"The spirit of globalization fuels the gusto with which this Hindu-Muslim city celebrates Christmas--another British legacy--with colored lights festooning the streets, decorations on sale everywhere, and life-size Santa Clauses sculpted of mud and straw in the same workshops that produce the myriad Hindu gods. On Christmas Eve, thousands of Calcuttans of different religions converge on St. Paul's, the British-built 19th-century Gothic cathedral, infusing the holiday with a cosmopolitan ambience."

-- Robert D. Kaplan, "Oh! Kolkata!" The Atlantic, April 2008.