Pandal hopping with young children

Morning. Seven to ten, on any day, and the festival is a completely different proposition — no queues, no crush, room to walk, and a child who can actually see something rather than a forest of legs.

The evening version of this, on Ashtami, with a four-year-old, is not a good idea and you will know that within about eleven minutes. If you must go in the evening, choose Chaturthi or Panchami, choose a residential block-organised neighbourhood, and be home by nine.

A pram is very hard work during Pujo. Pavements are uneven and often occupied by stalls, queues are managed with barricades that do not accommodate wheels, and in a crush a pram is a hazard to the child in it. A carrier or a hip is easier for anything under three.

For an older child, agree a meeting point at every pandal before you go in — a named stall, a gate, a lamp post — and repeat it. Write your phone number on their arm or put a card in their pocket. Police assistance booths are set up across the city during the five days and are the right first stop if you are separated.

Toilets are the weak point. Public facilities are limited, temporary ones are set up near big pujas and vary a great deal, and a plan that involves a restaurant or a mall in the middle of the outing is a sensible plan.

Take water and a snack you know they will eat, because the street food during Pujo is excellent and not always a good idea for a small stomach. Ear defenders are not an overreaction near the dhak and the sound systems.

Bhog on Ashtami or Navami midday is a genuinely lovely thing to do with children, and the sitting itself is calm even when the street outside is not.