I have worked my way down from air conditioning to an open-air grate.

Room without a view

My Kolkata adventures started at Hotel Ashreen (720 rupees / $19 a night) — queen size bed, walls with trim, newly tiled floor, and no one to talk to.

Next came the Sunflower Hotel – no AC, nice rooftop garden, simple and clean. But still, the silence of my walls.

And now? I have arrived at the Paragon Hotel — which is definitely not a paragon of aesthetics. Ugly lime green walls, old old matresses, and a ceiling-level grate where a closeable window could be. Oh, and a price tag of just 320 rupees a night ($8.50) — and that’s the most expensive room in the house.

It is disorienting staying at a backpacker’s lodge. But it is much less disorienting than being mostly alone for a week in a metropolitan city. The Paragon Hotel may be a rundown heap, but it also offers cheap plastic tables and a dirty courtyard. That’s all you need to bring together the backpackers’ late night version of the G-8 Summit.

Backpacker culture is a wierd thing. It is its own bubble, and it puts a wall between you and the actual world you are visiting. Some folks conduct their entire travels within this bubble, while others just take a dip from time to time when they are craving some company. Now that my Hindi is getting better, I can converse with the many people who walk through Kolkata’s streets. But none of that is relevant to the backpacker’s den.

Still, it was an easy choice to trade hotel sterility for ramshackle sociability. And I can accept the dirty hallways and the drum circle of East Asian hippies who play in the background. I’m just happy to be talking with people — including this young Wisconsin electrician who is sharing his reasons for hitting the road.