New Years!
So I had a pretty good, but quiet night. Well quiet in parts. Went out with the fam early on, and wandered around a bit. Then met up with Aditi & Munia, and established a plan for the night. First, Aditi and I want to the bar in the Park Hotel, (Park Street was a insanely jumping and crowded street on New Years). The place was called Something Else, and after a mere 500 rupee cover charge (per couple), we got in. Tables were all taken, but Aditi tough talk with waiter (and our liberally purchasing shots/drinks) got him to specially arrange a table for us. I discovered I love Indian bar snack (who thought!). We hung for a couple hours, and I was amazed by both the good service, and frustrated by the weak drinks. When the band came on, we easily pushed our way to the front, where our server would chase us and repeatedly offer us anything we wanted. He had the saddest face when we finally left. Aditi and I had rented a Maruti Van for the night (with driver), something like 1 dollar an hour. So we went and found him, and took a ride to an party she knew about. I actually managed to navigate (who's the native now!) to the party, which was in Highland Towers, Kolkatta tallest residential towers (25 or so stories). On the way, we blew a tower on the Eastern Bypass (made Aditi quite jumpy, she's pretty fun to ride in a car with). We showed up as it struck midnight, the guards at the gate were like leave the car, run run. The party was hopping (though bit of a family crowd). We had some food, saw a lot of fireworks (I got to see Aditi leap in air a bunch of times), and met some folks, including one of the hosts/Aditi's friend Joy. We took a quick tour of Joy's apt, and then headed for coffee at the Taj Bengal hotel. This place was magnificent, but the wait was so long, after 20 minutes or so, we diverted to the Hyatt (note, there was an amusing lag where we lost our car, as it was parked waaay out in the parking areas, and we didn't have the plate #, only the drivers name.) We then visited the Hyatt in Salt Lake, where we managed to kick back, have some coffee, and relax. I got dropped off first in Salt Lake (quite the adventure to find the house).
Plenty of fun, though I told Aditi she has to take me out to the club scene again at least once while we are here.
Today, off for a bit of touring the city, and maybe some book shopping!