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Last year, I undertook a day trip around the City of Joy with my Uncle. This trip showed me the city I identify with through a new lens. Well, all my life, seeing and knowing the city was the same to me until I walked, rode a circular railway better known as Chakra Rail to the centre of the city took a ferry across the river, and took a metro under the river to the top of the river. This, to me, showed that seeing and knowing are not the same.

Picture 1: Tala Station where it all began, Picture 2: Shovabazar Ahiritola Ganga Ghat where we admired the Ferries.

The journey began with a Circular train ride from the Tala station to Shovabazar Ahiritola. We took a break to admire the riverbank of Ganga and look at the ferries that undertook continuous journeys to carry people from one bank to another. Then again, hopping on the next circular train from Shovabazar Ahiritola to Prinsep Ghat, then a walk to the Ferry Ghat while stopping in between for some photos and Ganga Arti, which was a new addition to the city’s attraction to our next destination, Howrah and then from Howrah to Esplanade on India’s first Underwater metro. 

Picture 3: Shovabazar Ahiritola Station, Picture 4: Howrah Bridge from the Chakra Rail ride

Listing down the places matters because after the journey began, I slowly began to be consumed by it. On the train and accompanied by the breaks we took in between to sit on the riverbank, I began to wander into the city’s illusions that had been made on me because I had either visited the place before or had heard stories of it. This was different because I was in control of what I saw, and I know from it because I was able to make new stories and memories out of it, which, in the way, either added to the memory of what I know or slowly replaced what I know. 

Picture 4: Second Hooghly Bridge from the Chakra Rail ride, Picture 5: Ganga Arti on the River bank

The train, as a mediator, went through the invisible of the city, making it visible to the eyes of someone like me who is partaking in looking, maybe not looking per se but made to be seen through the looking. This was the first wandering out of the Illusion It was a Sunday when we went, so maybe the train ride was silent, but once on land, life was in full form. Families and maybe many more people like me were out there seeing the city take life. Little addition, as I mentioned earlier, Ganga Arti was something the city started taking part in because of the exclusion of Ganga in this city, unlike the major cities known for its Arti, for which people need this one also to join in. Then was the next Illusion that followed. Then up to the Ferry Ghat accompanied by many stories. On the Ferry up to Howrah, the city suddenly went dark, and the Howrah Bridge suddenly disappeared but once again lit up. This was accompanied by the SBI office in blue and Eastern Railway in red. The disappearing bridge and the colours painted a new identity to a side of the city I had never seen because the Ferry Ride was my first time. Instead of wandering out, I gave into the Illusions, which followed me till the Underwater Metro ride. 

Picture 6 : A foot over bridge on the path, Picture 7: SBI on the River bank

The Underwater Metro, one of its kind in India, was accompanied by my Uncle’s stories of people who took the first ride, like him, when it started last year around April. He said many people took this ride hoping to see under the river, but this was the biggest plot twist in terms of giving into the illusions by the people who took the ride when it was just a blue strip of light on the tunnel made under the river. This is when it hit me that the City of Joy, as a title given to Kolkata, is nothing but an illusion that millions of people give in, but this time, I choose to get out to give myself a new identity of the city to identify with seeing it afresh and knowing afresh as made to be seen in front of my eyes.

Picture 8: Eastern Railway on the River bank, Picture 9: The Illusion of the Howrah Bridge 

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Abhipsa Munsi is a student of Shiv Nadar University in the Department of Sociology. Beyond academics, she is an enthusiastic writer and poet, expressing her thoughts and observations through written words. She believes that her love for East Asian dramas and webtoons complements her sociological interests, offering diverse cultural perspectives.