Khusi Departmental Stores

Khusi Departmental Stores is located on Durga Mandir Road, which is a pretty busy spot since it is close to the North Bengal Medical area in Darjeeling. You can usually see the temple from our front step. The store is filled with all sorts of things, from plastic buckets to packets of noodles and school notebooks. Because of the medical college nearby, we get a lot of students and staff members coming in to grab snacks or basic household stuff for their hostels. It gets quite chilly here in Darjeeling, so we often have the door mostly shut in the winter months. The shelves are packed tight because we try to fit in everything anyone might need in a hurry. Sometimes it is a bit cramped inside when more than three people are browsing the aisles at once. Post-Sasustranagar is a lively place to be. We spend a lot of our day unpacking cardboard boxes and checking the dates on milk packets. The rain can be heavy in this part of West Bengal, so we often have people standing under our small awning to wait out a storm. We don't have a big staff, just a couple of us who know where every single item is hidden. If someone asks for a specific brand of soap or a certain type of battery, we usually know exactly which shelf it is on without even looking. It is a simple life running a shop in the hills.