If there are people who know how to lead a decadent life, they live in Kolkatta, what with the chai baggan (tea garden) culture having come to a few homes in the city. The city offers just about everything from metal works, to pottery, to smoked outfits for kids, to auction houses where you can buy decent stuff at a bargain, to the famed Bankura horses, Dhokra metal craft, and exquisite textiles. The Crawford market of Kolkatta is the Burra bazzar where you can buy any kind of embellishment for your home or your clothes, it all comes at wholesale rates. Another interesting market is the New market previously called the S S Hogg market. This is one of the fastest moving two floored markets that stocks everything from clothes to jewellery to shoes to the works. Most banks have their ATM's close to this market. In this market also lies one of the oldest and famous bakeries called Nahoums. If you were to walk towards the market from the main roads. You'd pass three movie halls -- lighthouse, new empire, globe hard to believe but true- these places still house a wooden flooring on of their floors. And this is where in the old times, balls were held. Yeah, you've got to see it for old world charm to sink in. And for the mall feel, the best effects are at city centre in Salt lake like any other mall it has it all here from a Fab India to a stationary store to homes dr to cosmetics, a lot of food and my favoruite Cookie jar where the the death by chocolate is, well, to die for! For Tangail and Baluchari silks as well as fine cotton textiles, try RMCA Basak (48 Nandi Street); Kundahar (10 Sarat Banerjee Road); Meera Bose (8 Dr Sarat Bose Road); Toontooni (10 Satyen Datta Road). For exclusive top-of-the-line silks in classic prints head to Ananda, at 13 Russell Street. Bentinck Street has many Chinese shoe shops offering good value for money. Morrison & Cottle at the corner of Chowringhee and Park streets is one of the city's oldest shoemakers. It still fashions made-to-order shoes at reasonable prices. Antiques and period-style furniture can be bought at Saroj (3A Camac Street) and Nu-Bilt (57, Park Street). Doing the rounds of Sunday auctions at Chowringhee Sales and Victor Brothers on Park Street, and Russell Exchange and Dalhousie Exchange on Russell Street may lead to the unearthing of interesting curios and furniture. Gariahat Market, Vardaan Market on Camac Street, AC Market on Shakespeare Sarani and Satyanarayan Market, off Mahatma Gandhi Road, are some of the more busy shopping districts.