Kalimpong Calling

A Brief on Beef

The fifth essay from my 2002 book Kalimpong Calling.

Beef-eaters in Kalimpong admit, a little regretfully, that their lot is less fortunate than their counterparts in Darjeeling. There, the aesthetics of the trade are preserved in well-cut, hygienic, portioned displays at sober stalls. Kalimpong, on the other hand, flirts with barbarism in its meat-selling quarters around the motor stand.

In Darjeeling, perhaps due to a colonial hangover, the butcher provides carefully carved portions, sometimes with proper nomenclature — rump, joint, steak. In Kalimpong, the meat succumbs to almost illiterate hackings of the bamfok. The surroundings too differ starkly. Darjeeling is urbane, functional, almost artistic: meat hanging neatly from iron hooks, evoking culinary anticipation. Kalimpong, by contrast, is slum-like, and unless your sensibilities have been dulled by habit, even the choicest cuts seem unpalatable given the filth in which they are sold.

To add insult, the soliciting that begins as soon as one sets foot on the stairs leading to the stalls is often accompanied by rampant eve-teasing, hardly what one expects in a marketplace. Though pork and buffalo vendors may share some of the same faults, it is the Kalimpong beef seller who is most suspect of sleight of hand. Many buyers recount that while the weighing seemed honest, once home, the bag revealed unpalatable lumps slipped in with the purchase.

In Darjeeling, you take your time, survey your options, and choose your cut. In Kalimpong, meat-buying feels more like a punishment for being non-vegetarian.

Yet beyond these complaints lies a deeper contrast in attitudes. In Darjeeling, the brutal act of butchery is dignified with a cosmetic appeal. In Kalimpong, it is shown in its raw grotesqueness, unvarnished and unrefined. Something could also be said of the quality. Darjeeling beef, often smuggled from Nepal, is generally better. Tea gardens there have little use for oxen; left idle, they are butchered young, their meat carved with respect. Kalimpong, meanwhile, makes do with cattle whose prime years have been spent in toil. By the time they reach the butcher, they are spent, defeated creatures, yielding flesh too far gone for any attempt at sanctification.