As mentioned before, we spent our last day in Mumbai. Actually this was my birthday too, and I had kind of an ambitious itinerary for it, but Felicia was game, so off we went. First, we walked about 15minutes north of our hotel to the famous Victoria Terminus, the Grand Central Station of India.
As you can see, there's old Victorian architecture aplenty. Its kind of crazy to look at.
Then we went inside to see the ridiculous masses of people. I think we were a little late for the stereotypical images of people riding on the roofs of the trains, but I've heard it does happen all the time. We got there far enough after rush hour that everyone was crammed inside the trains, at least. They say that when it gets really busy, the rail authority refers to it as "Super Dense Crush Load", meaning there are 16 people for every square meter of floor space per train. How do you breathe? Personal space is not expected in India. Everyone pushes all the time, there is no concept of a line, people cut in front all the time, and push, shove, and push again for the slightest little thing. Its very annoying.
After VT (as it is known) we kept walking "uptown", passing more interesting architecture. I have no idea what this is, but it sure looks cool.
As you walk along, this is a common sight, in Mumbai, Delhi, even Vellore. At almost every corner there is a guy with a pile of sugar cane stalks and a stand. They put the cane through a press and collect the juice, mix it with flavors, and serve. There are almost always lines for these stands, even though they are everywhere. They all use real glassware, and I did not see any hot water anywhere, so I shudder to think of what you can pick up from those glasses, much less what is in the special cane-juice additive.
Felicia and I kept walking north, past a busy fruit/veg/livestock/spice market. We thought about it for a minute, saw they wanted to charge us to go in, and decided we'd seen enough similar markets at this point, so we pushed on. We entered another "market" district of town, with some streets all jewelry, some all silk, etc etc. Along the way we ran into a temple, surrounded by flower vendors. Here's the top of it.
We kept walking, and then decided to push farther north into what is know as the "thieves bazaar" to find some old movie posters to fill a request from a friend. We asked two different shopkeepers, and while they could not identify the address we were looking for, they both said it was dangerous to go there, even in the daytime, and that we would likely be robbed. We then asked a policeman, who said the same thing. This was kind of strange, because all the guidebooks we have speak extensively about this place, but are quick to point out that the name is a misnomer, and recommend it for shopping. Well, we decided to take a cab, figuring we could always tell the guy to keep driving if we didn't like it. Our cab driver, of course, had no idea where we were going, and could only get us within 2 blocks of the place. we grabbed our stuff and hustled it down 2 alleys and there it was! The people at the shop were very nice, gave us cold Cokes, and helped get us a cab and give the driver directions when we left. A success!
So, our next stop after that was the Mahatma Gandhi museum. This is free! Based in the house he stayed at in Mumbai over 20yrs, it is small but nice.
Upstairs, there is an awesome room dedicated to telling Gandhi's life story through about 40 highly detailed dioramas! somebody put a lot of time into these things. They make the shoe boxes I used to take to school look pathetic. Here is one of the rows of dioramas.
This is an example of one of the dioramas. All the little people are very detailed dolls, with hair and detailed clothing and all kinds of cool stuff.
This one depicts his assassination. I guess you can tell I thought these were pretty cool.
This is Gandhi's bedroom. They tried to keep it the way it was when he lived here, except, i think they added a couple of portraits of him. Either that, or the guy was very narcissistic.
For lunch we went to a place that was kind of like Denny's for Indians. They even had a large Mexican food section (I passed on that). Felicia got a poori, which is like a giant balloon bread. Fun stuff!
After lunch we headed over to the side of Malabar Hill, where a very popular Hindu temple is located. Unlike many previous temples, they actually let us inside this one, we were just prohibited from taking any pictures inside. It was up a really long flight of steps, and was topped with beautiful white marble. We were amazed at how clean they have managed to keep the thing, considering how dirty many things, especially the air, in India can be.
Here is a view of part of the bottom half of the temple. Lots of people came and went to prayer as we were there.
We climbed up some steps behind the temple and wound up on the top of Malabar Hill. From a park up there you can see the bay and downtown, with Chowpatty Beach in the near distance.
Here is Felicia, enjoying a break from the heat and all the walking.
The park at the top of the hill also had a giant Old Mother Hubbard shoe, so I fought many children (seriously, this was actually quite an undertaking; nothing in India is simple) and made it to the top for this pic.
After the park, we headed down the hill to a Jain temple. I need to read some more about Jains. They seem like Hindus, but a lot more laid back and friendly.
Here is the outside of the temple.Inside, they were fine with me taking photos, and didn't even try to charge me anything (hear that, Hindus?). There were many small sparkly shrines set into the walls, with images of various gods, or incarnations of gods.
After that, we headed over to Chowpatty Beach. This is famous as the place that real Mumbaikers head to on evenings or weekends. The water is apparently disgusting, and we saw sewer pipes draining right on the beach where people were swimming, so out feet stayed dry. It was pretty amusing, though. As the sun set, lots of people were out, and lots of vendors roaming around selling peanuts, roast corn, etc, etc. Some guy walked up to me and offered me a massage. No, thank you.
Here are some of the people gathering on the beach.
Chowpatty Beach is famous for one of its foods sold at all of the stalls, called bhel puri. Well, we were getting on a plane in less than 12 hours, so I told Felicia to put me on the plane home no matter what was happening to me. Then I went to the most famous place, Gupta's, and got some. Bad idea. It hit me on the plane. That was a long, uncomfortable flight, during which I enjoyed none of the 5-star cuisine I had been looking forward to. This one was my fault. Do not eat street food in India. Seems like a no-brainer, huh?
As we sat there on the beach, eating my poison snack, there were some carnival rides next to us. We realized that there was no power out there, and these were all being run by human power. The Ferris wheel was powered by the guys standing on the structure and pushing it with their feet, faster and faster. Occasionally, one guy would grab onto a passing car and jump off, using gravity to pull the car down even faster. This was nuts.
Here is a shot of a guy hanging onto a car. The guy on the side there pushes the wheel round with his feet. I was sure I was about to witness and amputation or something. I have attached a great video of this at the end, so please check it out, its worth a look.
Well, after all this we headed back to the hotel.
Felicia had gotten a sari made, so the tailor had delivered that. Then she took me out to eat at what is probably the nicest restaurant in Mumbai, for my birthday. It was really, and the wine list was ridiculous, and it was a very sweet birthday present for which I am extremely grateful. We had a wonderful evening on the top deck of the restaurant, and weren't attacked by monkeys or anything. Then we went home, packed up, and headed for the airport at 2:30AM. You already know what happened on the flight home.
So,
five weeks in India, 3 bouts of GI distress (the last totally my fault), about 15 pounds of weight loss, 1 car wreck including a concussion with stiches on my face and likely broken ribs (they still hurt pretty bad 3 weeks out, I'm seeing someone here in the next day or two). My rotation at the CMC in Vellore was great. I saw a lot of the country, and I have decided that Vellore is without a doubt the dirtiest place in that entire country (only slightly edging out Agra, which is a hole and exists solely for its architectural points). I made new friends, saw and did new things. I survived, had a lot of fun, but man am I glad to be home. I can drink the water! No more Indian food 3 times a day! I have about 6-7 gigs of pictures that I'll be posting online, so let me know if you want a link to my gallery once it is up. I may post one or two more times, but this is the meat of it here.
Felicia and I appreciate you reading along with our adventures, and hope you have been entertained. Now all I have to do is graduate in less than a week and move! Good times.
Don't forget to check out the goofy Chowpatty beach video. If y'all want to see anything else, let me know and I'll post it! Thanks for reading!
