Food and travel with Kanaya

  As you all know that I am vegetarian, I used to survive on corn flakes, mueslis, breads, croissants, cappuccino and some Gujarati snacks that I got from India. I was bored to have the same type of food everyday. After doing an extensive research, I found two restaurants having Indian food on their menu card. One had a buffet food system, available between 12:30pm to 3:00pm, since I had classes till 5pm, I preferred to go to the another restaurant near to the main market of Antwerp . Expecting the increased bill, I ordered a plate of jeera rice and paneer butter masala, which I found worth paying for. While talking to Charlotte, my first friend at the University and my co-researcher of "Social Food Lab"; she expressed her love for Indian food. Another team mate of Antwerp, joined  us in having the Indian cuisine at the Indo-Nepali Restaurant . We ordered some good food and to my amaze, Charlotte loved the thick saucy paste of Paneer Butter Masala, so much that she dipped i

 It was my second day at Antwerp . Fill with excitement and a competitive pressure, I walked down to the University of Antwerp . Direction to reach the class was well depicted on sign boards and A4 size posters. Since, it was the first day we were introduced to each other, introduced to my research guide, Mr.Ramon Pino. We were divided into team, and our team had a blend of Mexico, Switzerland and India, all of us belonged to different subject discipline. Since, in our selection form we shared same interest, i.e; Food; we were clubbed as a team and the research we were going to perform was on "Social Food Lab". My study at summer course and specially on the research provided me an extra angle to explore the culinary taste of Belgium. While interviewing the samples that we selected statistically, I visited few famous chocolatiers of Antwerp, like, "Neuhaus", "Leonidas" and "The Chocolate Line". After my classes were over, somewhere around 5 in the

Dear Readers! As mentioned in my previous blog, " Life at Gunj ", the population of Mccluskiegunj can be broadly classified into two categories. One that have immigrated to Gunj for earning their living by working in institutions like Don Bosco Academy, situated at Mccluskiegunj . People falling into this category faced a lot of financial crisis as their major source of earning paused. Small proprietors earned no revenue during the lockdown. The sweet shop owners had no customer as the major chunk of customers are students who stay at hostels in Gunj. Even the crows and street dogs lost their weight, since the extra food of the hostel was their source of breakfast, lunch and dinner. Since there were zero corona positive cases here, people used to go out and meet among each other on streets (By maintaining proper social distancing and wearing masks). The best part of the day since everyone of us who met on the streets used to share about the pandemic situation, about the vacci

 Covid-19 pandemic led to national lockdown and multiple government restrictions for the safety of the public. You would agree to the fact that many of us took this lockdown as an opportunity and learned new skills, and many of us would curse the period since they were forced to do things that they usually don't do. As I mentioned in my previous blog that my roots belong to Bengal. My father visited by Grandfather's place in early March. And when it was time to return back to Mccluskiegunj , to us; national lockdown was imposed all over India. He was stuck there! Weeks passed, we applied for travel passes for both West Bengal and Jharkhand to bring my Dad back to Gunj . None worked! We waited for a month, thinking some restrictions on travel may be reduced by the Government in the weeks to come. On the contrary, instead of reducing the restrictions, imposed lockdown extended for another month. And this process went on until, the unlock phases began.   Meanwhile, we continued t

The weekend was about to start and I had another two days to explore. For the first day, I thought of visiting Antwerp and for the second day, I was a little confused between visiting Amsterdam again or visiting some other city. I decided to explore Paris- City of Love. Late evening I decided to board a Euro-Bus, take a six hour journey and reach Paris. As planned, I reached Paris around 1am in the night, and guess what I had no hotel bookings done, and as I said I had no international internet connectivity on my smart phone. Found a hotel near to the bus station, but  they were full. The main agenda of visiting Paris was to visit one of the seven wonders of the world- Eiffel Tower. So, I decided to walk down the street and reach to the Eiffel. On my way, I bought some souvenirs and found out that the shop owner  hailed from Pakistan. He directed me to board the bus number 7, the last bus to Eiffel Tower. Back in my mind, I thought I have so much time, why not walk and find my way towa

  Before boarding my flight, from Birsa Munda Airport ; I did quite an extensive research upon Antwerp. Historical places, stories behind them, best chocolatiers, best ice-cream parlors and many more. Amsterdam was fun but coming to Antwerp was the main agenda, since I was a part of the summer school course at University of Antwerp. I had one day at hand to explore Antwerp, since my classes were scheduled from the next day. Early morning, I went to the nearest big Mart, picked multigrain -bread, croissant , cherry tomato and hummus dips. I picked a regular cup of coffee went to the Antwerp Station, fetched a map in French and Dutch (Oh Gosh! Maps in English were out of stock). The person standing next to the Ticket vending machine asked me to go the board next to the exit gate, and click a photo of the map printed on the board. I genuinely wanted to hug him, he made my plans execute so easy. Since Antwerp is a small city, finding my way towards Antwerp Zoo was not difficult. Being

  June 2018, it was. I was selected to be a part of Summer Course at University of Antwerp , Belgium. I was extremely proud of myself to represent India in an international level. I was excited , since I would be studying along with students of other countries, and receive first hand experience about their culture. Though I have always lived in a small little corner of Jharkhand, I had that courage and excitement of exploring Europe. Flight tickets, train tickets, hostels everything was arranged by the University. Passports, Visas and other paper work was done. And then I left to Delhi from Ranchi and then after a six hour journey, I reached Schiphol Airport . So, this was my first landing at Amsterdam. I followed the other passengers and led myself to the exit gate. Since, I had sufficient time before boarding my train, I planned to explore the happening city of Netherlands (Inspired from the Bollywood movie, Queen ).  Oh My God! Such a beautiful city, clean water, so many beautifu

  I was two when I was brought to Mccluskiegunj by my parents. Born in West Bengal , the culture of Jharkhand was entirely different for me. With passing time and me growing, this place created a special place in my heart. The serenity, the calmness, the cold breeze, misty mornings made it a little hill station. Every winter, I used to meet tourists who visited Mccluskiegunj . Bengali speaking tourists used to fill my heart with immense joy and I used to wait for this part of the year, when they use to share their experiences at Gunj . Let me introduce you to the real Mccluskiegunj . It is a small hillstation situated  70 kilometres from Ranchi , the state capital of Jharkhand. This place is well connected with roadways and railways. Mccluskiegunj has received its name from the founder of this place, Mr. E. T. Mccluskie ; an Anglo-Indian who came from Calcutta. Let me inform you with the fact, that Mccluskiegunj is the only village with Anglo Indians residing in it, though the populat

14th August, 2020; we were bit ambiguous about tomorrow's independence day celebration at the office. 3/4th of the office staffs were interested to take a day leave. Suddenly, something popped in my head and we decided to do something different this independence day. I mean since our school days, we are habituated  to have samosa  and jalebis  on Republic Day and Independence Day. One of my colleague said Kanaya, let's do something to develop a good bond and affinity toward each other, let's finds ways so that  we spent valuable time and cherish these memories over the time. What else can bring in such affinity apart from food! When shared with other colleagues, many of them agreed on this. Suddenly, like a sea wave on a high tide day, idea popped in my head and we decided to cook typical fried rice with a new variety of cottage cheese, which we later named, Paneer Maharani. Many of you might think, Pane er Maharani...ummm...? Well, so it's started with an idea of ma