A novel on the Baghdadi Jews of Calcutta
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Jael Silliman tells Time Out Mumbai why she decided to self-publish her novel based on the Baghdadi Jews of Calcutta
There’s a moment during my phone call with Jael Silliman when I stopped listening to what she was saying. It’s not that I had tuned out – far from it. It’s just that my head was filled with memories of the many drives back home through central Calcutta (now Kolkata) from Howrah Station that I took while I was growing up, and the sense of amazement I always felt when we passed by the synagogue. My thoughts as we drove past it were always on the same lines: We have a synagogue in Calcutta. Wow! Calcutta has a Jewish community. Wow! My hometown is the hometown of all sorts of people and so much of it is so pretty.
