Ducking and diving in Bombay - get the pun?!

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Trip Start Dec 05, 2004 Previous
Entry Trip End Jan 17, 2005

  Mumbai, India
Friday, January 14, 2005

After a leisurely breakfast, I repacked and the taxi took me on another hair-raising hour's ride to Trivandrum airport. The 2 hour flight to Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay) with Jet Airways went smoothly and I got an old fashioned looking yellow and black taxi into the centre of Mumbai. This journey brought me back to crazy Indian life with a bang, still no cows in sight, there were bumper to bumper cars, taxis and motorbikes smogging up the city. Auto-rickshaws are not allowed into the centre of the city, only taxis. Here was the India that I had been expecting in Delhi but not really seen. Adults and children, selling or maimed coming up to the taxi and thrusting their wares (or damaged limbs) in my face. There were eunuchs or transvestites or transexuals - really not sure which - dressed in saris telling me they were neither man nor woman, dressed in saris. There were the young lads selling Time Out Mumbai and the man with a diseased arm. My taxi driver had a sixth finger (looked like a second thumb) which was very weird but not uncommon in India - considered by some to be blessed by the gods by having an 'extra' appendage

Colaba and the Taj Mahal hotel

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We finally found the Bentley's Guesthouse in the very touristy harbourside district of Colaba, although my driver didn't speak a word of English. I was staying with Saskia, who I had met in Kerala a few times. Her friend Kate had already left for England and Saskia was on her 5th day in Mumbai and had been to all sorts of exhibitions, films etc. The hotel was very centrally located, even if the beds in the room were rock hard and the 'bathroom' was shared - at least we had a TV. I quickly got changed and went round the corner (conveniently) to another hotel, where the top floor had been rented out for the last year by Chabad (an organisation run by the very orthodox Jewish Lubavitch community who amongst other things, host Sabbath meals for out of towners). There is a sizeable Jewish community in Mumbai, but the Israeli Rabbi from Chabad and his wife catered to visitors wanting to keep the Sabbath or in the case of the many (unreligious) Israelis who turned up for the meal - to find an environment which reminded them of home. About 30 of us turned up and as is always the case with Chabad, the Rabbi's wife miraculously conjured up without knowing how many people would be there, enough food for us all. My first taste of meat for 6 weeks was lovely and we sang songs on the rooftop overlooking Colaba harbour and a huge Hindu wedding venue in full swing below.

Lazing around at the Crawford market

The next day, I got up to watch the busy streets of Mumbai start buzzing, with street vendors, begging children, and polluting taxis. Home to 18 million people (and growing!), Mumbai is a major trading centre and an industrial hub of India. It is an island made up of Victorian architecture, Bollywood glamour, a huge red-light district, endless bazaars, beaches, and nestled amongst the hugely wealthy few in Mumbai are the massive ever growing slums. Mumbai is literally choked with rural migrants hoping for a better life in the city and only finding misery. There are so many people living on the streets - hundreds of thousands, whole families - how can you solve the magnitude of this situation?

Saskia showed me the few sights of Colaba - the shopping area, the Taj Mahal Hotel (one of the most expensive hotels in India and a Mumbai landmark built by the Tata family at the turn of the 20th century when Mr Tata was refused entry to the British owned hotels) and the Gateway of India facing the harbour. We browsed in the bookshop of the Taj Mahal Hotel and gasped at the designer shops inside this vast hotel, with their jewel encrusted saris for sale. Then we got a taxi over to Crawford Market, a Victorian designed building where Rudyard Kipling was born. We visited the fruit and veg sellers and the spice and Indian sweet stalls, whilst being tugged at the whole time by women begging with their babies - so hard to see and know how to deal with it too

Meditating Shiva at Elephanta caves

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In the afternoon, we treated ourselves (due to the timely article in Time Out on the best hairdressers in the city) to some pampering at a top salon in Colaba. 'Touch of Joy' brought joy to my hair and the next day to my nails, toenails and my face for a very reasonable amount! It was interesting to see how the other half lived with affluent Mumbai citizens (especially men) chatting on their mobiles, whilst a man gave them a pedicure and a woman manicured their hands - they didn't talk to their beauticians and didn't even say thank you - talk about upper class!!!! That night we ate in a great Indian restaurant - as always the best places are where their are no tourists and tons of Indians!

My last day in India started with a massive paper masala dosa breakfast and after Saskia had been to church (she's reading Gandhi's autobiography where he says that everyone should have some type of religion!), we caught a boat over to Elephanta Island, 10km off the coast. The caves on this island host rock cut temples dating back to the 5th century CE and have impressive statues cut out of the rock of Shiva and Parvathi. We were especially impressed with the statue of Shiva meditating, it was mesmerising. We walked quickly back to the boat area, past the tacky stalls and the menacing clusters of vicious monkeys

My last breakfast - a huge masala dosa

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After the rest of my beauty treatments and a bit more shopping, we spent the rest of the evening listening outside an enclosure by the Gateway of India monument to a jazz concert featuring Al Jarreau and Ravi Coltrane, and also hanging out in the busy lobby of the Taj Mahal Hotel trying to look part of the furniture! Before I knew it, it was time to get my taxi to the airport. The journey there was nail biting and also very sad, as the streets the whole way were lined with sleeping huddles on the pavement, you couldn't work out what was sacks of rubbish and what was human being on the side of the dual carriage ways - it's tragic.

Check-in was a bit of a hassle and duty free was pitiful. Then I was back in the familiar environment of British Airways plane and the 10 hour flight back to cold Blighty!

Now that I'm back I'm missing the friendly, kind, smiling warmth of the Indian people, the endless beeping of the millions of cars, the colourful attire of the people and sweet, well behaved kids, and the smells of incense, sewers and spices. India is a wonderful place, with lots of things going for it. Even its traditional lifestyle with the inequalities for women etc. have some merit as the restrictions of living only in the family unit is conversely what makes Indian people so respectful and nice to be around. Obviously there are many people who are rejected by society in India and their life is tougher than most. Even in the severe poverty, India still retains an upbeat vivacity which despite all our material wealth in the West, we seem unable to capture - we really don't realise how lucky we are, although some might say after visiting India, that the Indians are the lucky ones! There are lots of opportunities emerging in India as industry grows especially in the tertiary sector - I hope and pray that the disparity of the poor and the very wealthy levels out in the coming decades.

Someone once said to me "If you want to see life and shit, go to India" - they were right and I'll be back here soon!

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