Maa Kali South Indian Food Center, Beliaghata

Maa Kali South Indian Food Center at the crossing of Beliaghata Main Road and Radha Madhav Dutta Garden Lane, Joramandir, Beliaghata, Kolkata 700010 makes fabulous0 Masala Dosa (₹40), Masala Cheese Dosa, Sambar Bada (₹25 for 2 pcs), Idli (₹20 for 2 pcs), Dahi Bada, Chole Bhature (₹40 for 3 pcs), etc. 

The owner Bablu Ghosh is a very well behaved young man. 

The outlet is just about 500 mtrs from my residence. 

I have become his regular client since April 2022. 

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* Foodie Roadie India 

* Indian Roadie Drive For Food 

Ma accidentally fell on 2022-11-27 and fractured her hips

Ma accidentally fell down just outside the main gate of our house in Behala in South Kolkata on Sunday 2022-11-27 at 1 pm.  Although I was down with excruciating lower back pain since yesterday evening 18 kms away near Salt Lake Stadium, I had to rush to Behala, and that too by scooter because car is in the workshop. 

By the time I reached, my younger brother had Ma admitted to Narayan Memorial Hospital in Manton in Behala, about 1.2 kms from our house. 

X-ray has revealed that there's a hipbone fracture. 

Met the Orthopedic surgeon at 7 pm. He is expected to operate on Ma on Tuesday 2022-11-29 morning if all the preoperative test results are satisfactory. 

Ma is 83. I can only pray that she gets back on her feet at the earliest 🙏 🙏 🙏 

I have no clues about the findings in the X-ray. Attaching the images for doctors in my list of friends to tell me what exactly has happened. 

P.S: Ma had a hipbone replacement after she had slipped inside the kitchen of our house in June 2018. I have been made to understand that the fracture today is at a different place.

IR GTG 2022-11-19 @ Mio Amore, IA, Salt Lake - Shasvat Kumar, Arnab Chowdhury

Indian Roadie Shasvat Kumar had reached Kolkata on Saturday 2022-11-19 driving his Jeep Compass absolutely solo from Bangalore to Kolkata. He had put up with fellow Indian Roadie Arnab Chowdhury and had expressed desire to meet me (Deep Banerjee). Shasvat has been in Indian Roadie since October 2016. 

All three of us with our erratic work schedule were finding it difficult to meet up. 

The desire for an Indian Roadie GTG thankfully matured on Thursday 2022-11-24 evening.  We met at our very convenient Indian Roadie Adda Joint at Mio Amore, IA265, Salt Lake for a hearty chat on cars, bikes, food, road travel, issues related to electronics and electricals in modern day cars, etc, etc. The steaming cups of coffee at Sweet N Sour a stone's throw away added to the charm of the meet which continued well past 10.15 pm before we bid 'good night'. 

While I returned home, they left for authentic Chinese dinner to China Town for Shasvat to have a 'darshan' of popular food joints in Kolkata. During a telecon on 25th morning I was informed by Arnab that all the eateries in China Town had downed shutters by the time they reached there around 10.45 pm. They had to remain content with dinner ordered at home via one of the food delivery apps 😊

Visited Ma for lunch 2022-11-22 by scooter

Three different videos recorded one after the other of Ma (83 yrs young) blowing the conch shell from 5.06 pm onwards on Tuesday 2022-11-22 in my bedroom at our house in Behala, Kolkata. After blowing the conch for 10 - 12 seconds, she stopped for not more than 10 seconds and started once again for the second time and then the third time! 

She follows this ritual everyday in 3 different rooms, thrice in each of the rooms 😲 

Simply awesome 😊 

Visited Ma alone for lunch by scooter around 2 pm after returning Nikhilesh Roy's Mahindra Xylo. 

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* Visiting Ma 

Fond recollections of my visit to Delhi for ASIAD 1982, exactly 40 years ago

ASIAD 1982 (9th Asian Games 1982) was unveiled on the afternoon of 19th November 1982 at the spanking new Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. 33 Asian countries participated in 21 sports. 
It's unbelievable that on yesterday, 40 years have gone past since 1982-11-19.
It was on that date 40 years ago that Baba, Na Kaku (uncle) and me reached New Delhi from Asansol by 81Up Airconditioned Express (renamed, Purva Express years later) to spend a fortnight of fun, masti, stadium hopping and food with Sejo Kaku (another uncle of mine), kakima (auntie), cousins Tito (Arnab) who was still in school and Tina (Tulika) who was a kid then, at their place in Rajouri Garden.
Almost a month prior to the Opening Ceremony, train tickets for the onwards and return journeys were booked. Tickets for every event of the Asian Games were in huge demand. I used to stand for hours in long queues outside SBI branches in Asansol and Kolkata to procure as many games tickets as possible. My uncle who was employed with CPWD in Delhi also managed to procure quite a few tickets. Unfortunately, we couldn't procure even a single ticket for the opening and closing ceremonies 😩.
Typical of the Congressi era, tickets for the opening and closing ceremonies vanished within 2 hours of commencement of sale. Almost immediately thereafter, the same tickets were sold in the black market at a huge premium.
Before setting off for Delhi, baba got me bunches of printed maps of Delhi in B&W and colours. Computers and internet were practically alien topics in India four decades ago. I was only 20 but had mugged up the geographical location of every single stadium, the bus routes, bus terminus, names of every major road and intersections in the Capital.
Our return ticket was by 82Dn on the closing day of the games on 4th December 1982. Before returning to Asansol we managed to squeeze a day out to visit Faridabad where two more of my cousins were settled. Two STUDDS helmets with IS specifications, a black one for Baba with bubble visor and a short peak and another grey one for Na Kaku with the same configuration were bought directly from the STUDDS factory in Faridabad on that very day. I still remember that each of those helmets with accessories were procured at a princely sum of Rs.75 in November 1982.
P.S: Both helmets are still in use till date. My Na Kaku (uncle) had presented his helmet to my daughter about a decade ago. 

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* Timeless fond recollections 

* Recollections

My WB38A0582 has rolled on roads far and wide between 1991 and 2022

My LML Vespa 150 NV on 2 wheels only. 

Registered in July 1991 from Asansol (WB). 

My faithful vahan must have rolled 2.25+ lakh kms between July 1991 upto this day, viz. 2022-11-22. 

Fuel economy: 31 - 33 kmpl (within Kolkata city even after 31 years. 

Engine overhauling: Yes (a couple of times). 

Cluth plate replacement: Yes (a couple of times). 

Tyre replacement: Each of the tyres of the three wheels (including stepney) must have been changed 5 - 6 times. Most of the times (not always), MRF has been the tyre of my choice. 

Starting from Kolkata, my faithful has been to Bardhaman, Durgapur, Asansol, Barakar (WB), Chittaranian, Purulia, Bankura, Bishnupur, Bolpur, Suri, Rampurhat, Baharampore, Chakdaha, Ranaghat, Krishnanagar, Farakka, Malda, Arambagh, Kharagpur, Baripada (OD), Balasore, Baripada, Bhadrak, Cuttack, Bhubaneswar, Puri, Brahmapur (OD), Srikakulam, Vizianagram, Vizag (AP), Dhenkanal, Angul, Sambalpur, Bargarh, Bolangir (OD), Deogarh, Keonjhar, Saraipalli, Raipur (then MP, now CG), Dhanbad, Jharia, Bokaro Steel City, Dumka (then BR, now JH). I might have missed out mentioning a host of more locations. These trips on my LML Vespa were invariably solo rides undertaken mostly  between 1991 and 1996. 

All these towns are in the same place where it used to be 35 - 40 years ago. I was taught where these places are when I was in school and came to know about a lot more when I roamed around India during my years with Castrol India more than 30 years ago. 

Now you know why I don't need to stare at some moving dot or an arrow on a dumb online navigation map while driving or riding. I do stare at it if I need to move from Patparganj to Mahipalpur in Delhi or Churchgate to Oberoi Mall in Mumbai. 

Photos clicked at Madurdaha in East Kolkata on Tuesday, 2022-11-22 at around 12.30 pm.  

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* My WB38A0582 

* Castrol Made Me A Roadie

Meeting Indian Roadie Sushant Bhartia of Bangalore in Kolkata on 2022-11-09

It was a pleasure meeting fellow Indian Roadie Sushant Bhartiya of Bangalore who after completing his professional assignment in Jamshedpur made it a point to take a night train to reach Kolkata with the sole objective of meeting me before flying back to Bangalore in the evening on 9th November 2022. 

We met up for a delightful buffet lunch at Haka in City Centre 1, Salt Lake. The food was simply too too too good. 

We discussed cars, road travel, future plans for Indian Roadie and Indian Roadie eGranth, human behavior, degeneration of Kolkata and West Bengal, flight of capital/ business/ manpower from WB to other cities, the reluctance by people of WB to embrace digital payment modes, a perceivably low happiness quotient which is telltale visible in people's face, non-maintenance of existing infrastructure, the farcical No Refusal taxis, the terribly ill maintained public buses, etc, etc, etc. 

The analysis by Sushant about WB was bang on target. It was evident that a professional like him will never get carried away by barely 12 - 15 kms of gaudily painted roads and a row of skyscrapers dotting Kolkata. When he said that the sorrow, professional uncertainties and rot inside is clearly visible once one starts talking to people here in Kolkata, he was so right ☹️

Durga Puja 2022 - Maha Ashtami outing on 2022-10-03

Durga Puja 2022 - Maha Ashtami outing on 2022-10-03. 

VW Vento started self jammed outside Mio Amore, IA265, Salt Lake at 9 pm. Had to push start. Returned home after buying dinner from Tripti Fast Food Center.