations of fantasy rendered manifest only to you by some special places you’ll remember.

I found challenge in cricket fields, scored centuries and smoked biris as reward, and roamed free and rampant over territorial land, hand in hand with childhood friends all integrated into one pulsating living ‘gang’.

I found heartwarming crushes that made me smile and feel happy for enormous stretches of time, and began to roam to Jodhpur Park, a serene and yet earthly environment for a young aroused soul. I sat there for hours and days and years, changing places and intentions for visit – from football to adda to smoking to flirting to seeking refuge from earthly fetters – but remaining ever faithful to the place.

Meanwhile as I grew, my prowling region expanded, and I discovered that dreamy wonderland – the Lakes. I went in there at first like a child discovering a new storeroom, venturing widely and forming maps. I discovered old memories of learning to swim in the Andersons’ club, and new places of captivating fancy among trees in bloom to hidden bushes or lakeside benches where the cool breeze blows. I discovered Central Calcutta, through my admission into the basketball School Team, with weekend-ly trips to WBBA’s courts to practice or play tournaments. Wandering through Maidan listlessly and exhausted, saved by the random fruit vendor who rescues you with ripe papaya, I started feeling at home in the City’s then so myriad faces. Then as I grew, and leapt into realms of internal turmoil and battle, I discovered the Ganga, with the waves like a flowing transparent sleeves on her bare white arm. I discovered the feeling, so deep rooted in every Bengali’s soul, of the rural calling, when lying in a wooden boat with a sing-along boatman. The gentle rocking of the Ganga, like your village mother would rock you to sleep in your little clay hut with thatched hay roof, and the sound of her violently feminine presence around you, send your mind into introspective quests as you battle yourself, cocooned from the world by her engulfing embrace.

As age drew on, I turned reclusive, and discovered a new religion. The temples of prayer were slowly discovered courtesy friends, strangers and sheer courage. I sat back down, happily home, with a heart more stable and a soul more calm. The lakes drew me to them, as I found my nest of solace and beauty in nooks and crannies and iron cannons. In pursuit of happiness, through the new religion, I began to become a hermit for short stretches of time and merge as one with the monsoon soaked Lakes or the sun baked Lakes.

Then with newfound inclination towards the truly technical sciences and humanities, I found myself frequently in College street, passing hours and hours in the burning sun looking for this one promised book that is oh-so-rare. I discovered coffee house, where one could sit and have coffee, while breezing through his old memory albums, to young days with cousins in Central Park or family zoo visits, or Science City or Nicco Park treats from relatives on single digit birthdays, to old English houses abandoned by all but a group of white pigeons and mice and lichen to spare.

You gaze over the books you found and weren’t strong enough to not buy, and order another coffee, as you start to feel, quite strongly, that no matter how affected any future blunder could leave you, this home of yours, your city, Calcutta, shall always hold you to her breast and calm you with her loving heartbeats and make you rise and turn to smile, as yet another day passes by.