Kothari

Up in Belghoria, at 3 Basudevpur Main Road, that’s where Kothari is located. Kolkata has a certain pace, and this neighborhood is no different. The building is right on the main road, so you hear the buses and the rickshaws all day long. It’s a bit of an old structure. The walls have that yellow paint that’s common in Bengal. Inside, we have a few heavy wooden desks and some steel almirahs for keeping our files safe. We’ve been at this spot for quite a while. Most of us have been working together for years. We take our lunch breaks seriously and usually talk about local news or football. The office isn't very big. It can get cramped when we have a lot of deliveries or paperwork coming in. There’s a ceiling fan that wobbles a bit on high speed. We keep a calendar on the wall with gods on it. It’s a very traditional setup. No fancy carpets or glass partitions here. We just handle the day-to-day business. The walk from the station is short, which is good. Sometimes it floods a bit on the road when the monsoon is heavy, but we still make it in. It’s a steady place to work, and we like being part of the Belghoria community. There’s a tea shop right downstairs where we get our morning biscuits. The owner knows us by name. It’s just a normal way to earn a living in this part of the city. We have some plants in pots near the window.