Last summer my friend Kavita and her daughter joined me in Kolkata. We did lot of touristy things. It was great being a tourist in my hometown. While taking a stroll in Kolkata’s Alipore zoo, Kavita expressed her desire to visit Shantiniketan. She being an avid reader considered Shantiniketan as some kind of holy place and wanted to go on a pilgrimage. As the Hindi saying goes “chat mangni pat beha”, immediately we bought tickets. I called up my friend “Dhee The Man” who is a professor in Shantiniketan and he booked a room in the university guest house.

The following day, we arrived in Shantiniketan. The kids were super excited. After lunch, myself and Kavita locked the kids in the room (don’t get scared, the kids insisted it to be that way, they were in no mood to take an afternoon stroll and wanted to watch TV and read books) and went for a stroll.

If you have never been to Shantiniketan then let me tell you. This place was built by Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore. Even today the place has retained the old charm. It is still a sleepy town and the best way to explore this town is by foot. All along your way you will find interesting statues , houses of famous people like Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, Ramkinkar Beg etc and beautiful murals, mosaics and a great collection of plants. During spring the Palash blossom is worth a watch. If you want to see spring fall in India then do visit Shantiniketan.

This particular tree of Champa was within the premise of our guest house and we couldn’t resist clicking it. Isn’t it lovely?