A friend of mine has commented off chain 'A great city with so much character and all you could think of writing about is gutter.'

It made me realise I had some some positive things I wanted to say about Calcutta that I neglected to include. It's a fact that we were in the gutter, and that was where we spent almost all our time. There are slums in pretty much any city in India.
Let me just state in the blockchain. I really liked the vibe in this city. It has had a different political trajectory than most of the country (communist for a long time). Although there is A LOT of extreme poverty I would guess that the wealth inequality is less here and also any happiness index better than other cities.